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Congressman
Elijah E. Cummings |
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Congressman
Elijah E. Cummings |
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(9/23/00 Baltimore AFRO-American Newspaper)
by Congressman Elijah E. Cummings
On September 14, actor and director Charles "Roc" Dutton and an expert panel joined me in Washington to discuss the importance of expanded drug treatment, mental health services and job-training within our evolving national anti-drug strategy. During the forum, Mr. Dutton spoke eloquently about his experience directing The Corner, the HBO mini-series about life in one of Baltimore's most drug-infested neighborhoods.
One day, while Mr. Dutton's film crew was on location in West Baltimore, they heard the unmistakable sound of gun fire. The police officers who were providing security for the film-makers raced off to the crime scene. When they returned twenty minutes later, they reported that a young man was lying dead in a nearby alley.
Two young boys from the neighborhood overheard the police report, and one suggested that they run down the street to see the dead man. "No," the other replied. "We see that sh-t every day. Let's stay and watch them make the movie . . . ."
Mr. Dutton's account of real life on the corner reveals two of the most chilling side-effects of our national drug epidemic. At the same time that too many young people are dying or living destroyed lives, younger children are becoming so hardened by the carnage that they may never learn the joy of being alive.
That is why we must teach them by our actions, even more than by our words that life has value.
We can begin to save young lives by understanding that it is within our power to restore the local economies and social fabric of even our most drug-devastated neighborhoods. We need only to apply the necessary will, commitment and resources to the task.
I do not suggest that obtaining the financial resources needed to rebuild our communities will be achieved without a struggle. To the contrary, if we are to formulate and fund a truly comprehensive anti-drug strategy, hard political battles lie ahead.
I am convinced, however, that we can prevail in those Washington and Annapolis funding debates because the drug crisis is not limited to poor African Americans hanging out on the nation's urban street corners. Americans everywhere now realize that drugs are everyone's problem.
In Baltimore, a city with one of the worst drug epidemics in the entire nation, we are witnessing a growing grass roots movement that is leading the way toward reversing that appalling distinction.
Within the Historic East Baltimore Community Action Coalition, the Edmondson Community Organization and Project Garrison, private citizens are combining their personal commitment and their understanding of local drug problems with financial assistance from the U.S. Justice Department's "weed and seed" program and private foundation backing.
As a result, these communities are now better able to reclaim their neighbors from drug addiction, even as they reclaim their streets from the drug dealers. They understand, as Charles Dutton observed during our Washington forum, that "if we want to protect our children, we must do it ourselves."
Theirs is a life-affirming insight. The survival of our families is a compelling argument that encourages each of us to reach out and help others.
In the central city and suburbs alike, wide-spread drug addiction is directly related to social disintegration. When individuals and families become isolated from each other, their lack of connection provides fruitful territory for those who would prey upon the weak.
In Baltimore, weakened commitment to our communities during the last two decades has produced a city that now contains 55,000 illicit drug users, a city where over eighty percent of new HIV/AIDS cases are related to drug abuse.
When local communities come together to affirm life, however, they are far stronger than those who would prey upon them. That is the lesson that committed local leaders in Historic East Baltimore, Edmondson, Project Garrison and other neighborhood organizations throughout the City are teaching us.
They are showing their children that life is far more interesting and valuable than a movie. Their children will learn that each of us has but one life to live. There is no dress rehearsal. This is that life.
-The Honorable Elijah E. Cummings represents the 7th Congressional District of Maryland in the United States House of Representatives.
