Shawna Oochoo is a night float at Ranch Ehrlo Society, but during the day she gives her time to another cause equally close to her heart.
Shawna is the founder of a community group called North Central: End the Violence.
“Living down here in North Central, there tends to be a lot of negativity, especially when it comes to gang violence. As a community, this isn’t what we want,” she explained. “We’re losing so many of our community members to gang violence, whether that’s through death or incarceration.”
Shawna’s work on End the Violence has another meaning, as well. While working at Ranch Ehrlo, she has seen many youth leaving care to return to communities like North Central, where she believes they need more options to help them succeed.
“As soon as our youth walk out these doors they’re faced with so many challenges, and for me, it’s about making a safer community for our youth so that they have opportunities and options; and they have the resources that they need so that when they are faced with these issues they can handle them.”
The group’s overarching goal, Shawna explained, is to create a non-profit similar to the now-disbanded RAGS (Regina Anti-Gang Services), which lost funding in 2012.
“RAGS ran for about four years and then the funding was cut. We’d like to learn from that and hopefully re-establish a similar organization, but looking at different programming and different avenues to address the needs of the community,” she explained.
The first initiative undertaken by End the Violence was a rag tying ceremony at the site of North Central’s first homicide of 2016. About 150 community members came out to tie bandanas in the three colours of the gangs known to frequent the area, sending a message that the violence and gang life is not what the community wants to be known for.
But they aren’t stopping there – the group has a very busy few months ahead of them.
A community meeting is planned in collaboration with the North Central Community Association to continue to raise awareness of issues surrounding the neighbourhood on March 14th at Albert Scott Community Centre (1264 Athol Street). End the Violence is also hosting a community forum on March 23rd with members of local government to look for answers in the form of policy and to secure a commitment for the resources required to make change.
A fundraiser is in the works for the end of April to raise money to keep the momentum of the group going.
“Everything comes from my past experiences. I know what it is to be a youth growing up on these streets, and I also know what it is to have a strong sense of culture and traditions and spirituality. And I really feel like that’s where I’m driven from,” she concluded.
