CHICAGO — Senator Dick Durbin was in town on the same day a $75 million grant was announced for violence prevention programs.
Senator Dick Durbin spent Thursday touring St. Sabina in Auburn Gresham to learn more about its violence prevention efforts.
Sen. Durbin walked around the campus and met with participants of the Brave Youth Leaders program at the church and school.
“You wanna end gun violence in Chicago, police have an important job in doing that, we have an equally important job in programs just like this ,” Durbin said. “Making sure we invest in young people and give them a fighting chance in their lives
It’s an opportunity for kids and young adults from a variety of different schools and communities to come together to promote peace and change.
The Rev. Michael Pfleger and Durbin are working to drum up federal funding to keep the program, and others like it, up and running.
It came on the same day Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle announced a historic amount of grant money that will help fund violence prevention programs in Cook County. Seventy-five million dollars will be distributed to 68 different organizations that offer an array of violence prevention services.
“At its core, violence prevention is about facilitating healing, building peace and providing support and resources for our historically underserved residents and the communities that they live in” Preckwinkle said.
Organizations will receive their first allotment of grant money next month and it will be distributed over the next three years.