The Massachusetts students who organized the recent March for Our Lives have planned another activist event: Town Hall for Our Lives.
Working with March For Our Lives Boston and Stop Handgun Violence, students have organized five town halls to take place this Saturday, April 7.
“We may not be old enough to vote; we are certainly old enough to voice our opinions,” said Charlotte Lowell, an Andover High School student organizer, in a statement. “This movement will continue at the Town Hall for Our Lives, where we will learn and mobilize to create the change our classrooms and communities deserve.”
State and federal legislators as well as city council members will participate in different town halls, from Rep. Katherine Clark to Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone to Boston city councilors Ayanna Pressley and Annissa Essaibi-George, and more.
According to the Town Hall Project, 157 members of Congress have not held an in-person town hall in more than a year, since Jan. 1, 2017. But town halls are vital to democracy, student organizers said, and especially important to their fight for gun control.
“I was in the fourth grade when the Sandy Hook shooting happened. I was in the ninth grade when the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting happened. Since I heard about Sandy Hook, I have had a fear that this will happen to me or my little sisters. … I am tired of being afraid,” said District 2 student organizer Jaylin Gemmel, of Nipmuc Regional, in a statement. “The adults that are leading this country have shown that they are not going to change. It’s time to show them that it is the only option.”
Town Hall events scheduled for April 7 include:
District 1: Robert Boland Library, 1350 West St, Pittsfield, MA 7 – 9 p.m.
District 2: Millbury Public Library- 128 Elm St, Millbury, 9:30 -11 a.m.
Districts 3 & 6: Joint town hall at the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Lowell, 657 Middlesex St, Lowell, MA 11 a.m. – 1 p.m.
Districts 4 & 5: Joint town hall at the Kennedy Middle School at 165 Mill St, Natick, 10 a.m. – 12 p.m.
District 7 & 8: Joint town hall at the Bolling Building, 2300 Washington St, Roxbury, 1:30 – 3:30 p.m.
