Organizers hope to unite neighbors

Boston-Bay State Banner
July 27, 2006

This Saturday afternoon, Dorchester residents will host Malik’s second annual Community Celebration on Barry Street. This event honors the memory of Malik Andrade Percival, a three-year-old child killed on January 24, 2002 during an attempted home invasion.

Organized by residents of Barry Street, the Louis D. Brown Peace Institute and the Bowdoin Street Health Center, the block party will include free food and beverages. There will also be entertainment for children, including face painting, moon bounce, pony rides, Boston fire safety exhibitions and traditional drum beats.

According to organizers, last year’s peaceful event drew neighbors, community activists and local politicians, including Mayor Thomas Menino and state Rep. Marie St. Fleur, to this small Dorchester neighborhood. It was also featured in the documentary “Street Soldiers,” a new movie about young men trying to change their lives and their community for the better.

In the movie, the camera pans from the candles, teddy bears, crosses and photos that make up Malik’s sidewalk memorial to the faces of two young boys. Both are wearing T-shirts with a picture of a smiling Malik. Asked what to do when they hear gunshots, one says, “You just run.” The other says, “You stay in the house and don’t come out.”

The organizers of Saturday’s event plan to build on last year’s success in a way that will do more to bring more neighbors together.

“Unfortunately, we are seen as a neighborhood of trouble,” explained Linda Barros, a community health worker with the Bowdoin Street Health Center. “This is an opportunity to tell the world that we do have peace and a sense of community. That our children can come out.”

Similarly, Mario Rodrigues of the Louis D. Brown Peace Institute said, “We don’t [want] people to come out and worry about the violence in the area because the dudes there are involved in putting this together. This will be peaceful because we know our families are there, our friends are there.”

Belmira Andrade, Malik’s mother, described Saturday’s event as a chance “to bring peace to our community, have everybody get together and have fun and stop this violence.”

In a letter to neighbors, organizers wrote, “We are inviting friends and neighbors to come out, meet each other and enjoy the day without a sense of fear. We want people to stop isolating themselves from this beautiful community that desperately needs to be rejuvenated.”

For Barros, building stronger relationships between neighbors on Barry Street is key. “You can’t live next to someone for twenty years and not know them,” she offered.

With similar fears in other parts of the city, the organizers of Saturday’s event have already been contacted by other neighborhoods requesting support to hold similar events in other parts of the city. “That gives us hope that this will be an ongoing event and celebration,” suggested Barros. “We need more of these around here.”.