Mayor Cherelle Parker summons city leaders to meet and discuss solutions following SEPTA shootings

Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle L. Parker summoned dozens of elected officials, law enforcement leaders, union officers, and advocates to attend a closed-door meeting about gun violence Friday following a spate of shootings this week that left 11 students shot.

The gathering included the district attorney, top police brass, the superintendent, City Council members, the mayor’s cabinet, business leaders, and even a group of high school students. It lasted for about two hours on the second floor of City Hall Friday afternoon and was not publicized by the mayor’s office.

Parker said after the meeting that it was important the gathering took place in private so “there was nobody to perform for.” She said she was inspired by the students who attended, including a 15-year-old who said he told the room the city needs to do a better job helping parents secure access to jobs and housing.

“We have short-, medium-, and long-term strategies that we have to employ to address all of what is happening,” Parker said. “I left feeling like everybody was together … and nobody was finger-pointing at each other.”

The meeting, while it had a feel-good conclusion, came at the end of what may have been the most challenging and violent week the city has seen since Parker took office in January, when she pledged to end what she has described as a “sense of lawlessness.”

Over the last five days, gunfire erupted on or near a SEPTA bus four times. On Monday, five people were shot at a bus stop in the city’s Ogontz section, including Dayemen Taylor, a 17-year-old student from Imhotep Institute Charter High School, who was killed. Two days later, eight Northeast High School students were shot and wounded while waiting to board a bus.

Investigators are still trying to piece together the crimes and are probing whether the two high-profile shootings were connected. Philadelphia Commissioner Kevin Bethel said the investigations are progressing, but the shooters in both cases remain at large.

Superintendent Tony B. Watlington Sr. said leaders came away with specific strategies to explore, including how the police department, the school district, and charter schools can better share information about potential conflicts.

“We feel really inspired that we’re going to work together under the mayor’s leadership,” he said.

Parker this week expressed a sense of resolve, saying at the scene of the shooting in the Northeast that “we will not be held hostage” and vowing that she would ensure law enforcement that “every resource that is needed is readily available so the work can be done to solve the crimes.”

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Punctuating the week with a meeting of top city officials, community leaders, and law enforcement also fulfills a key campaign promise Parker made to convene leaders who have expressed divergent views on how to stem shootings in the city.

That dynamic was on display during the latter years of former Mayor Jim Kenney’s administration, when he and former Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw at times publicly disagreed with District Attorney Larry Krasner, a progressive prosecutor. The clashing views angered other city officials, including former City Council President Darrell L. Clarke, who said in 2022 that city and law enforcement leaders needed to “get in a room and figure out a way to like each other.”

But Parker campaigned on bringing an end to public displays of disaffection and, since taking office, has made her mantra: “One Philly, united city.”

“Philadelphia is yearning to be unified,” Parker said after winning the Democratic primary in May, “and I’m proud to be the person who has an opportunity to do such.”

The administration has yet to detail a comprehensive crime and safety plan. On her first day in office, Parker signed an executive order declaring a citywide public safety emergency, and charged Police Commissioner Kevin J. Bethel and Managing Director Adam K. Thiel with developing a crime abatement plan by her 100th day in office, which falls in early April.

She has said her plan will be three-pronged — focused on prevention, intervention, and enforcement — and will include strategies to bolster recruitment and retention in the police department, which has been drastically understaffed for several years.

Parker also said earlier this week during a meeting with antiviolence advocates and people who have lost loved ones to shootings that her budget proposal, set to be unveiled next week, will include dollars for grassroots community organizations “that have a track record of connecting with the populations that need it most.”

Following Friday’s meeting, she said her goal is to “find a way to leverage every government dollar … to get a more effective and efficient use.”

“We’ve got to do it for the school district and we’ve got to do it for SEPTA,” Parker said. “We can’t have people afraid of riding mass transit. And so we have to have a collaborative approach.”