Pubdate: Wed, 28 Jun 2006 Source: Province, The (CN BC) Copyright: 2006 The Province Contact: http://www.canada.com/theprovince/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/476 Author: Elaine O'Connor Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth) WINNIPEG'S WEST END: DRUG WARS CATCH INNER-CITY KIDS IN THE CROSSFIRE Vancouver's not the only city fighting street crime. We can learn from other Canadian cities: Winnipeg's West End is a modern-day Wild West. The inner-city area's struggled with drugs and gangs, while the city itself is the murder and gang capital of Canada, with the highest per-capita homicide rate (nearly five per 100,000) of nine major cities, 2004 Statistics Canada data shows. In October 2005, a tragic death shocked citizens into demanding change. A 17-year-old bystander was caught in a shoot-out between the Mad Cowz and African Mafia gangs fighting for crack territory. In response, police launched Operation Clean Sweep and from November 2005 to March 2006, made 658 arrests, seized 68 weapons and mounds of drugs. The effort got the University of Winnipeg thinking. "If your university's in an inner-city that has gangs, kids dropping out and single parents, you'd better darn well embrace that neighbourhood and try to make it a better place," says former mayor and U of W Foundation president Susan Thompson. So they opened the Wii Chiiwaakanak Learning Centre near campus to help kids with homework clubs, arts, sports camps, native crafts, elders circles and ESL, with university students as mentors. Hundreds of kids have discovered the centre, and themselves. "If those kids see an aboriginal university student or another inner-city university student," says the university's Jennifer Rattray, "they begin to believe that they can do it too, what seems so impossible." - --- MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman