2008 Woodie Awards
Mayoral candidates speak at St. Joe's
Patrick Temple-West ’07
Issue date: 2/28/07 Section: News
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As the Philadelphia Democratic mayoral candidates arrived on campus last Thursday night, they brought with them a sense of urgency that immediate changes need to be made in the city to quell the epidemic of violence that claimed 406 lives in 2006.
Four of the five candidates spoke at the Institute for Violence Research and Prevention's (IVRP) seventh annual symposium held in the Wolfington Teletorium: State Representative Dwight Evans, U.S. Representative Chaka Fattah, former Councilman Michael Nutter, and Tom Knox. The candidates did not debate one another, but rather voiced their individual strategies for curbing Philadelphia's violence as the city's next mayor.
U.S. Representative Bob Brady was unable to attend but sent a campaign official, Lois Williams Bishop, to speak on his behalf.
University President Timothy Lannon, S.J., opened the discussion by highlighting student and faculty outreach as a means for fostering peace and by offering "the power of faith" from the University to help with the violence problem.
The event also included presentations from four local researchers who have studied the problem of urban violence. These experts spoke before the candidates to discuss the social consequences of the murders: neighbors are reluctant to speak as witnesses for fear of retribution and the trauma that permeates through Philadelphia's communities forces residents to live in constant fear.
Scott Charles, a trauma outreach coordinator at Temple University Hospital, said that the 406 murders are part of a larger number. Over 2,000 people were victims of gunshot wounds in 2006 and survived with medical help. More than 50 people have been killed in Philadelphia this year.
The moderator for these speakers, Joseph Tierney, proposed a challenge to the mayoral candidates. He asked them to pledge that they would not run for reelection in 2010 if the murder rate has not fallen to 288-the number of Philadelphians killed in 2002.
Four of the five candidates spoke at the Institute for Violence Research and Prevention's (IVRP) seventh annual symposium held in the Wolfington Teletorium: State Representative Dwight Evans, U.S. Representative Chaka Fattah, former Councilman Michael Nutter, and Tom Knox. The candidates did not debate one another, but rather voiced their individual strategies for curbing Philadelphia's violence as the city's next mayor.
U.S. Representative Bob Brady was unable to attend but sent a campaign official, Lois Williams Bishop, to speak on his behalf.
University President Timothy Lannon, S.J., opened the discussion by highlighting student and faculty outreach as a means for fostering peace and by offering "the power of faith" from the University to help with the violence problem.
The event also included presentations from four local researchers who have studied the problem of urban violence. These experts spoke before the candidates to discuss the social consequences of the murders: neighbors are reluctant to speak as witnesses for fear of retribution and the trauma that permeates through Philadelphia's communities forces residents to live in constant fear.
Scott Charles, a trauma outreach coordinator at Temple University Hospital, said that the 406 murders are part of a larger number. Over 2,000 people were victims of gunshot wounds in 2006 and survived with medical help. More than 50 people have been killed in Philadelphia this year.
The moderator for these speakers, Joseph Tierney, proposed a challenge to the mayoral candidates. He asked them to pledge that they would not run for reelection in 2010 if the murder rate has not fallen to 288-the number of Philadelphians killed in 2002.
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