Peace Action Bay Ridge, a local anti-violence organization, is aiming to bring the community together at their annual anti-gun violence vigil on Feb. 14.
According to Vicki McFayden, one of the founding member of the initiative, the goal of the event is to raise awareness on the severity of fire arm related deaths and encourage safe gun laws. Tuesday’s event takes place in front of the subway station on 86th Street & Fourth Avenue at 2 p.m.
“It’s a big problem and we’re against violence. We should address it,” McFayden told Brooklyn Paper.
The group has been hosting community events for the past ten years, and were first spurred to activism by the Iraq War.
They look to share information not just on gun incidents but many social justice issues such as racial environmental causes.
“Anything that causes injury or suffering, we try to address,” she said. “It’s a small group but we’re pretty active.”
This years vigil falls on the anniversary of the at Stone Douglas High School mass shooting in Parkland, Florida where 17 students and staff members were killed.
“It’s just a tragedy all over,” he said. “We don’t want to see these [shootings] in our communities, we don’t want to be out there doing a rally for someone who in our community that got shot. We’d much rather be out there doing a rally for greater investments in our community.”
