HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) -- Another two shootings happened in Harrisburg Monday night. Luckily police say no one was hit in either. It happened at the same time grassroots organizations were holding a town hall to talk about the violence.
It's not the first forum of this kind, but was unique in that kids were involved in trying to stop the violence before it begins.
Over the weekend, two people died and three others were hurt in four separate shootings.
"Friday I had four victims. We were able to save three, but one young man did not make it," said Dr. Dale Dangleben.
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Dangleben, the trauma surgeon who treated them, talked to a few dozen people, half of them kids, about gun violence in the city.
"When I start getting in trouble, those were learned behaviors outside of the home. So we want to get them as young as possible, and start planting that seed and instilling the right things into their brains," said Lamont Jones, one of the organizers of the town hall in Allison Hill.
Jones is looking to reach kids like eight-year-old Sir Davis.
"I just get scared because there's a whole bunch of gun violence in the neighborhood. We can't go outside and play like we used to be outside. Only thing they do is shoot at night. I can't sleep. I can't do nothing," Davis said.
And while these kids and parents discussed solutions, two more shootings happened. Seven to 10 shots were fired near a playground by Fourth and Emerald streets Uptown and another shooting at the Hall Manor complex.
Police say no one was hit in either place.
"They're blindly shooting innocent people getting shot. You just had a 12-year-old get shot, like really? C'mon!" said Richard Brown.
"Young girl just playing in a neighborhood that was hit by a stray bullet. That's something that we just can't stand for," Jones said.
Jones hopes the adults will take up a bigger role to stop the violence and the kids will see the consequences of picking up a gun.
"This is our community. We understand what's going on inside of our community. I don't believe that there's any legislation that can save us so we have to come together as a community and make sure that we're doing the right thing for our future generations," Jones said.
Besides education, these organizations are also actively making sure these kids have recreation opportunities to keep them occupied, like LOOP Boyz and Girlz at the Allison Hill Community Center.
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