Speaker 1: Natively and pot is a production of iHeartRadio in partnership
Speaker 1: with Resent Choice Media. Welcome Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome.
Speaker 1: At six two Sea's face a slew of chargers for
Speaker 1: Friday night shooting right near Howard University during homecoming weekend.
Speaker 1: Five people were injured, including a thirteen year old boy.
Speaker 1: We're told all the victims are expected to recover. DC
Speaker 1: police have arrested nineteen year old has Seen Parker and
Speaker 1: nineteen year old Julie Suburr On Friday. Howard says, nobody
Speaker 1: from the university was involved in that shooting.
Speaker 2: And what you just saw was a clip from one
Speaker 2: of the most recent HBCU shootings that we've had. And
Speaker 2: this is my first mini pod here on Native Land.
Speaker 2: Congratulations man, and I'm glad you took my call this week.
Speaker 3: Hey, listen, you know you're already doing better than me.
Speaker 3: You actually got this, guesshe many came in. No.
Speaker 2: I just had this idea because you were an SGA president.
Speaker 2: I was an SJA president, but you have this experience
Speaker 2: of being a mayor. I was in the state legislature.
Speaker 2: So what I wanted to talk talk about. It's just
Speaker 2: recently at Alcorn State, most recently at Howard University, at
Speaker 2: Jackson State, at South Carolina State, right near my home.
Speaker 2: We've had this rash of violence surrounding you know, our
Speaker 2: our culminating events, for lack of a better term, our homecomings.
Speaker 2: You know, you have Howard's Homecoming, you have GHO, you
Speaker 2: have spell House.
Speaker 4: You have whatever you got. You don't try it. But
Speaker 4: whatever whatever you are, don't try it anyway.
Speaker 2: But but I wanted to talk about how we make
Speaker 2: sure that because I want my kids one day to
Speaker 2: go to an HPCA, and you know, how do we
Speaker 2: make sure that those institutions are safe? How do we
Speaker 2: control the media narrative around these shootings? And Uh, the
Speaker 2: other thing is the only one of the things, not
Speaker 2: the only thing, but one of the things that can
Speaker 2: be most devastating to historically black colleges is if this
Speaker 2: becomes this perception becomes a reality in people's minds, and
Speaker 2: then it becomes a din in there enrollment.
Speaker 3: Yeah no, that's that's for real. And I asked you,
Speaker 3: but Carr believe that that latter piece you just pay
Speaker 3: up on impacting the enrollment of these institutions for some people,
Speaker 3: that is the plan right to make the image such
Speaker 3: that people associate with an HBCU violence, not academic achievement
Speaker 3: and chain breaking and upput mobility. I got to say,
Speaker 3: I'm really of two minds about these events, particularly the
Speaker 3: ones that we hear broadcasts out local, state, nationwide, when
Speaker 3: it has to do with a historically black college and university.
Speaker 3: The reason I moved with two Minsbaccard is because I
Speaker 3: was an SJA president. I remember as an SJA president
Speaker 3: having to negotiate with the local law enforcement around what
Speaker 3: would law enforcement presidents look like at the mall, what
Speaker 3: is the exit plan after the game?
Speaker 4: And are all.
Speaker 3: Streets going to be closed down? Or what we have
Speaker 3: some conveniences like Florida State University does when it has
Speaker 3: its games four five times larger in population than ours.
Speaker 3: So I remember as a student activist trying to negotiate
Speaker 3: that space. Then I became mayor and people were discussing
Speaker 3: and negotiating that space with me. From my standpoint at
Speaker 3: that point, my only goal is safety, security, that people
Speaker 3: move in this space without feeling threatened to their life,
Speaker 3: to their bodies, to themselves, to their family, their loved ones.
Speaker 4: And I got to.
Speaker 3: Tell you my biggest frustration, particularly as mayor, was anytime
Speaker 3: there was a violent event that occurred during fam Use
Speaker 3: homecoming in the city near the campus or away from
Speaker 3: it was always broadcast as during fam Use homecoming it
Speaker 3: was a stabbing during fam Use homecoming. Now, if a
Speaker 3: similar event happened and I had the ability to have
Speaker 3: a PWI in an HBCU both state schools in the
Speaker 3: same city, if an incident happened that was violent during
Speaker 3: a Florida State game or Florida State homecoming, it was
Speaker 3: never introduced into the news. As there was a violent
Speaker 3: event at Florida State University's football game this weekend. So
Speaker 3: there's deliberate intention in my opinion, and then there's what's real,
Speaker 3: and I think we have.
Speaker 4: To deal with both.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and the way I look at it is from
Speaker 2: an SGA perspective, because hopefully some SJA presidents and people
Speaker 2: who want to be in student body are watching this
Speaker 2: as well. You have to make sure you have to
Speaker 2: begin to think of both minds as well, because one
Speaker 2: of your number one priorities is not just having the
Speaker 2: best homecoming people remember or the best step show is.
Speaker 2: Right now, you have to make sure people are safe
Speaker 2: and one of the things that I've learned from examining
Speaker 2: each of these incidents, as much of the activity comes
Speaker 2: from people who are not students, of course, and not
Speaker 2: alums of course. Not right, And you know, it kind
Speaker 2: of goes back to this age o adage that most HBCUs,
Speaker 2: you hear it all the time, most HBCUs are in
Speaker 2: some of our forsaken areas in the black communities, right
Speaker 2: save for Hampton by design, save for Hampton University. But
Speaker 2: I do think we have to think about that. And
Speaker 2: I think that it takes people having some foresight envision
Speaker 2: college presidents because sometimes they want to think they're on
Speaker 2: their own SGA presidents, mayors of your local cities, and
Speaker 2: law enforcement officers. Somebody who did it right recently, although
Speaker 2: it wasn't necessarily in HBCU in their city was Randall
Speaker 2: Woofin Rando had the Magic City Classic in Birmingham, went
Speaker 2: off without a hitch. He has a great police chief.
Speaker 2: He worked with both college presidents, both school's campus police,
Speaker 2: and then went off without a hitch. And so the
Speaker 2: question is, I mean, do you so I oppose it
Speaker 2: to you? Do you as do you make sure that
Speaker 2: others can't access your campus. Do you do you fortify
Speaker 2: your campus? Do you increase law enforcement? You know, I'm
Speaker 2: of the mind that I think that there has to
Speaker 2: be some process whereby only those people that are participating
Speaker 2: in homecoming events or football games can come into those
Speaker 2: spaces those people who want to tailgate. I don't know
Speaker 2: if it's a ticketing process, and I'm not I don't
Speaker 2: know how I feel about an increased police presence. However,
Speaker 2: I do think the state state law enforcement. You know,
Speaker 2: in South Carolina, we have our South Carolina State Troopers.
Speaker 2: They do the same thing at Clemson and South Carolina State.
Speaker 2: I mean, excuse me, Clemson at Universe South Carolina on
Speaker 2: game days need to be monitoring traffic and making sure
Speaker 2: there's no standstill. And I think that we need the
Speaker 2: same resources that they distribute to the pwis at our HBCUs.
Speaker 3: So I would say beca the first. Let me say
Speaker 3: HBCUs in most places are the one center of higher
Speaker 3: education learning where whether if you attended or you didn't
Speaker 3: correct as a young black person growing up in that state,
Speaker 3: or in that city or in that community. I know
Speaker 3: for us in Florida, family was everything.
Speaker 2: I mean, I used to break into the gym before
Speaker 2: he's college and there you go there.
Speaker 3: So these are the fabled institutions where all people could gather,
Speaker 3: whoever you were, wherever you came from, which your family did,
Speaker 3: which your mom and daddy.
Speaker 4: Did, so on and so forth.
Speaker 3: So our HBCU homecomings have real special definition, and I
Speaker 3: think differently than pwis or any really other right, So
Speaker 3: because of that, it is the center of gravity. It
Speaker 3: is where people come to gather from Miami to Jacksonville
Speaker 3: to Atlanta. If you were in driving distancing, you know
Speaker 3: fun is about to be had. You're about to see
Speaker 3: some stuff you ain't seen before, running into some type
Speaker 3: of people you don't usually run with. It attracts people.
Speaker 3: But guess what most of our cities want to attract
Speaker 3: people to them. The difference is is that we then
Speaker 3: apply a whole entirely new and different to what safety
Speaker 3: and security looks like once we get those folks coming
Speaker 3: into our communities. So what I would say this is
Speaker 3: when you're talking about a traffic plant management plan you
Speaker 3: know run by the city, or you're talking about surveillance
Speaker 3: around the stadium, or you're talking about your local attractions.
Speaker 4: Like the mall and what that would look like.
Speaker 3: At some point it became pretty obvious that a decision
Speaker 3: was made not to treat people coming into our communities
Speaker 3: for homecomings and for big games like that as normal,
Speaker 3: you know, fun loving, family oriented people who just want
Speaker 3: to have a good time and have something to do.
Speaker 3: We started erecting big as barricades at the malls so
Speaker 3: the first floor and the second floor couldn't see each other,
Speaker 3: you couldn't throw anything over, or god forbid, you couldn't
Speaker 3: look over and make a sound. So instead of looking
Speaker 3: like a welcoming retail establishment, it looks like, you know,
Speaker 3: some sort of mild capacity detention center.
Speaker 4: But what do you tell to them?
Speaker 2: Like, I'm in this kind of both worlds because I
Speaker 2: have a twenty year old that goes to Howard University. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and you just had a rash of shootings at Howard
Speaker 2: that didn't necessarily around Howard, But it's to your first point,
Speaker 2: it's attributed to So how do you how do you
Speaker 2: what do we tell parents that that can help ensure
Speaker 2: them or give them confidence which I will be safe.
Speaker 4: I will just say this.
Speaker 3: Most at one interrogate whether or not it's a real
Speaker 3: thing that your chism dangerous way by attending the game
Speaker 3: or being at that university.
Speaker 2: Period and nine times out of ten, actually ten times
Speaker 2: out attend. The answer is not, yeah, this happens when
Speaker 2: the sun goes down.
Speaker 4: What I say I.
Speaker 3: Learned both as a stually president of student activist, but
Speaker 3: mostly as the mayor, was the instances that were occurring
Speaker 3: weren't random incidences of violence. They largely were associated. For instance,
Speaker 3: we have somebody come up to famous homecoming, Oh come
Speaker 3: up to the Miami game and shot somebody at the
Speaker 3: exit the first exit entering the city that they had
Speaker 3: clearly exited the highway. It was a targeted shooting. I
Speaker 3: read in the paper immediately like, Okay, clearly this nobody
Speaker 3: didn't come here and just randomly decides to shoot someone
Speaker 3: off the exit ramp. No, this is a target.
Speaker 4: It hit.
Speaker 3: And so my argument will be in most these situations,
Speaker 3: these are people who have trafficked to a place to
Speaker 3: probably again traffic in illegal activity in the bullshit exactly,
Speaker 3: And what happens if they run up on their score
Speaker 3: opponent where they from and now nobody have their squad,
Speaker 3: but you have an opportunity.
Speaker 2: And the other thing that's separate that that differentiates, to
Speaker 2: your point, kind of gives credits to your point, HBCUs,
Speaker 2: particularly the ones we went to from some of these
Speaker 2: institutions of pwis that don't get the same glare or
Speaker 2: lens is that we're dry campuses for the most part.
Speaker 2: A true, and so you don't have the free flow
Speaker 2: of alcohol people are drinking at their tailgate, but it's
Speaker 2: nowhere near I don't know if anybody's ever been to
Speaker 2: a universe South Carolina University of Georgia tailgate.
Speaker 3: The most unsafe I've ever felt have been at some
Speaker 3: of those tailgates, except that the law enforcement who's patrolling
Speaker 3: a lot of those places share a lot.
Speaker 2: But I do think let me just say, but I
Speaker 2: will this goes back to my other point, and I
Speaker 2: think we have a little bit of a of a
Speaker 2: of a disagreement here, if not just a little rub.
Speaker 2: There is a heavy law enforcement present out presence out there,
Speaker 2: and I think, to your credit and to your point,
Speaker 2: if if those law enforcement officers are willing to treat
Speaker 2: HBCU homecoming participants with the same dignity that they treat
Speaker 2: the participants that these pwi's, then I think that increased law.
Speaker 3: Enforcements this argument, I would would necessarily, if you were
Speaker 3: designing the road traffic plan, consider that you might be
Speaker 3: one of the people who attended the game and maybe
Speaker 3: just trying to get back to your hotel. Correct, But
Speaker 3: when you've rerouted us an hour out of the way
Speaker 3: just to make sure that the left and the right
Speaker 3: going traffic now or in a sex that doesn't make sense.
Speaker 3: It doesn't make any sense, and it also is highly
Speaker 3: inconvenient and can create I think hot tempers, right, because
Speaker 3: when I leave FSU's game or whatever the artists, it
Speaker 3: seems like it's built for us to just move traffic
Speaker 3: and to do so to get these folks out of
Speaker 3: there as quickly as possible. So so what I would
Speaker 3: suggest for the law enforcement for those communities treat them
Speaker 3: as if you were one of the patrons yourself. Treat
Speaker 3: it as if you were going to be Then what
Speaker 3: kind of experience with you like, because that's really what
Speaker 3: people want. If you're a student activist, know that the
Speaker 3: people who are coming there, they want to feel safe too.
Speaker 3: They don't want to get jacked, they don't want to see,
Speaker 3: you know, gun violence.
Speaker 4: At the end of the day, and that's not what
Speaker 4: we know that's not what.
Speaker 3: Isn't what we know in it outright undermines And I
Speaker 3: think devalues the experience of the students and the family
Speaker 3: who are working. You know, you know seven out of
Speaker 3: you know, seven out of seven days are trying to
Speaker 3: get their degree. We give some grace there, we both
Speaker 3: have been there, right, but generally they're there for a reason,
Speaker 3: get your degree, get out, make it better for somebody else.
Speaker 3: So when we devalue these experiences, and when you devalue
Speaker 3: these institutions by associating violence that occurs while an event,
Speaker 3: another unrelated event is going on and making the two
Speaker 3: to one is one not good journalism, but two, it
Speaker 3: does a tremendous disservice to these institutions. And then finally,
Speaker 3: I'll just say on this Bikari, I think when you
Speaker 3: treat people like they are a caged bird, and a
Speaker 3: bird has only known freedom, they're going to want to
Speaker 3: feel free. So if you pull a military style lockdown
Speaker 3: on a place during a festive event, know that you
Speaker 3: are going counter to what people are expecting when they
Speaker 3: spend money.
Speaker 2: And these institutions look to these homecoming events as an
Speaker 2: economic as an economic.
Speaker 3: Catalyst, so to the cities by the way, Oh that's true.
Speaker 4: And so I don't think we want to say them
Speaker 4: down on anything.
Speaker 2: That's right, but I do want to give a condolence
Speaker 2: to I know there's one student at least who lost
Speaker 2: their lives that was at South Carolina State. I think
Speaker 2: other individuals who may have lost their lives were not students,
Speaker 2: but still deserve the same respect. I hope Alcorn and
Speaker 2: Jackson and State and Howard, and I believe Lincoln University
Speaker 2: can all bounce back.
Speaker 4: I hope their presidents are clear out about it. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I hope they think through it, and I hope that
Speaker 2: they work with their local officials and mayors and chiefs
Speaker 2: of police to ensure that you can have that that
Speaker 2: fun for lack of a better term, and make sure
Speaker 2: everybody feel safe.
Speaker 3: Well, I think they can do it, so long as
Speaker 3: we see each other's humanity right and see what we hear.
Speaker 4: We have in comment. I've go to a football game.
Speaker 3: I want to have a good time. Don't want the
Speaker 3: law to be uphill, but but I'm not arresting everybody
Speaker 3: who I see drinking in public because everybody would be
Speaker 3: in jail.
Speaker 4: Correct, Yeah, Yeah, so thank you.
Speaker 2: I just this was on my heart for about twenty minutes,
Speaker 2: so I wanted to make sure we can have this conversation.
Speaker 4: We have twenty minutes worth. Come home. Welcome Home.
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