So I’ve written about this before, but I want to try again.
The streets of Baltimore don’t “belong” to any one ethnic group. As taxpaying citizens of Baltimore, they belong to us all. As free Americans, they belong to us all.
There is no such thing as a racially white street or black street or Jewish street or gentile street.
I grew up in Northwest Baltimore, attended Fallstaff Elementary, Pimlico Junior High and Northwestern High School.
My wife Lisa and I live just blocks from where I was raised in the city. The only aspect that’s changed for me is my zipcode. I went from 21215 to 21209.
I played at the JCC Park Heights when I was a kid.
I had black friends, Jewish friends, and even an Asian friend who lived a block from me.
Today Eli Werdesheim’s trial was postponed.
He is facing serious charges as the result of a response to a Shomrim call that seems to have gone all wrong.
I think there is a possible racial misunderstanding that runs as deep as an underground well. It’s not unique to the defendant Mr. Werdesheim nor the 15-year-old plaintiff, a Northwestern High School student. It might not even apply in this situation. It just seems in this day and age to come with the territory in cases such as this one. Still racial overtones are the undertow that knock us down unexpectedly as if we were standing at the ocean’s edge.
We have to talk to one another. We have to learn to understand that our own morals and values are special and unique and that’s perfectly fine.
There’s this scene in my favorite movie, “Remember the Titans.” The actor Denzel Washington plays a football coach of T.C. Williams High School in Northern Virginia that is newly integrated.
The racial tension among his football team is high during summer training camp, which is held at Gettysburg College. But he takes his team members, blacks and whites to a Civil War cemetery. And there he explains to them that it was hatred that tore this country apart. He said that if people, white and black don’t start respecting one another, they could destroy each other.
A black kid can walk through any neighborhood he pleases in the United States of America. This isn’t Civil War Mississippi. This is modern day Maryland. A Jewish kid can also walk through any neighborhood he wants. We are all free people, and we have rights that defend that freedom. Those rights aren’t based on color.
There is nothing wrong with a community watch group as long as it serves only as the “eyes and ears” of the local police and is done so in accordance with the local police. It should have rules of conduct and codes of ethics. And, more than anything else, Shomrim, the Northwest Citizens Patrol and any other group should hold itself up as a mirror to its community. Black parents and Jewish parents both want their children to be safe. So why shouldn’t Jews and Blacks and Hispanics and anyone else see themselves as members of existing community watch groups in Upper Park Heights.
We all seem to get concerned when there is an incident. But we can’t afford to wait until something goes horribly wrong. In between, there’s got to be active dialogue. There’s got to be blacks and Jews and everyone else riding together in those neighborhood watch patrols.
Or it won’t work. There will be misunderstanding. Oh you say, one particular group answered 4,000 calls without incident. All it takes to cause a forest fire is one misplaced spark. And that’s what we have here, I fear.
The Mayor has been a great supporter as has the police department of these Jewish patrol groups. But these groups could stand some criticism and some re-invention.
We have a strong Police Department. When we dial 911, we have to have faith that they will respond and take care of crime. Our job as neighbors, white, black, Jewish and gentile is to aid our police officers with our eyes and our ears. But not with our fists, nor our feet.
The streets of Upper Park Heights belong to us all, black, white, Jewish, Hispanic, Asian and however else you describe yourself.
We are good people with good neighborhoods.
The trial that we might be witnessing in the coming months could be difficult at times. Let’s let the capable attorneys do their work on both sides. And let’s let the justice system decide. Lives have already been impacted here.
Let’s be good neighbors, and let’s help one another.
That’s our job now.
When I was an elementary school student, Fallstaff was desegregated. The experience turned into one of the most memorably positive forces in breaking down stereotypes I’ve ever witnessed.
At Northwestern, Robyn Quarles, my friend and homework buddy helped me get through geometry class. The numbers on the paper were black and white. We were just high school friends.
I want this racial tension to be studied and worked out. No it isn’t right that any injustice happen to anyone, black or white.
But I’ll say it until I get hoarse. We’ve got great streets, city blocks, housing and neighborhoods. And they don’t belong to a race, a creed nor a color. They belong to Baltimoreans.
Like Baltimore Hebrew Congregation gives over its sanctuary to a local black church for worship services on Sunday, it is because God isn’t about color, God is about his people, their truths and their self actualization.
I pray we can move on now, and that some heroes come forward to bring us all, everyone of us together as a unified neighborhood.