Monica Henderson has been there “on the front row of a funeral.”

She knows parents who lost their children to gun violence 20 years ago, she said, “and they still cry to this day.”

Her daughter’s graduation ceremony this spring paused to remember a schoolmate killed in her home by a bullet through the window.

She has a friend “who is burying her son right now.”

And her own son, four years ago, was murdered in the back seat of their car, dead at the age of 12.

“It’s real,” she said to the crowd at Kansas City’s Ilus Davis Park, dressed in orange t-shirts that said enough, enough, enough, enough . . . end gun violence.

“It’s real.”

LINC joined the gathering of people from around Kansas City May 7 to listen to the testimonies of the impact of violence and to march in solidarity in a commitment, as Mayor Quinton Lucas said, “to call for a future that is free of gun violence.”

“We recognize we work around the clock in Kansas City,” Lucas said, “not just to prevent violent crime, but to make sure we are addressing it as the trauma it truly is in our community.”

Some of those efforts include Partners for Peace — where LINC has joined a host of social services and anti-violence organizations in an effort that Lucas said has provided aid to more than 500 individuals and families who are caught up in the web of violence to help them escape and find safer, healthier paths.

The effort, in collaboration with the police department, health department, county prosecutor’s office and mayor’s office, has launched SAVE KC — Stand up Against Violence in Kansas City — to take a pointed, reformative approach with individuals involved in or close to violence to help them choose peace.

A “call-in” at the end of May gathered people at risk of violence at Morning Star Youth and Family Life Center at 27th and Prospect Ave.

“We broke bread with those who have associates, friends or partners who have been impacted by violence,” Lucas said. The message, delivered by justice officials, social services and victims, was “we have a way out for you. We have a way for you to avoid violent crime. We don’t want to see you killed. We don’t want to see you shot. We don’t want to see you in jail.”

It was hard, Henderson said, to dress in orange and gather the courage as a parent of a gun violence victim to speak to the rally.

“I still cry every day,” she said. But people need to know, she said: “It happens anywhere to anybody.”

The reach of violence, Kansas City Health Department Director Marvia Jones said, “extends way beyond the people who are immediately impacted.”

The community suffers from a toll of physical, mental and social-emotional trauma, she said. “Heart attacks, strokes and birth outcomes are impacted by violence rates in the community.”

The message rising from the rally was that Kansas City remembers and mourns for the victims of violence. And it is reaching out to give support and opportunities for change for those who are poised at risk of more violence.

The message to all "is to say your life is truly valuable,” Lucas said. “Here in Kansas City we’re going to make sure everybody knows we value them. No matter what you’re dealing with, we care about you.”

By Joe Robertson/LINC Writer