Girl Vow & The National Taskforce for Missing & Murdered Women & Girls of Color is hosting a one day summit entitled, What About Us on May 27, 2022 from 11:00 a.m. to – 04:00 p.m. to be held at the New Settlement Community Center, located at 1501 Jerome Avenue near the corner of W. 172nd Street, Bronx, NY 10452.
The summit will address many of the disparities plaguing missing girls and women of color in New York City. The one day summit will include CM Athea Stevens, family of the missing Chelsea Cobo, Kassandra Ramirez, and father of a recovered youth 13 year old Enrique Rivera. Organizations include ECLI Vibes, New Pride Agenda, Visionary V, Ruuah Ministries, trauma therapists, and youth survivors, and many more.
In light of so many recent missing black and brown girls in New York and around the nation, Girl Vow is launching a task force, consisting of a well cultivated team, to tackle the issues head on: why are our girls going missing, how can we take these important issues more seriously, and also address preventative measures? Our bill S6924 and A8347 is written to examine the perplexing gender based issues that have been overlooked for far too long. This summit will spark a dialogue.
As reported by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in 2019, there were 421,394 missing children in the database. Almost 75% of those missing children were females, 205,802 were black females. Latinx are statistically invisible and considered white.
“The National Taskforce for Missing and Murdered Women and Girls of Color is a response to solving the pervasive silence when girls/women of color are missing, murdered, and unnoticed. Our mission is to organize to advance beyond the issues of colorism, racial, economic, and structural oppression with communities at the helm of change.” Rowe said.
“It is sad that we even live in a time when this topic is even being discussed but whats more sad is the look in these girl eyes when they truly believe that they are not as important to the community or even to society in a whole because of the color of there skin. I have seen it in my neighborhoods with the heroine epidemic nobody cared that it was killing us until it started killing in predominately white areas. Why do our girls have to feel as if they are not important?
“Why do our girls have to strive harder fight stronger work harder just to survive in life? Why do our families of the girls in the black and brown community feel alone? Laura Mullen, Cofounder of The Survivor Advisor Board-Anti-Trafficking Service Advocate.
“It is our responsibility as a community to take care of each other. The silence that is present when Women & Girls of color go missing, is not acceptable. We must amplify our voice together to effectively raise awareness, in addition to exercising all necessary resources to combat this issue. It is my pleasure to be partnering with Girl Vow on this event, because the first step to bringing change is educating yourself and others.”
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Councilmember Althea Stevens
