New PBS series spotlights local peacekeepers
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Diane Latiker founded Kids Off the Block and is featured in "Firsthand: Peacekeepers." Photo: Courtesy of Abel Arciniega for WTTW
WTTW is launching a yearlong series called "Firsthand: Peacekeepers," aimed at understanding and reducing Chicago violence through profiles of local peacemakers and public events.
Why it matters: While Chicago shootings have fallen 42% over the past four years, they remain high at 2,282 last year.
- The Peacekeepers series, which started Monday, highlights some of the most promising avenues for tackling violent crime.
Zoom in: The core of the series features five short documentaries focusing on different people:
- Judge Patricia Spratt, who oversees a traditional courtroom in Maywood, but every Thursday leads the North Lawndale Restorative Justice Community Court.
- Damien Morris, a Garfield Park peacekeeper who visits victims in the hospital, mediates disputes and brokers peace agreements.
- Kids Off the Block founder Diane Latiker, who's been keeping the peace in Roseland for 20 years.
- Adrian Rodriguez, who tries to bring peace to the same streets his gang-involved family once claimed.
- Cedric Hawkins who, after prison, returned to push peace in the same area he formerly sold drugs.
What they're saying: "When we hear 'peacekeepers' we tend to imagine that people are standing between warring factions...And the peacekeepers we feature in this series are doing some of that dangerous work. But sometimes peacekeeping is about relationship-building, or creating the conditions for peace," executive producer Dan Protess tells Axios.
- For example, "Diane Latiker is "caring for neighborhood teens in Roseland and West Pullman...she's helping to create a beloved community."
Zoom out: The year-long campaign will also feature a series of violence prevention-focused expert talks, investigative journalism and community screenings across the city followed by discussions.
The big picture: The "Firsthand" series has existed for seven years, focusing on social problems — including homelessness, poverty and gun violence — and presenting solutions heroic people applied, but Protess says this year he chose to focus "on the heroes themselves."
The hope: That viewers will see "these are trained professionals who are reducing violence in Chicago—the evidence clearly shows that these peacekeeping efforts work. And yet these programs are under constant threat of losing critical funding," Protess says.
- "We don't say 'sorry, we couldn't pay for the fire department this year, so if your house catches on fire, you're out of luck'. If there are interventions that are saving lives, we need to treat them like essential city services."