SALT LAKE CITY — To close out the month of Juneteenth celebrations, the Project Success Coalition hosted a healing and reconciliation vigil.
Betty Sawyer, the executive director of the Project Success Coalition, said the event has many different purposes.
“The trauma that has occurred because of racism, the hardship, the heartache, the division, all of those things, and for us to just pause and recognize that,” Sawyer said.
Not only that, but they say it's to focus on building back relationships with others to try to tackle the challenges our divided society is currently facing.
“Whether it's health care, whether it's education, whether it's business development and mental health — all of those things that we could work on those together,” Sawyer said.
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Fifteen-year-old Larenz Jordan attends Westfield High School and is actively working to make his school more inclusive.
“I plan to start a club called Black Student Union and be the first one in my school district,” Jordan said.
Jordan said because of the past, relationships with federal and state agencies are strained.
“The Black diaspora in America, they have a lot of distrust with federal ideas,” Jordan said. “It's just important that we heal from that and we can progress as a world.”
Sawyer added that with recent legislation being passed — not only federally but locally — it can make society feel even more divided.
“With our legislation, you know, flags, anti-DEI, it’s like, for what purpose? What is the purpose? Even the rhetoric and what we're doing around immigration, we all know that most of our systems need reform,” Sawyer said.
Sawyer said, however, there is one thing all agencies can do to try to bring the community closer.
“If you walk into a room and you're having a major conversation, and you look around and everybody looks like you, then you need to pause,” Sawyer said. “We know some solutions. Okay, we're creative people, so invite us to the table so that we can reason together and come up with better solutions that we can all live with. “
