Good afternoon, everyone.

My name is Mitch Kennedy.

I'm the deputy city manager for the city, and I just want to give the order of the program today.

We're going to open with a statement from Mayor Jerome Rice Jr.

Followed by remarks from some voices from our community members in order.

Tammy Jordan Principal Mary H.

Wright Elementary, Robert Reader, Forest Park Neighborhood Association, Avery Jefferson, Youth Spartrook High School, Kim Brown, Parks and Rec, Special Events Director, Reverend Dr.

M.

Keith McDaniel Senior, Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church, and Deputy Chief Jennifer Kendall.

I'm sorry, point of clarity, order of Sheriff Jeff Stevens, Sponburgh County, Chair's Department, followed by Deputy Chief Jennifer Kendall, Spongebob Police Department, close with a prayer by Bishop Charles J.J.

Jackson III.

Mayor.

Thank you, Mitch.

And thanks everyone for being here this afternoon.

I really do appreciate the attendance.

I really appreciate the community standing as one.

So as we gather here today, I want to say thank you again for being here.

Not just in times of celebration, but in moments when we're hurting, when we're grieving, when we're ready for change.

Your life matter, your future matter.

You belong here and you matter.

We all have a role to play.

Parents keep leading and loving our children, teachers and leaders.

Keep planting seeds of knowledge and hope.

Pastors, keep planting seeds of hope.

Law enforcement, build trust, not fear, with those you serve and neighbors.

Let's look out for one another like family, not strangers.

To those who feel trapped in violence or anger, I want you to know there's a better way.

And there are people who care about you.

We care.

I care.

We need you alive.

We need you to be a part of the solution.

We are more than your circumstances.

You are somebody.

Spartanburg, we are strong when we stand together.

So just take a moment and look around.

As I see your elected officials, thank you for coming.

As I see the solicitor's office, thank you for coming.

As I see community members, thank you for coming.

But it can't stop here.

At this podium, at the center, at this moment.

It has to move on forward.

We have to move it forward.

Elected officials have to move it forward.

Thank you, representative for being here, Rosna Myers.

Thank you, County Councilman Moldia Abyssale.

Thank you to the City of Spartanburg Council.

Thank you.

This means something to us, folks.

It means something.

So today we're just standing at a unified front, just to have a call to this community, to our community, to our home.

We love our young people.

We care for our young people, and we're here to stand for our young people.

So now we will have Miss Tammy Jordan, principal at Mary Wright Elementary School come forward.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Rice.

Good afternoon.

On behalf of our school, I want to extend our deepest condolences to the families, friends, and neighbors affected by these tragic events.

As principal of Mary Wright, I want to speak not just as an educator, but as someone who grew up in this community.

My mom still resides in this community.

I am someone who loves it deeply and I'm concerned for its future.

Recently, we've seen a rise in violence in our city.

But this isn't just about the headlines or the numbers.

It's about our children.

It's about the fear they carry.

It's about the innocent lives that were lost.

It's about the families who no longer feel safe.

I look into the faces of our students, some as young as four, who are already learning how to navigate fear.

They come to school eager to learn to feel safe and to be seen.

Our schools are providing structure, support, and care, but we can't do this alone.

This moment calls for all of us, parents, neighbors, city leaders, law enforcement, and local organizations to come together with one goal in mind, and that is let's protect our children.

Thank you so much for inviting me, Mayor Rice, and thank all of you who have come out today to make a difference in the lives of our children.

I appreciate you so much.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Here representing not just only Forest Park, but all the neighborhoods that surround this community, this city.

We are here today that we are calling out because there is a rise on our young kids.

They are the future.

But if we don't come together as community leaders, our law enforcement, our schools, our ministers, and collective, all of us to come up with a situation and a solution that we can curb what's happening in this community in this city today.

As the principal just said, our young kids, I have a track team.

Been having a track team for over 30 years.

They are worried about their lives, about being in the community, doing things and participating because their friends are trying to recruit them.

So what we need to do as a body is that we have the community centers.

We need to sit down with our leaders and get these community centers with programs that can curve the atmosphere that's surrounding our young youth.

The communities need to come together, all the neighborhood associations come together, have a gathering with the youth in your community.

Sit down, talk to them, to see what's on their mind.

Because if you don't invite them to the table, then we're going to have a problem later on as they mature and grow.

It's not only just the officers and the police department, Chief Thompson and all of them.

It takes all of us as a collaborate partner to come up with ideas and solutions, and we need to sit down, and both and everybody need to be transparent.

The police department, the community, the uh centers, everybody that is involved.

We need to sit down, talk, come up with an idea on what we can do to curb and monitor these situations that's having now.

That was not cause for, it shouldn't happen.

And that's why we need to come together.

And don't let this gathering right here be a hoorah, and we all go home and say we had a good time today.

This is where it begins.

This is where it starts.

This is where we need to get out and do what we need to do and bring our council mayor, our uh city councilman, the chief to the community, to a meeting.

I would like to see a board set up out of this with the communities and leaders and ministers so that we can come up with a situation and a solution to bring our communities and to save our kids because they are the future.

Thank you very much.

God bless.

My name is Avery Jefferson, and I'm a student at Spartanburg High School.

I want to start off by acknowledging my goal here, and that goal is to be completely transparent with all of you.

I don't stand here today just to say a few words and just to get it over with.

However, I am here to speak on what needs to be heard, as well as to challenge all of your perspectives.

Initially, I struggled to bring myself here today.

My response to this opportunity was fear.

I was scared.

I was scared that I pushed the wrong buttons or maybe push the perfect ones just not hard enough.

Strangely enough, that feeling was not uncommon.

I recognized it.

I recognize it because it has become a pattern to myself and my peers.

It seems that all we know today is fear.

As a society, we have shifted so far from what is important.

Uplifting one another has suddenly become embarrassing.

Choosing to be set apart has become every bit of problematic.

I believe that is the reason you and I stand here today.

The world no longer strives to redirect the youth.

Instead, we spend our time labeling them and reminding them of where they went wrong.

We spend our energy glorifying a set narrative, a narrative that our generation is lost, violent, hyperactive, without morals.

In this, we often forget that there is a route to every vice.

There is a beginning to every pattern.

And in the midst of chaos, we have refused to pause, take a breath, and unpack what needs to be addressed, especially with young people.

We have refused to celebrate success just as much as we glorify misfortune.

Again, especially with young men and women.

The truth of the matter is those sort of cycles produce the reality we see today.

Where many young men gain their confidence and respect through the pulling of a trigger, and where many young women cultivate their self-esteem through the words of everyone but herself.

As a teenager, it's normal and expect it to feel to feel new things or to feel things that are more familiar.

However, what we feel today is different.

It isn't normal and it shouldn't be normalized.

We feel for our classmates, friends, and peers differently because we have to.

We have to, because that's unfortunate as it is, you truly never know.

You never know what your what load your friend carries.

You never know what thoughts your lab partner doesn't discuss, and you never know what realities your hallway buddy is forced to face.

The truth is the world is not always generous.

And it can be hard to receive help without it being an exchange.

The harsh reality is that these pressures often manifest themselves into the violence we see every single day.

It's scary, but it's real.

And it seems that a lot of teams, including myself, are becoming desensitized to it.

Simply because it's become a culture.

It's not, it's become normal.

But I don't believe it has to be.

So with that, I challenge you to feel.

But I'm not asking you to feel the way you've always felt.

I want you to feel differently.

I want you to feel for your office buddy.

I want you to feel for your favorite coffee shop, Barisa.

I want you to feel for the person in front of you while shopping at your local supermarket.

It's inevitable to feel.

So let's make it worth our while.

Thank you.

My goodness, Avery.

Um, I think if there's anything that we take away from today, uh, it's I believe is this is where we start.

Um we have to hear that youth voice.

Um, and without it, we're almost going in circles.

And so I certainly appreciate you overcoming those fears to kind of set us level as we move forward.

My name is Ken Brown.

I'm the Parks and Recreation Special Events Director with the City of Spark Murray, um, and certainly want to thank the mayor for the opportunity to speak on behalf of not only my agency, but as I speak today, you'll hear me use the word we a lot, and that we refers to City of Spark Murphy Parks and Recreation, our community centers, but it also refers to the number of other youth serving organizations that we work with on a day-to-day basis.

Um, those who have a mission to elevate and support our youth through adolescence, uh, many of whom were here on just last night, helping to build that capacity.

Some of my greatest rewards in my 19-year career with the city have to be the relationships that we've been able to build with our promised youth as we follow them through life.

Um we've attended college graduations, open houses for small businesses, military promotion ceremonies, weddings, um, artistic performances, but we've also sat in hospital rooms with families, grieving.

We've also made remarks at funerals to youth who were who lost their lives due to violence.

There are current programming uh options here at our community centers.

Um we uh take it as a challenge.

We have two very we are led by two very um passionate staff members, uh Jasmine and Patan, who is here, who is our youth development coordinator, and Juan that Teeks Holmes, who is our community support coordinator, um, and they lead us in our youth programming.

Uh, just this past summer, I think our final numbers were about 150 youth that we were able to connect with.

Uh but as I was thinking and writing some notes on last night, I thought about how many young people, how many more young people could we have uh contact with those young people who have yet to step foot into our community centers, uh, those young people who whose parents haven't yet entrusted us with their kids.

Um so I want to reaffirm our commitment not only to our current programming uh but to our ability to pivot and grow as needed.

We have a lot to learn, not only from Avery, uh, but from those other students.

We can certainly lead in the spaces that we're expertise in, but we also have to step back and really support and follow in those spaces where we don't have that.

Uh I invite you to listen to a TED talk by um Jeffrey Brown.

Um he's a uh I think he's still a minister uh in the Boston area.

Um, but he does a TED talk on some of the things that happened in that in those areas that help change the culture and in turn reduce some of the violence in that area several years ago.

Um he stresses as we do, um, strong community part components.

Um but one thing that I think we all feel and should understand uh is that anything that is done for youth without them is done to them.

Uh so we always want to keep that in mind that if they are not in the mix of of these conversations, and we're not led by students like Avery and students who have no desire to even be in our facilities.

Um, we're almost running in circles.

Um I believe that at the end of the day, just being alive should not be the goal of our teenagers.

Um I believe that we in Spartan, we have currently what we need to fix what ails us.

I think we just need to get it coordinated together, make sure that all the components are there and that we're listening to our young people.

We make that commitment to everyone here, um, to every young person who has yet to see us, uh, to every parent who has a challenge with a young person.

Um, and we just ask that you join us in that.

Thank you.

Okay.

Keith McDaniel, pastor of Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church and moderator of the Spartanburg County Baptist Association, a fellowship of 32 churches.

Today is the third-year anniversary of my own son's murder, Saviour, and my youngest son uh was murdered three years ago today, and so I understand uh the pain of parents uh burying children.

Scripture reminds us that children are our heritage as recorded in Psalm 127 in verse 3.

It is our sacred duty as a community to protect, to nurture, to value every human life.

As a collective community, we express our deep sorrow, our anguish, and our outrage due to the violence that plagues our community.

The recent killings of seven-month Zamir Smith, Rahim Kelly, and so many others in recent months has left this community saddened and indeed broken.

As a consequence, we denounce acts of violence in the strongest possible terms.

We must refuse to become numb to the deaths of our children.

Children are not supposed to die before they learn how to walk.

We refuse to normalize grief as the price that we should pay for silence and inaction.

We refuse to sit while our babies die in the arms of those that love them.

This is not how we are supposed to live.

As a consequence, death cannot continue to be the only option to resolve matters and issues in our communities.

Our churches and neighborhoods were never meant to be memorials.

Pastors are tired of burying sons who never got a chance to become fathers or daughters whose only crime is being guilty of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Our fellowship of churches are heartbroken.

We lift our voices together in grief to express this deep mourning and agony that we all feel because we hear the cries of innocent blood in our community.

It is not just the family's loss, it's the community's loss.

It's our collective grief.

It was once said that it takes a village to raise a child.

Now it takes a village to keep them alive.

And as a consequence, we call our law enforcement and our city officials to prioritize these investigations to ensure that justice is swift and that it is sure.

We call civic leaders to declare a state of emergency on gun violence and support meaningful and community-based prevention.

We call on churches, mosques, and temples, and other houses of worship to move beyond their pulpits and sacred days and into the streets where hope and help and healing is needed.

We call on young people to choose life.

These streets have no love and no loyalty.

They will kill and hurt anybody, just to prove a point.

Your life matters, your future matters.

We call on the community collectively to speak out if you know something, say something.

Because we owe these families more than prayers and thoughts and flowers, we owe them change.

And if you are not outraged, it is because you are not paying attention.

We will, however, not let fear right our future, nor let violence steal our voice.

We will keep speaking life.

We will continue to walk in power.

Spartanberg, we can get through this together.

Weeping may endure for a night.

Joy works the first shift.

It promises to come in the morning.

By God's grace, the morning will come.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, y'all.

My name is Jeff Stevens.

I'm a sheriff of Swarmer County.

I wanted to come here today, and I'm here with a heavy heart.

And every uh bullet flies through a house or home or a car, and it strikes somebody and kills hope.

And without hope, we have nothing.

These are not random acts of mission.

These are deliberate, violent acts in this community.

Which, by the way, I grew up here, went to District 7 school.

Been here all my life, except for temporary summaries.

They're often connected to a beef between groups, retaliations, and at the end of the day, senseless disputes.

And it plays out with deadly consequences.

We're seeing a growing culture that glorifies retaliation over resolution.

And a fear in the community that prevents people from coming forward.

We will not stop the violence without your trust.

Your hell, community, and your voice.

If you're a parent, a grandparent, an older brother or sister, please, please, please talk to your little one tonight.

Ask them who they're with, where they're going.

Be aware of who the friends are.

And if any beefs, they need to carry somebody up.

That's important to me.

If you need help, reach out.

I commit to you, we'll stand with you.

This type of crime is not old.

It's been it first happened in the 1920s during the prohibition years.

They shoot up all city bots.

I thought it was gone forever until the 80s.

Migrated across this country from California primarily.

That's how they settle disputes out there.

They shoot each other.

And we cannot, we cannot do that here.

The position that we're in as law enforcement officials.

It is not a pleasant task to deliver bad news to a mother, a father, a grandmother, that their child was killed in a random act of violence.

We have another side to our strategies.

We are right now formulating some operations.

Um and I'm gonna talk more about that probably next week.

So citizens, witnesses, we have activated on our website at Spartanburg Countysheriff.org a way to submit information.

It's anonymous.

If you know anything, whether you think is important or not, it's on our Facebook page.

Everybody does Facebook now.

Go to Facebook, hit that, and just tell us in a brief summary what you want to tell us.

The important things are remember the five W's, who, what, when, where, why, if you know, and submit that information to us.

That's a real problem we've encountered in these in these uh shootings.

So I pray every day for guidance.

We need guidance.

The other side is I have to enforce the law.

I swear I am sworn to enforce the law, and we're going to enforce the law.

We're going to enforce it fair, we're going to enforce it legally, but we're going to enforce the law.

And send a message to this community, not only the city, but the county, because they know no jurisdictional bounds.

These people don't.

They know none.

So in closing, I would say, parents talk your children.

Please talk your children.

And I remember the Facebook.

But it might be exactly what we need.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you, Sheriff.

My name is Jennifer Kendall, and I'm the deputy chief of police for the City of Spartanburg Police Department.

First of all, thank you all for believing it was important enough for you to be here.

That says the law.

We grieve with the bit with the family of not only Baby Smith, but with every family that has been impacted and has lost a loved one due to the callousness and unconscionable acts of others.

The Spartanburg Police Department and I know Sheriff Stevens and his team are committed to identifying and arresting those individuals who have perpetrated tragic and senseless acts of violence throughout our community.

I am deeply grateful to our officers who respond to and our investigative teams who participate in investigating these senseless acts as well as our support teams.

But with all the successes of this community, we still have many challenges and we have a lot of work ahead of us.

For the sake of our children, our future, our community, we cannot shy away from those challenges.

And we must face them together, head on, and collectively as a community.

Public safety must be our highest priority and our collective solemn responsibility.

The City of Spartanburg Police Department will continue to work together to stop gun violence in our city and county and to assist us in solving the crimes that have been committed throughout our community.

Law enforcement throughout our city and county are dedicated to addressing this issue.

But we know and we recognize that we cannot do it alone.

We must have the commitment, cooperation, assistance, collaboration, and resolve of every citizen, every leader, and every organization that exists to enhance the lives of others.

Some might wonder what can I do.

But I challenge everyone here and in this community to embrace the philosophy that we all have a duty to foster change.

And we can solve and prevent crime with everyone's engagement and involvement.

So share information and cooperate with the law enforcement professionals who are working tirelessly to serve you.

Continued silence and failing to engage is not an option.

And it sends the message that you are enabler and protectors of those who commit these violent crimes.

So in closing today, I implore you, help us identify and hold those accountable who have and are causing harm and destruction to the lives of others.

Thank you.

Let us pray.

Father, it is in the name of Jesus that we come to you now, asking you, Master, to give us strength.

Give us strength, Father, to help this family as they process death, as they deal with this tragic incident that has happened.

We pray, Father, for your comfort and for your consolation.

We pray not only for the family, Master, but we pray for this community.

Because as the family mourns, we mourn as well.

As they hurt, Father, we hurt as well.

So, Father, we ask that you would give us strength.

Give us the strength to come together as one to collaborate, Father, that we might hear from each other, from the children of our communities, and Father, that we might work together on a solution.

Father, help us to be involved and not be afraid to stand against every act of violence everywhere.

Father, we thank you for those who are already on the front line.

Our city and county law enforcement officers, those who work, oh God, with the city, our mayor, Father, we thank you for the law enforcement officers who have sacrificed their lives in order to work, God, hard to make our community, our city a better place.

We thank you for the volunteers.

We thank you for our legislators.

We thank you, Master, for every person who has worked diligently, God, in the past and in the present.

That we might, oh Father, work out solutions and problems that we can implement them to make a change in this city.

Father, we bless you today, Master, for those who have come, those who thought it not robbery to bring their time here, God, that they might stand against what has happened in this community.

Master, we ask, oh God, for your diligence and your strength, oh God, to yet be with us as we come together, Father.

Let it not be about us, but about what's best for the city.

Father, help us to die to our own personal issues, our racism, our sexism, our hatred, oh God, whatever we harbor in our hearts that would keep us from standing together as one.

Father, we ask that you will help us, Father, that we might love the way you have called us to love.

You said in your word that you loved us so much that you gave us your only begotten Son.

And Father, we stand on your word.

You said in your word that greater love have no man than this, that he will lay down his life for his friend.

And Father, we stand on your word.

You reminded us in your word, Father, that a man that knoweth not God knoweth not love, for God is love.

And Father, we thank you that when love abounds, that love is able to cover a multitude of sins.

We thank you that when love abounds, that God, we can stand together as one and work the way that you have called us to work.

And Father, we remember not only this family, but every person.

As Dr.

McDaniel reminded us that there are others who are yet mourning, who are yet remembering, oh God, the loss, the transition of their family member.

Help them as they remember, even as they mourn.

Help them to get through this, oh God.

And Father, we thank you because we yet trust in your word.

Our faith yet stands resilient, God.

We trust in your word.

We don't know when nor where, but God, we believe that something good is going to come out of this.

We believe that better days are ahead.

We believe, God, things will change.

So Father, help us to make this future a better future.

And Father, we love you and we thank you.

We adore you and we celebrate you.

We worship you, oh God.

We esteem and extol you, God, because you deserve the praise and the honor.

Father, we thank you for this wonderful day.

We thank you for the leadership that we have here in the city.

And God, let us continue to work together, not against one another, but help us to stand together as one.

And Father, we thank you in advance for the outcome.

In the name that is above all names, in the only name I know, in Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

At this time, I want to thank those that participated in the program to our law enforcement community, to our elected officials, but most importantly, to the Sparburg community.

Thank uh thank you.

But I also encourage you to continue to challenge us as we can only do this together to the media.

We're not gonna take questions for the podium, but I'm certain that those behind me will be happy to take your questions.

Thank you all for coming.