Dear Mayor Gilbert,

We are the current students and alumni of schools throughout Miami Gardens, predominantly Miami Carol City Senior High School, who are calling you to help initiate an active investigation and safety plan for our turbulent city.

Though we understand how your City Manager's Budget for Public Safety from 2011-2012 was a gracious $29,155,848 and considerably decreased the violent crime rate that was formerly 138.67% higher than the national violent crime rate, we are alarmed by the fact that in 2012 you projected 30 reported cases of murder and manslaughter for the year while in just 11 days this past November in 2013 there were 10 shooting victims. If this rate persists, that means your projection of approximately 1 victim every 12 days will expand to approximately 1 victim every day. Your efforts to reduce overall crime rate are commendable, but simply increasing the number of policement on duty is not effective. THE ONSLAUGHT OF SHOOTINGS PARTICULAR TO THE MIAMI GARDENS AREA NEED TO BE ADDRESSED WITH A SEPARATE, SPECIFIC PLAN OF ACTION.

After careful consideration, we wish to outline the following requests for our community:

(1) As many of these vioent acts occur at night, we propose a strictly enforced cerfew until shooting rates can be measurably decreased over a 3 month period.

(2) Among us, we have discussed the plausibility of these violent acts being related to gang violence that is not always inter-community; thus, we propose the following:

◦ Police-enforced check points at the borders of our city for anyone coming in or out of Miami Gardens.

◦ A comprehensive 3-month investigation into targeted gang activity relating to the shootings.

(3) We believe there are additional variables pertaining to the rise in shootings-- such as some policemen and community safety authorities enforcing Zero Tolerance with a serious lack of integrity-- which only furthers the feeling of hopelessness and rebellion among us. Please conduct a reevaluation of your police force and provide a community report as to the numbers of active members you reprimand or fire for behavior that could be directly contributing to recent events.

(4) As any responsible student body, we wish to be held accountable for any information we can provide and want to develop a more respectful relationship with Public Safety; thus, we request 1 class period of the day to be dedicated to education and real solutions to community issues-- specifically gun and gang violence-- that will be co-lead by our teachers and local policemen for the remainder of the 2013-2014 school year.

In closing, we understand there are individuals in Miami Gardens as well as outliers from surrounding cities that are threatening our mutual livelihood. In no way do we wish to blame you for the horrific current situation, however we will be better equipped to activate this movement with your support.

Please send your thoughtful response to [email protected] by December 15, 2013 so that we may discuss ACTION STEPS.

Best regards,

Your City's Youth