Mayor Young meets with 100 pastors to discuss plan to fight crime

Shay Arthur
·2 min read
5

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Mayor Paul Young met with dozens of pastors on Tuesday to discuss his team’s crime-fighting efforts.

Crime scene tape in neighborhoods, around parks and popular downtown streets have become a site seen too often in Memphis.

Many are looking for solutions, including a group of 100 pastors who met with Mayor Young on Tuesday.

Memphis murders and homicides 2024

The group gathered at the Memphis Baptist Ministerial Association as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) encouraged support for the mayor as he looks to combat crime.

“We talked about public safety, talked about taxes and we talked about adding value to this community and what it’s going to take to turn the corner,” Young said.

WREG asked the mayor what his administration is doing to address crime as this past weekend saw a handful of shootings across the city, including one on Beale Street.

Overnight triple shooting on Beale Street injures 3 people, MPD looking for suspect

Recently, a mass shooting in Orange Mound left nine people injured and killed two people, including a minor.

Young told WREG that the team is working on many things.

“If you look at Operation Code Zero, you see that we are saturating places where crime has been high and we hold people accountable,” Young said. “You’ll also see that we are engaging all throughout the community to put programs in place to make it that we are stopping young people from having to go in that direction and so it’s going to take a wholistic effort when it comes to public safety.”

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That’s where the group of pastors comes in.

“We have a perfect opportunity to get behind our mayor and to make our communities safe, put love in our community and be a beacon of light in our community,” SCLC President and Pastor, Walter Womack said. “Every day concerned citizens would get out and do their part, it’s going to take all of us. It’s not just going to take the police department, it’s not just going to take the mayor, it’s going to take all of us working together.”

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