A barbecue event, held last week, provided students from kindergarten to college in Syracuse area school supplies, backpacks and full meals to kick off the school year.

Syracuse resident Mary Nelson led the annual event since this mission’s start in 2002. The Youth Day Barbecue is part of Nelson’s vision for a violence-free city for Syracuse students to flourish in.

This year, she said she collected around 18,000 backpacks and even has some leftover, which she plans to distribute to schools and other agencies.

She began the barbecue in wake of her nephew’s death from gun violence. Her mission has grown greatly since its start, with Nelson expanding her community presence through The Mary Nelson’s Youth Center.

“I don’t think I looked at me to get as far as I can. I looked at it as a way to see these babies walk out prepared for an education,” Nelson said.

Nelson said the center is for resources, which she believes are the key to fighting poverty.

“These blue- and white-collar workers, they say, ‘Money is going to make our country go around.’ It won’t, resources will,” she said.

Resources like school supplies, training programs, food and life-skill programs are all on Nelson’s agenda as important resources to be available to a community.

The center provides a place for students in the community to eat daily, get tutored and learn real-life skills, a reinforcement to the education that they are learning in school — one that Nelson said she believes needs a reform.

“I want to see reform in our schools. No one is talking about the schools,” Nelson said. “I want to be a resource center, I want to fight this (poverty).”

Nelson said she believes grassroots agencies like her own are the key to fighting poverty, because they are the ones in the communities witnessing the effects of the gap between officials and regular citizens of the community.

“If I could get in front of Barack Obama, I would say, ‘Let’s turn this around, let’s fight poverty by providing money to the grassroots, they’re the ones doing the work,” Nelson said.

Nelson was recently named a fellow, or affiliate, of the Center for Neighborhood Enterprise as Robert Woodson’s affiliate. The center finds grassroots agencies across the world fighting poverty, and Nelson said being named an affiliate was an honor.

Additionally, Nelson said SU community members should get involved in the community.

“We have to bridge that gap, you have to come off that Hill and come into the community,” she said. “If (SU students) come down here and come into the center and see the young kids, they’re going to want to come back.”

Published on August 30, 2016 at 11:46 pm

Contact Baylee: bawri100@syr.edu