Go-Go Community Criticizes Closing of Night Spots but Suggests Ways to Stem Violence
By Avis Thomas-Lester
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Representatives of the Washington area's go-go community marched on Prince George's government yesterday to protest County Executive Jack B. Johnson's order to close nine popular nightspots.
About 100 singers, musicians, sound engineers, and club owners and operators marched in Upper Marlboro from the Show Place Arena to the County Administration Building about a mile away to deliver a message to Johnson (D) and his administration: Let us be part of the solution to the violence that has recently plagued the county.
The march, organized by Peaceoholics and the Go-Go Coalition Inc., put the protesters on the path to conflict with county officials who say the clubs have contributed to the violence. The protesters aired their concerns about the closures and pitched ideas on ways to stem the violence to County Council members, who met with them in a special session.
Speakers offered suggestions such as requiring people in clubs who get in fights to attend peace training, copying the IDs of troublemakers and establishing security standards.
"The go-go community is full of resources, people who are on the ground floor," Jahar Abraham, 40, co-founder of Peaceoholics and a member of the go-go band Familiar Faces, told the council. "You have a body here of hardworking people who are willing to help."
The marchers vehemently oppose last week's decision by Johnson to close the clubs under a law passed to address establishments that pose "an imminent danger to the public."
Five of the clubs reopened after a judge granted attorneys a temporary restraining order. On Monday, a judge signed off on a deal for several clubs to remain open while negotiating with county officials over security plans that could include hiring off-duty officers.
Johnson's action came in the wake of 11 homicides in 11 days in the county. Police have said that they have received hundreds of calls about noise, crime and violence in and near the clubs. Johnson targeted the establishments as part of a larger effort that included establishing a task force to address violence.
Yesterday's march was peaceful, but a tense moment occurred when a spokesman for the protesters was denied permission to enter Johnson's office to deliver a letter outlining their concerns. Johnson aide John Erzen said he would have to deliver the note, and in an ensuing encounter, chief of staff Michael Herman drew the ire of the Go-Go Coalition's legal counsel, John Mercer, when Herman touched him on the arm.
"Please don't touch me," Mercer told Herman, saying that he found the gesture condescending. Herman quickly walked away.
Mercer turned to the marchers. "We are like elephants. This will stay in our memory banks. We will be back, and Jack Johnson will meet with us," he said.
The marchers said they think that their music has been unfairly maligned and linked to violence.
"We have met and developed some specific plans of actions. . . . As local entertainers who many citizens come to see regularly, we have direct communication with these citizens and substantial influence that can lead to behavioral change for the good of our community," the letter said.
Ronald Moten, co-founder of Peaceoholics, a nonprofit group that works to settle disputes and decrease violence among urban youths, said his organization recently helped quash a beef between gang members from Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue and Robinson Place SE in Washington by bringing them together at a basketball tournament. The conflict had arisen over a shooting at Ballou High School.
Moten said that his organization has met several times in the past year with representatives from the offices of Johnson, State's Attorney Glenn F. Ivey and Police Chief Melvin C. High but that nothing resulted.
"We are offering to help again, because this is an emergency," said Moten, accompanied on the march by his 9-year-old daughter, Yasmeen. "They call the killing of 11 people in 11 days an emergency. We say there has been an emergency for a lot longer than that."
Greg "Sugar Bear" Elliot, frontman for the go-go band EU, said that most clubgoers are law-abiding "citizens who don't condone violence anymore than Jack Johnson does." But he said that some clubs need to do more to maintain a safe environment.
But the Rev. Clinton H. Saunders Jr., pastor of Mount Victory Baptist Church in Seat Pleasant, applauded Johnson's action. He drew jeers from some marchers when he said he thinks that his son, who is serving in the military in Iraq, is safer than he would be at local clubs.
After the meeting, some of the marchers confronted Saunders.
"If Jesus was around, he might tell you to go in those clubs and get those people out of there," Abraham said. "You made a lot of people mad with what you said."
"I have had one son shot here. I know what I'm talking about," Saunders said.
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