Residents in KCMO's Marlborough neighborhood work to reduce violence

Community members in the Kansas City area are coming together in the pursuit of making where they call home a better place.

KSHB 41's Megan Abundis went to a south Kansas City neighborhood where people are going out of their way to make needed improvements.

The Marlborough Community Coalition is made up of people who live right in the neighborhood.

They’re hoping to serve more than 10,000 homes across a 2.5-square-mile area.

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Sarah Sommerkamp, the group's contracted program manager, and others were out Monday canvassing the area with the goal of simply reducing crime.

"Marlborough Community Coalition is modeled off of Omaha 360 and KC 360," Sommerkamp said. "We used public data to try to map out where the highest frequency of violent crimes happen."

Sommerkamp talked about what happens after the conversations are had.

"We are looking to find what the causes of the violence are," Sommerkamp said. "We are getting those in our survey to the health department, so we’re asking for the neighbors' perceptions of what causes the violence and what they think are the solutions. Once we know, we hope that we can translate that into actions we can take through our collation actions."

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"It’s nice to know there’s people in our community who care and want to know what we think; I appreciate it," said Alberta Pittman, a neighbor living in Marlborough.

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Sommerkamp walked a large area with people who she describes as those who "have the heart of helping other people in the neighborhood."

"These are individuals who really care about their neighbors having a good quality of life, understanding what people are going through, and they are also residents, so they hear the shots — they know that things are going on," Sommerkamp said.

Instead of being passive, she says they’re making change.

“A couple of years ago, when I moved to the neighborhood, there was a lot of gun violence on my block, and it was kind of difficult to get solutions in place," said Tim Dixon, who's also on the Marlborough Community Coalition. "Thankfully, it was resolved. I’m just out here because I feel like I wish other people would have been doing at the same time."

Debonie Lewis, president of the coalition, also talked about the importance of the conversations.

"It’s important for us to make face and show face to our neighbors and say, 'Hey, we are here; we want to listen to you,'" Lewis said.

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Lewis says it all starts with a knock.

“We’re just consistent; we are here day in and day out every single year; we want people to know about that," she said. "We have more in common than we have apart, and we don’t know that until we open up the door and converse."

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