GRAND RAPIDS, MI -- A week after a peaceful protest ended with a riot in Grand Rapids, marchers again took to the streets over police brutality.
Several hundred people came to the #AmINext #4Unity protest at Rosa Parks Circle.
Organizers said they planned a peaceful protest.
“We just want the Grand Rapids police, our commissioners and the government to just see us and understand the power in the number that we have hear today, and that we’re all concerned about the same things” co-organizer Jeana Mason told the crowd.
Protests have happened across the nation since in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis. He died when a Minneapolis police officer, now charged with murder, knelt on his neck for nine minutes.
Saturday’s march was at least the fourth protest in Grand Rapids in the last week. The only violence happened after dark following the initial protest on May 30 and long after the demonstration ended.
Rioters damaged up to 100 buildings, breaking windows and looting some stores. City officials now are giving a preliminary damage estimate at close to $450,000, not including stolen items and policing costs.
During Saturday’s protest, people carried signs and chanted while marching down city streets. The group stopped at a police barricade, erected at Fulton Street and Ionia Avenue following the riot, and several people gave short speeches.
Many told how racism affected their lives.
“We need to recognize that racism is a problem. We need our (commissioners) to recognize that racism is a problem. We need GRPD to recognize that racism is a problem,” Mason told the crowd at Rosa Parks Circle.
“With recognition, we can then move forward. With moving forward, we can get real change,” Mason said. “Real ways to implement (change) so I can ensure my life is safe, I can ensure my sister’s life is safe and I can ensure my daughter’s and husband’s lives are safe.”
Denise Torres of Jension brought her two children, ages 12 and 13, to the demonstration.
She spoke in front of a large crowd gathered at the barricade and the children said “my life matters” on a megaphone.
“There is so much inequality and injustice in this world. We need to make a change and we need to do it collaboratively,” Torres said later.
She talked about exposing her children to the cause of fighting racism.
“This is the life we’re setting up for them (her children) and their future. So they need to be part of a possible journey that the will be facing as they get older," she said.
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