Dear Editor,

Anyone who believes in Dr Horace Chang’s proposal to remove funding from social intervention has no knowledge of the impact such programmes have on society on a whole, whether small or huge, and has never found themselves within such a community so as to realise the necessity of such efforts.

The issue here, I think, is when you are not exposed or aware of the struggle that mother, father, and children experience every day, then such conclusion is easily drawn with the intention to put the blame elsewhere.

In the 1970s to early 1990s the then Anthony Spaulding for St Andrew Southern funded the School Of Music for the area — a centre at which boys and girls congregate every evening after school with the bandmaster Sparrow Martin. That effort created up to today some of the most famous musicians and bandmasters all over the world. By the way, St Andrew Southern comprises the area called Arnett Gardens (Concrete Jungle). If Spaulding’s dream had been fulfilled today, the present so-called sports complex would have been fitted with swimming pool and all the relevant amenities required to aid the youth.

The true reason social intervention can have little or no impact is due to the fact that we don’t know how to manage such programmes here in Jamaica. The facilitators are not exposed to real-life scenarios elsewhere for them to properly disseminate such training. There are no suitable training centres and, of course, too little funding that we are thinking of cutting. Though a serious matter, it’s a joke what we refer to as social intervention in Jamaica.

The only part of Dr Chang’s speech I agree with is the point that new life, new direction, new vision is needed. I am advocating for more funds with dedicated, proven professionals to implement such programmes. Spending funds on states of emergency all over the place for soldiers to fall asleep will certainly not help our present crisis. In the USA, each city has its own community centre with activities such as swimming, basketball, computer labs, chess tournaments, various language and literature classes, etc. I guarantee that, with such revamping and effort, along with an increase in funding, we would have far less youth attracted to crime; this is no guesswork. This has been proven all over the world. We need to stop fooling ourselves to think we even have a fully fledged social intervention programme in Jamaica.

Neville Grantnevillejamrock@gmail.com