A week of protests against racism in Valley Stream

When Elmont resident Goldie Harrison and Valley Streamer Christine Rivera set out to organize a protest against systemic racism and police brutality against black people, it resulted in the first, and so far, largest demonstration of its kind in the area.

On June 1, exactly one week after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis police custody, it took place against a national backdrop of anguish in which hundreds of similar such protests were taking place in cities and neighborhoods across the country. The two women said they believed it was only right to use their connections to bring their hometowns into the conversation.

But beyond honoring Floyd’s and others’ memories, they had another reason to do what they did.

“A lot of these people — it’s their first time protesting, and we need to bring awareness to the black lives who have been lost to police violence,” Harrison said, “but also give people an opportunity to protest and see what that’s like.”

Since then, what they started appears to have morphed into a campaign with the potential to highlight demands for reform both through sustained demonstrations and at the ballot box.

Valley Stream saw three additional protests over the subsequent week, all organized by different activists, some working in parallel with others, stopping only on June 3 due to bad weather. By last weekend, the protests had moved to other neighborhoods. More, however, were being planned by the day.

June 2 saw a gathering of a few dozen protesters on the Village Green. Word of the event appeared to spread primarily through Facebook. Alex Guerin, 25, from Baldwin, a congregant at Valley Stream’s Bethlehem Assembly of God, said the demonstration remained confined to the green, but there were reports from residents of small, peaceful marches on Merrick Road.

Guerin recounted a handful of speeches from the rally, but said they all followed a similar theme.

“I think the entire message was to try and rally everyone to be peaceful,” she said “. . . and to use your voices to advocate for those who don’t or have less of a voice, and use your ability to vote.”

South High School student Edan Jeanlouis, 16, organized the protest on Thursday, June 4. It began at the Hendrickson Park pool parking lot, and followed a circuit to the Village Green. Nearly 200 people took part.

“I put this out kind of on a whim. I was sick and tired of seeing everyone else hold a protest and not Valley Stream,” Jeanlouis said, noting that he believed Monday and Tuesday’s demonstrations had caught only passing recognition.

He recounted feelings of anxiety every time he spotted a police car, and cited the 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin, who was killed while walking home from a convenience store.

“Me and my friends go out to the deli all the time,” Jeanlouis said. “Imagine getting shot just for doing that? That’s crazy.”

Within the crowd, Valley Stream North High School student Tayler Rochester, 17, said it was her first protest, and that she was attending to show support for the Black Lives Matter movement. She had heard about it through social media.

“I hope that everyone starts to realize that black lives truly do matter because this has been an issue for so long and we’re in the year 2020,” she said. “The fact that people still have to fight for basic human rights, that shouldn’t be.”

Joelle Henry, 23, from Queens, said, “I wanted to be able to tell my children when they grow up that I was out here protesting for what I believe in.”

She said she wanted to see change, “not for two or three weeks, not for a month, but for the rest of my life and the rest of my little brother’s life.”

Upon reaching the Village Green, the group held a nine-minute moment of silence for Floyd. Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin had held his knee to Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes as Floyd pleaded for his life before going limp.  Chauvin has since been charged with second-degree murder in the killing.

Friday, June 5, saw another crowd of nearly 200 demonstrators in the neighborhood. They gathered on Sunrise Highway near Brooklyn Avenue Elementary School, with a planned march east to Merrick, a nearly 8-mile trip.

Many of the organizers had been involved in Monday’s protest, and the messaging appeared to become more refined, with voter registration literature being passed around.

Tafari Jones, 25, from Elmont, and one of 10 people who had organized the day’s demonstration, had attended Monday’s, and said he was inspired to help organize another. He said he hoped to do the same for others.

“I want to show solidarity and unity, and I also want people to feel empowered to put on their own peaceful protest and move differently moving forward,” he said. “I want people in the crowd to become more educated, and politically engaged.”

Voting, he said, was vital.

Erik Blam II, 24, from Elmont, worked alongside Harrison and Rivera to organize the June 1 march. He said he and the other organizers had chosen Merrick as their destination after a tense confrontation there earlier in the week during which a group of white residents demanded protesters demonstrate in other, more diverse nearby neighborhoods.

Blam drew parallels between this moment in history and that of America in the 1960s, and hoped the day’s protest would echo the landmark 1963 March on Washington.

“They were marching for jobs and freedom, and now we’re in this situation where we’re fighting for jobs and freedom,” he said. “How many Americans are unemployed? How many black people have died from police brutality?”

Olivia Nance, 23, of Freeport, and another organizer, said it was paramount to maintain momentum in the current movement, and to keep demonstrating. The long-term goal, she said, is reform, but in the short term, she said it was important to register people to vote.

“In the past, unfortunately in the Black Lives Matter movement, we’ll have a strong voice, and we’ll march and we’ll protest, but unfortunately the fact of the matter is they kind of stop showing up,” she said of the protesters.

Monday’s protest in Elmont had been Nance’s first. The next day, she attended another in Freeport, and between the connections she made at both, became part of a group organizing more demonstrations.

For people who might be wary of becoming activists themselves, she encouraged them to “just start,” she said. “People might not have guidance or background. They might not know how to get started or get active. If you’re looking for resources or information, you can make it happen … Be the change you want to be in your own neighborhood.”

And using herself as an example, she said, “My first protest was on Monday, and by Friday I was an organizer of my own.”