One Brooklyn
October 22, 2019
Brooklyn, NY – On Thursday, October 24th at 10 AM, Brooklyn Borough President Eric L. Adams will join with Families for Safe Streets and faith leaders for a special clergy forum focused on safe streets at Brooklyn Borough Hall. The event will focus on how the faith community can be part of the solution to traffic violence in New York City, and particularly in Brooklyn. It will feature a special faith leader training for participation in Sermons for Safe Streets, an opportunity to join the UN and cities around the world in memorializing those who’ve been killed in local neighborhoods – and in calling for safer streets, in connection with World Day of Remembrance. The program will also include powerful testimonies from crash survivors and those who have lost loved ones in traffic crashes.
Figures from NYPD’s TrafficStat, which tracks all incidents in the city, show that 172 people have died in traffic crashes in 2019, a 13.9% increase over last year’s overall number. A large number have been concentrated in parts of Brooklyn: to date, 55 of the 172 fatalities have been in Brooklyn, according to Streetsblog NYC. Of the 55 people killed in Brooklyn this year, 17 have been bicyclists, which alone outpaces the 10 cyclists killed citywide last year.
“We mourn with every family who has been touched by traffic violence this year or in previous years. But we also have to turn our pain into purpose. That’s what Families for Safe Streets has done since their founding, and their advocacy has saved countless lives. Traffic violence does not discriminate. And now, we are partnering with the faith community in this mission to make our streets safer for all New Yorkers. It’s on all of us to come together and demand an end to traffic violence and its irreversible effects on families,” said Brooklyn Borough President Eric L. Adams.
“All of us in Families for Safe Streets have lost family members or suffered serious injuries. We face the unimaginable from this silent, preventable epidemic. We are so grateful to the Borough President for being a street safety champion and helping bring this message to New York’s faith leaders who can literally use their pulpits as a vehicle to save lives,” said Amy Cohen, Co-Founder, Families for Safe Streets.
When 2 young children are killed in traffic violence, on our city sidewalks, in less than a week’s time, we know we have a public health epidemic that we must all work together to tackle. While our thoughts and prayers go to these two families and the thousands of others injured and killed on our streets, we must come together as faith communities to address this critical issue for an important clergy forum and Sermons for Safe Streets training. Our voices are needed,” said Pastor Gilford Monrose, Director of Faith-Based and Clergy Initiatives for the Office of Brooklyn Borough President Eric L. Adams.
“Every death on our streets is one death too many. And every death on our streets is preventable,” said Danny Harris, executive director of Transportation Alternatives. “We must treat this as the public health crisis that it is, and demand action from our elected leaders to bring this crisis to an end. Transportation Alternatives thanks Borough President Adams for bringing attention to these issues, and for his commitment to solving the problems on our streets.”
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