Worthington Park will be home to all kinds of food, fun and activities as the annual Darbo Peace Walk and Neighborhood BBQ returns on Wednesday, Sept. 15, 4-8 p.m. on Madison’s east side, after a year off due to the pandemic.
The event was originally scheduled for Thursday, Aug. 26, but was postponed due to weather concerns.
Also traditionally called the “Darbo Block Party,” the event kicks off with the Darbo Peace Walk, which was the brainchild of Aaron Perry, a Madison-area community health advocate for African American men, who came up with the idea years ago when the 1st annual Mentoring Positives Back To School Walk For Peace was held in August of 2015 at Worthington Park.
(Photo supplied)
“Initially, we were walking on the bike path from Darbo to Bridges Golf Course which is about a 3-mile walk,” says Will Green, the executive director of Mentoring Positives, who organizes the event every year. “We ended up shortening up that walk a bit and changing the path because some people had disabilities and could not make that whole walk.
“The purpose of the walk was to give the neighborhood and the community a positive peace walk message for those kids going back to school,” adds Green, “Of course, you know we just had a shooting in the neighborhood a couple days ago, so now more than ever it’s important to send an important message to our kids and families. It’s really just about bringing peace.”
Green, along with wife Becky Green, founded Mentoring Positives back in 2004, an innovative, referral-based mentoring program that works directly with kids and families in a variety of ways in the Darbo/Worthington area and beyond. Mentoring Positives helps to organize the annual Darbo Peace Walk and Neighborhood BBQ and has a big presence at the event.
“This will be the first year that I will have some basketball as a part of this event,” Green says. “I’m only going to do a four-team tournament and hopefully, we’ll get some old MP [Mentoring Positives] alumni playing in that tournament. I’m really looking forward to the basketball tourney.”
Green says he’s excited to be partnering with Tara Wilhelmi and her EOTO Culturally Rooted, a community recovery and wellness organization that has been planning BYAYA (Black Youth and Young Adults) events throughout the summer.
“I’m excited to be partnering up with Tara. She’s going to bring some stuff over like kids games and activities, double dutch, etc.,” Green says. “We’ll have some soccer goals out there. We have Africans in the neighborhood now and Latinos, so hopefully there will be soccer going on.
“Public Health will be out there doing vaccinations. Rissel [Sanderson] from Play and Learn will be there doing her thing. It’s going to be a fun time,” he adds.
A big initiative for Mentoring Positives, which Green started to honor his mother, Muriel Pipkins, who lost her battle with breast cancer at age 46, has been the Off the Block salsa and the Off the Block pizza, which debuted at the Darbo Peace Walk years ago. Off the Block products made by kids in the Darbo community will be sold at the annual Darbo Block Party and the profits will be used to benefit Mentoring Positives programs.
“We are surviving the pandemic. We definitely are still doing our thing at Mentoring Positives. We have been working with kids to make sure that they are employed this summer and we’re still trying to engage more kids,” Green says. “The Salvation Army let me back in the gym over there so I’m over there on Tuesdays and Thursdays 4-6 p.m. and we have some young men over there playing basketball and taking part in some programming.
“After COVID, it’s been tough for our organization – as it is for many organizations – to engage youth and get them into the routine of doing programming,” Green adds. “COVID has made it tough to re-engage with the kids. We hope to do that at the Block Party this Thursday.”
The annual Darbo Peace Walk and Neighborhood BBQ is an event that people have come to count on as a place to have fun, reacquaint with old friends and to get ready for the new school year.
“I’m really looking forward to this one. This event is going to be really fun, especially with Tara and BYAYA out there. We’ll have a DJ and some great music,” Green says. “We will have some artwork – UNIEK – out of Waunakee who donated some beautiful artwork to us and we’ll be giving that away to people who sign up and register for certain parts of the program.”
Tales With Big T literacy program will also be at the event engaging neighborhood kids and giving away free books.
“We are hoping a lot of people will come out and we especially want to engage new residents and start doing some other events in the neighborhood before it gets cold outside,” Green says.
