Posted on 07/06/2015 9:37:41 AM PDT by Brad from Tennessee
LAKELAND | The street is peppered with duplexes, with roadside couches and collections of unwanted belongings scattered here and there. People sit in front of their houses, laughing and talking, on folding chairs, cinder blocks, upturned buckets and tailgates. Music rings out through cars, cellphones and boom boxes. Children run back and forth across the road munching on snow cones and smiling while Boots on the Ground, a camo-clad group of seven people, marches along in two-by-two formation, praying loudly.
Overall, it's just another Tuesday evening in Chestnut Woods.
But it hasn't always been this way.
According to statistics provided by the Lakeland Police Department, officers were called to Chestnut Woods for gun-related incidents 19 times last year.
So far this year, officers responded to five reports of shots fired, all of which took place in January.
No one has been shot since October.
And everyone agrees: Boots on the Ground, the faith-based neighborhood watch group that marches through the streets in prayer, doing what it can to regulate the rising tide of violence through spreading the good word, has played a major role.
"The kids are able to go out and play now without having to worry about a drive-by," said Fenisha Kirby, 43, as she cradled one of her grandbabies. "You see how quiet it is here right now? Before, you couldn't even stand out here."
"We need them out here. They are getting all the demons out," 26-year-old Tamara Stanford added.
LPD Assistant Chief Mike Link said that overall, it's just a very positive thing. . .
(Excerpt) Read more at theledger.com ...
Good for them.
Nice story about Faith and doing good...
Forty-three years old and she cradles one of her grandbabies - just how many grandbabies can we expect a forty-three year old to have?
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