Gang Prevention Peace Fest starts Wednesday in Lawton

One person has the power to shape another person’s life, for better or worse. One person can either inspire them to become a hero to another, or ruin their life and others.

From 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Wednesday, the Marie Detty Gang Prevention Program seeks to fix that by hosting a Gang Prevention Peace Fest at H.C. King Center, 1705 NW 20th Street. The goal is to increase awareness and encourage others to band together to reduce youth gang involvement and gang crime.

Brian Pack, a Gang Prevention Outreach Advocate for Marie Detty Youth & Family Services, said they have high hopes for the event.

“If we have an event and it really turns out, we’ll have another one,” Pack said. “If we have an event and we really didn’t get it right, then we may not do that particular event again.”

Pack said everyone will walk away a winner.

“Nobody walks away from this a loser,” Pack said. “Every kid who comes in and gets involved with this event is going to walk away with something. They are somebody, we generally care about their well-being and we’re really on their side to do well in life. We’re going to make sure that they walk away feeling that the community [and] law enforcement really cares about them.”

Pack said the event gives youths something positive to do.

“We do these types of events for the purpose of giving young people something positive to do, bring them together, try to send a message to the rest of the community,” Pack said. “We’re trying to do something, a large event, at least once a year, and then maybe some smaller things throughout the year.”

Pack said the program has a lot of layers to how it’s run.

“One of the things we advocate and push for is education, trying to keep them in school,” Pack said. “For those who are old enough, we start preparing them for other things in life like job training, job searches and even how to present themselves for an interview. A lot of young people just don’t know how to do that.”

Pack said there’s a lot of things people don’t know about gang activity.

“A lot of times we hear about certain crimes being committed,” Pack said. “But it’s not often pointed out that some of the people committing the crimes are gang members.”

Pack said they try to aim for younger age groups.

“Sometimes people will ask, ‘Well, are there gang members in elementary school?'” Pack said. “Well, there are a lot of them within each group that have a lot of exposure to gang activity, sometimes from older siblings or just living in the neighborhoods where there’s a lot of gang members and gang activity.”

Pack said the way anyone treats a kid will impact who they grow up to be.

“If you keep telling a kid that they’re bad, chances are that’s the way they’re going to act,” Pack said. “But if you tell them and actually show them they’re somebody, they can do well.”

Unfortunately, there are some children who never “turned the corner,” but there are some who prevail, Pack said.

“I’ve been doing this a long time over the years,” Pack said. “We always feel like there was something that we said or did with those individuals that really clicked with them. They made better choices, finish high school, go to college, a job training program, military service. It’s not unusual for someone to recognize me before I recognize them.They’ll call me and may say ‘Yeah, I’m doing a lot better now.”

“We can do a lot once we come together and everybody is moving in the same direction, especially when it comes to gang involvement, which is still an issue here,” Pack said. “We’re trying to advocate for safer communities, streets, schools and for our youth. There’s no shortage of guns out there, that’s for sure.”