Yesterday, I was joined by several leaders from our interfaith community in the District to discuss public safety.

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February 14, 2024

Interfaith Gathering on Public Safety

Yesterday, I was joined by several leaders from our interfaith community in the District to discuss public safety. This was third ([link removed]) stakeholder discussion I’ve put together since December. The first was focused on representatives from our law enforcement, judicial, academic, and advocacy community. The second brought together retailers and restaurants struggling with how crime is impacting their businesses and the safety of their employees. I thought it prudent to bring this group together to focus on a couple of key questions, but more specifically to visit some of the efforts the faith community utilized the last time our city experienced similar challenges to the 1990s, and to discuss the approaches they are taking in facing our current crisis.


I want to thank all our faith leaders for the work that they do every day to feed the souls, minds, and hearts of our city. More specifically, I thank them for all they’ve done and continue to do to comfort those experiencing loss, pain, and hopelessness because of our city’s crime crisis. These leaders all play a role in helping to keep our city safe, advocating on behalf of our residents and their congregations. I appreciate their willingness to take part in our discussion and the earnestness they shared in our time together.

As a native Washingtonian who grew up in the 1980s and 1990s, I witnessed some of the worst violence in our city’s history. Today, with rapidly escalating incidents across our city, with staggering brazenness, and with unparalleled apprehension around crime being felt in the lives of residents, we’ve gotten perilously close to the way it felt back then, and I refuse to go back.


Our houses of worship provided stability during those times, and when the District experienced an exodus of residents because of crime, several of them stayed to be a harbor in the storm for our communities. I am immensely grateful that many of the formative experiences of my adolescence took place in and around the programming that our faith leaders created at that time, work that continues today in so many of our communities. These leaders have not wavered in their efforts, and we must continue to support their mission to connect the disconnected, and to reach those that our public sector may not reach. We saw this firsthand during the pandemic when our faith communities played crucial roles in creating positive pathways for communication on public health measures, helping to address food insecurity, and in education efforts related to vaccines.

Our epidemic of crime is no less serious. We are compelled to do all we can to prevent and decrease violence across the District and to help identify gaps where the planning and execution of prior public safety strategies have fallen short. Our current legislative efforts with Secure DC ([link removed]) are in process, but it will take much more, from all of us in our communities, to see meaningful change in the culture of violence that pervades our city.


Lastly, I want to thank Trinity President Patricia McGuire for hosting our gathering. The school has a rich history in the District and has been a great partner to our communities as they share our focus on yielding solutions to the problems we see around us. I am grateful for their support. A summary video and action agenda from yesterday’s conversation will soon be shared via our social media platforms and through this newsletter. We appreciate your partnership in this fight.


February 13, 2024 Citywide Interfaith Meeting Attendees
Dr. William Bennett, III, Good Success Christian Church & Ministries
Rev. Dr. Keith Byrd, Zion Baptist Church
Pastor Michael Campbell, Peace Fellowship Church
Reverend Karen Curry, The Pennsylvania Avenue Baptist Church
Rachel Feinstein, Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Washington
Thalia Ghiglia, Church of Scientology
Reverend Delonte Gholston, Peace Fellowship Church
Revered George Gilbert, Jr., Holy Trinity United Baptist Church
Rahim Jenkins, Chief Executive Officer of the National Center
for Juvenile Justice Reform
Pastor Donnell Jones, Grace Covenant Church of Brookland
Pastor Jason Jones, Pilgrim Baptist Church
Pastor William Lamar IV, Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church
Barbara Kraft, Temple Sinai's Davis Center for Social Justice
Terry Lynch, Downtown Cluster of Congregations
Joshua Maxey, Bet Mishpachah
Pastor Charles McNeill, Unity Baptist Church
Reverend Dexter Nutall, New Bethel Baptist Church
Imam Buheira Abdus-Sabour, B.R.I.D.G.E.S. DC
Imam Dr. Talib Shareef, Masjid Muhammad
Reverend Cozette Thomas, Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church
Reverend Wanda Thompson, The Ambassador Baptist Church
Reverend Rachel Landers Vaagenes, Capitol Hill Presbyterian Church
Pastor Patrick J. Walker, The New Macedonia Baptist Church
Rabbi Michael Werbow, Tifereth Israel
Beth Werlin, Temple Micah

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