The Notebook (Issue 25) 🍃

The week of April 10, 2023
A memorial lays across the stairs of Old National Bank at 300 East Main. There are five white rose bouquets - one for each of the victims lost in Monday's mass shooting.
(Photo Credit: Natosha Via for The New York Times)

We continue to mourn the loss of 5 Louisvillians whose lives were senselessly and tragically cut short on Monday: Tommy Elliott. Josh Barrick. Jim Tutt. Juliana Farmer. Deana Eckert. We also continue to pray for those that are still fighting under the care of our University of Louisville hospital leadership.  

Many of us are in a fog as we try to piece through memories from this week and try to make sense of the mass shooting in our own downtown Louisville. Moreover, at nearly the same time as the mass shooting at Old National Bank, there was another shooting downtown near JCTC. Monday, tragically, accounts for the 146th mass shooting of 2023, and brings the total number of homicides in Louisville to 42 since the start of the year. In every corner of this city, you can find a life turned upside down by the grief and trauma of gun violence. 

We are losing Louisvillians nearly every other day to gun violence, and yet, it feels like we can do almost nothing to tackle making stronger gun laws in our state. For years, even our brightest civic leaders seem perplexed by trying to find common sense solutions for getting guns off the street. Mayor Craig Greenberg and Congressman Morgan McGarvey did a great job of outlining this issue and calling for greater local and state collaboration in Tuesday afternoon’s press conference linked here with more information on the day's proceedings here. 

There is an ocean of guns available to virtually anyone in this country at any time, despite two critical facts: 1) Most Americans want stricter gun control in response to the increase in shootings; and 2) There is clear data showing stronger gun laws in states mean fewer shooting deaths. Below, we have compiled a joint statement calling for action in Louisville.  We’d love for you to consider signing on. 

The following is a joint statement that has been shared with the Courier Journal, Business First, and other media outlets. We are continuing to gather signatures, so please let us know if you are willing to have your name listed as a supportive signee. If you would like to sign or know of anyone else that would, please email us at [email protected]
 

In Louisville, we are completely heartbroken and fed up with the senseless gun violence which we continue to see almost daily in our city. It is essential that we each stand up, be counted, and together create a chorus of voices calling for getting assault weapons and guns off the streets. Together we can find the path forward to prevent all forms of shootings, including mass shootings. Each of our daily actions must constantly value and care for all of life, human and natural! It is our moral responsibility to insist daily that we immediately stop all cruel, senseless and inhumane violence and cruelties. We must reflect the best spirit of our beloved city and State calling for major action to create a safer and healthier Louisville and Kentucky.


This week, we have lost more Louisvillians who should not be dead. We’ve lost more fathers, more mothers, more friends, more family members, more leaders in our community. We must act immediately and stop the cruel and senseless violence.
 

With Love for Our City and All Those We Have Lost, 

Greg Abernathy, Mikus Abolins-Abols and Natalie Christian, Anne Arensberg,
Sen. Cassie Chambers Armstrong, Mary Berry, Wendell and Tanya Berry,
Turney Berry, Dr. Aruni Bhatnagar, Regina Blake, Representative Tina Bojanowski, Nina Bonnie,
Christina Lee Brown, Garvin Brown, Owsley Brown III and Victoire Brown,
Representative Beverly Chester Burton, David Y. Chack, Alfonso "Al" Cornish and Yvonne Austin-Cornish, Reverend Kevin Cosby, oSha Cowley-Shireman, Sarah Lynn Cunningham,
Archbishop Shelton Fabre, Robert Barry Fleming, Sandra Frazier, Jamie and Sydney Goldsmith,
John and Mary Moss Greenebaum, Representative Daniel Grossberg, Ali Haider, Tracy Jo Ingram,
Ed and Bernadette S. Hamilton, Audwin and Rae Helton, Representative Keturah Herron,
Alice and Wade Houston, Barbara Lynne Jamison, Former Minority Leader Joni Jenkins,
Ricky Jones, Anne Clay Kenan, Heather Kleisner, Representative Nima Kulkarni, 
Nana Lampton, Annie Langan, Clest and Chuck Lanier,
 Deborah and Paul LaPorte, Keith Logan, Todd Lowe, Lois Mateus, 
Tori Murden McClure, Congressman Morgan McGarvey, Sister Claire McGowan, 
William "Beaver" McMahan, Senate Minority Leader Gerald Neal, Mary Nixon, Will Oldham,
Timothy D. Peters and Susan Taylor Peters, Lyndon Pryor, Rick and Von Purdy,
Sadiqa Reynolds, Ambassador Theodore Sedgwick, Kevin and Ivvy Shurn,
Anthony Smith, Ted and Jane Smith, Rebecca T Smith and Ali Ahmad-Hukle,
Ted Steinbock and Sarah Martin, Bishop John Stowe, Julia Taylor,
Gordon Tobin and Elisabeth Tobin, Matt Wallace, Megan Webb,
Representative Lisa Willner, Dawn Wilson, Aaron and Sarah Yarmuth,
and Congressman John and Cathy Yarmuth.
Mayor Greenberg, Rep. McGarvey Plea for Gun Reform:
Tuesday's Full Press Release - April 11, 2023
City officials are calling on Kentuckians to give blood. Gunshot wounds require nearly 10x more blood than victims of other traumas.
Please consider scheduling your donation today.

Archbishop Shelton Fabre's Response

“My heart is heavy as we learn about another mass shooting, now in our own Louisville community,” Louisville Archbishop Shelton J. Fabre said in a statement provided to The Record, the weekly newspaper of the Archdiocese of Louisville. He reminded the faithful that amid Easter joy, the cross remains. “Even with our Easter hope so recently renewed, we have been quickly reminded that we still live in the shadow of the cross, the cross of senseless violence. For now, please join with me in praying for those who have died and for those who have been injured and for their families [...] Let us also pray for all in our community as we deal with this tragedy.” (Source: The Catholic Review.)
Festival of Faiths respond with a reminder for us to not lose hope in our despair, but fight for communal change.

Louisville Jewish Community Relations Council Response

The Jewish Federation of Louisville, Jewish Family & Career Services, the Jewish Community Relations Council, congregations Adath Jeshurun, Anshei Sfard, Chabad of Kentucky, Keneseth Israel, The Temple Adath Israel Brith Sholom, Temple Shalom, the Louisville Board of Rabbis and Cantors and the American Jewish Committee of Louisville mourn the tragic losses of those killed or hurt in the shootings at the downtown branch of the Old National Bank [Monday] morning and, minutes later, at the Jefferson Community & Technical College. We are horrified by this news and, like you, await the release of further information. We understand that there were five people killed (among them the shooter) and eight wounded -- including two responding law enforcement officers at the bank shooting, and one dead and one wounded at JCTC -- each the product of the all-too-frequent gun violence plaguing our city.

We have reached out to Mayor Greenberg’s office and Louisville Metro Police Department’s Victim Services Division. Additionally, we have offered support including emergency counseling services from JFCS, victims’ resources, and clergy support to the victims of this tragedy. We are also aware that Metro Louisville will be establishing a victims’ fund to assist those who have been affected. As we hear of additional needs or gain more information about this tragedy, we will share it.

We have also reached out to other faith groups and expect there to be vigils in the coming hours and days, and will share information on this as well. 

As members of the Jewish Community, we pray for and are committed to working for the day when swords are beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, and the gun violence terrorizing our community is no more. (Source: JewishLouisville.org)
The memorial on Main Street has continued to grow.
This photograph, taken Tuesday morning, shows the growing number of flowers gracing the stairs at the site of the attack. 
(Photo by R. Blake for The Notebook)
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