Reported on Oct. 7, 2009

A spate of violent incidents in the Lower East Side over the past three months has prompted two women to tackle the problem of gangs and violence the only way they know how — as mothers.

Aida Salgado, 40 and Maizie Torres, 42, are now partners against crime in a new organization they have founded called “Mothers in Arms”. The initiative aims to get parents more involved in ensuring that their children are safe and are engaged in constructive activity such as after-school programs and recreational activities to deter them from joining local gangs.

Maizie Torres and Aida Salgado started Mothers in Arms this year to put an end to the teen violence in their neighborhood. Courtesy: Aida Salgado

The New York Police Department did not make available statistics on gang-related activity. But the stabbing of a 21-year-old man by an alleged gang member near the Baruch Houses on September 12 was one recent incident that served as a harsh reminder that gang-violence still existed in the Lower East Side.

“We want to get parents more involved and educate them about these matters,” said Salgado, who suspects that many parents are in the dark about their own children’s activities. “They need to know where their children are and with whom they hang out with,” she said.

Salgado and Torres’s own sons grew up in an environment dominated by gangs. The mothers say many of their sons’ friends are gang members. Resisting the peer pressure to join gangs is a major challenge for both of their children but through “Mothers In Arms”, the women hope that parents will play a more active role in preventing their children from becoming involved in local violence.

Ideally, the duo envisions parents showing up at the scene at the first sign that their children are mixed up in something dangerous. “If we show up at these places, our kids are going to say to each other, ‘Yo, I don’t want to do this anymore. Every time something happens, your mother shows up,’” said Torres.

The picture she paints of the ever-vigilant parent has convinced about 20 other mothers to sign up for the organization. The organization’s early priorities will be creating more after-school programs, recreational activities and economic opportunities for the youth. Establishing safe, open spaces where teenagers can interact with other members of the community without being judged is another objective.

Jorge Soto, an activities specialist at The Door, a youth development organization in downtown Manhattan, is a former gang member. He welcomes the women’s efforts, saying that keeping teens busy is a key to helping them avoid the gang life.

“Kids join a gang because they feel they are not important,” he said. “When you get them involved in something important for the community, they feel important.”

Other community-based organizations in the neighborhood, such as Grand Street Settlement, already run a number of youth services programs to keep teens busy and productive, but these programs do not specifically target kids affected by gang life.

Thanh Bui, director of the Beacon Center at Grand Street Settlement, works with many high- school students. She believes that the gang-related activity has actually reduced over the last five years, as health problems such as obesity have instead plagued the neighborhood’s teenagers.

“I think gentrification has contained the problem of gangs to a few pockets on the Lower East Side,” she said. “The issues we deal with now are different.”

“Mothers in Arms” will be holding membership meetings every month. They can be contacted at mothersinarms@gmail.com.