- [Narrator] Just ahead on "One Detroit."

The Detroit branch NAACP announces the special award recipients for its Fight for Freedom Fund dinner.

Plus, Civil Rights activist, Reverend Joann Watson, talks about the impact of the 1963 Detroit walk to freedom on her life and career.

Also ahead, our future of work series explores the career goals of Generation Z.

Plus, we'll get details on this weekend's Silence the Violence March and rally aimed at eradicating gun violence.

And we'll give you some ideas on how to spend the weekend and beyond in metro Detroit.

It's all coming up next on "One Detroit."

- [Presenter] From Delta faucets to Behr paint, Masco Corporation is proud to deliver products that enhance the way consumers all over the world experience and enjoy their living spaces.

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Support for this program is provided by the Cynthia & Essel Ford Fund for Journalism and Detroit Public TV.

- [Presenter 2] The DTE Foundation is a proud sponsor of Detroit Public TV.

Among the state's largest foundations committed to Michigan focused giving.

We support organizations that are doing exceptional work in our state.

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(upbeat music) - [Narrator] Just ahead on this week's "One Detroit," we'll hear from the members of Generation Z about their thoughts and hopes for their future in the workforce.

Plus, an east side Detroit church brings together thousands to rally against gun violence.

And if you're looking for something to do for Father's Day and Juneteenth, Cecelia Sharpe of 90.9 WRCJ will have some ideas.

But first up, the Detroit branch NAACP is gearing up for several events during its June Jubilee A celebration of freedom from June 22nd through the 25th.

The weekend will conclude with the 68th annual Fight for Freedom Fund dinner featuring keynote speaker, US Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia.

Several awards will be presented at the dinner.

- These awards are presented based on service that has been done and work that is yet to be done.

We are proud to present to Attorney Aaron Keith one of two great expectations awardee.

Our second great expectation award recipient is Mr. Kenneth Nixon.

We are pleased to honor Senator Stephanie Chang.

We will present the Ida B.

Wells Freedom and Justice Award to none other than the Honorable Justice Kyra Harris Bolden.

(people applauding) As we celebrate 50 years of the hip hop industry, we will honor Mr. Doug E. Fresh.

And this is the creme de la creme, as we present the James Weldon Johnson Lifetime Achievement Award to former US Ambassador Andrew J.

Young.

(people applauding) - [Narrator] The NAACP June Jubilee will also include a commemorative freedom walk on June 24th in honor of the 60th anniversary of the Detroit Walk to Freedom.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was among the 125,000 people who marched down Woodward Avenue in 1963, making it the largest civil rights demonstration ever at the time.

When Detroit contributor Cecelia Sharpe of 90.9 WRCJ sat down with one of the marchers, Reverend Joann Watson, to get her memories of that historic day.

(soft bright music) - I am here with Reverend Joann Watson, and we are talking about the 60th anniversary of the Detroit Walk to Freedom that occurred in 1963, and you were there for that event.

What was your experience on that day?

- It was a magnificent day.

I was 12 years old, and my grandparents unexpectedly picked me up.

I had no idea where I was headed, and we were headed to Cobo to hear Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and to see the largest crowd I had ever seen in my life.

It was just truly a triumphant event 'cause you felt lifted up by the crowd, you felt energized by the excitement, and my grandmother held my hand tightly as we surged through that huge crowd.

For some reason, I never felt tired.

We were there a long time, but I felt lifted up.

- So the March or the Walk to Freedom was to generate awareness and raise funds for the Southern Christian Leadership Council.

- Well, the signs all said jobs, justice, peace.

Jobs, justice, peace which I later learned was the mantra for Dr. King's events.

But that march really changed my life, and it still touches me today to think about Dr. King's voice, how it reverberated with those loud speakers, how the crowd hung on every word.

Nobody left without talking about Dr. King's speech.

It was mesmerizing.

- Now this was the first time that he gave the I had a dream speech.

- Right.

- Before Washington.

- That's true.

- Which people forget.

What did the walk to freedom mean to the people in Detroit at that time?

- It meant a lot because the injustice that was happening around the country was not just in the south.

It also included the north.

There were housing issues, employment issues, we had police brutality in Detroit that was unaddressed, and I remember walking to choir rehearsal as the eldest of 10.

The girls never got stopped, but the boys in my family would get stopped frequently by police for nothing.

Nothing.

And so we witnessed injustice, and there was a need to have a march in Detroit.

We felt that Detroit was part of the movement.

So not only organized labor, but block clubs, community groups, youth groups.

We felt a part of it.

We felt a part of what was happening.

- You've had a career in public service serving for the YWCA as the executive director for the Detroit branch, the assistant executive director for the national YWCA.

Served on city council.

The community liaison for Congressman John Conyers.

At 12 years old, did you know this was going to be your path?

- Had no idea.

Didn't know what I was going to be doing.

I just knew that I was going to try to make a difference in my life.

Reverend Dr. CT Vivian was a mentor of mine, and he was one that Dr. King called the greatest preacher who ever lived.

I was certainly mentored by Dr. Dorothy Irene Height, who I loved and respected.

She was actually the highest ranking black woman in the YWCA of the USA, but she saw all of us as her mentees.

We were all her children.

I was mentored by Mother Rosa Parks who I loved and respected.

She lived in Detroit more years than she lived in Montgomery, Alabama, and we both worked for Congressman John Conyers.

She would go to reparations conferences with me.

So I'm very blessed, very blessed.

I didn't ask for it, could not have hoped for it, but it came into my life.

- But you continue to share that legacy and you continue to pass it on to the next generations and to the community, and to impact change.

Can you talk about some of the ways that you have made those changes, and the people that you have helped to nurture and mentor and guide?

- There's a wonderful organization in Detroit called We the People of Detroit, and they have gone door to door making sure people have access to water in Detroit and Flint.

They have been galvanizing and organizing around the country, and of course in Detroit, to make sure that people keep their water on, have access to water.

So I've made the water as a human right an important part of my legacy, and made sure that there's somebody following me who will carry that on in a generational way.

- Something people may not know about you, as you spoke of youth, is that you were on the board of American Girl.

- I was.

- The doll company, and you had an impact on one of the dolls that was created, Melody.

- I did.

- Tell us a little bit about Melody and the inspiration for Melody.

- They were looking for someone who could help them understand what life was like for a girl in the '60s who was embracing the Motown music sound, which I did.

Mattel folks and the American girl people when they came to Detroit, and I drove them all around the city to show them all the things that made Detroit so unique and special, and also to talk about how Detroit was proudly a part of that '63 march.

- What can people do today to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Detroit Walk to Freedom?

- I think they should identify acts that will help change.

We're not just here to take care of ourselves.

What have you done to help somebody today?

If I can help somebody along the way, then my living has not been in vain.

- [Narrator] Turning now to our future of work initiative, "One Detroit" recently held a town hall in front of an audience at Marygrove Conservancy focusing on Generation Z and their career goals.

I spoke with three Gen Z guests about their hopes for the future, the types of jobs they've been exposed to as students, and whether they'll stay in Michigan to pursue their careers.

Here's a portion of that conversation.

(upbeat music) - How optimistic are you about your future in general, and how optimistic do you think your peers are?

We'll start with you.

- Well, I would definitely say I was not as optimistic as I am now my senior year of high school.

I was leaving and I knew there was somewhere to go, but I didn't know if I wanted to be there.

But I went knowing that I had experience in that area already and I- - You're going into arts?

- Yes, going into illustration and fine arts.

But now that I'm engaging and experiencing at a more professional level, I feel as though this is something I would like to pursue.

I do see myself doing this in the future, and I am pretty optimistic of what holds ahead of me.

- [Will] Cool, what about you, Sam?

- Personally like, the future looks pretty optimistic to me.

I know a lot of my friends, they also probably feel optimistic.

We're all going into good universities or like, going into a job or taking a gap year and have a goal for that gap year like, wanna do entrepreneuring.

Like, everybody's doing their own thing.

Like, everybody's like we're done with high school.

Let's move on to the future so it's really, I don't know, everybody seems happy around.

- What about you?

- I personally know with the path that I have taken I do feel very hopeful just 'cause there is a large need for trades.

However, I know a lot of my friends that are still in university, they are a little bit fearful just 'cause they're not sure what they wanna do, and it's hard when you're already going for one thing to then figure out what it is you wanna do from there.

- In your K-12 education, have you had any courses that were geared specifically toward you experiencing, learning about, or making any sort of decisions, or aiming you towards any sort of career pathways or anything like that?

Kendall, we'll start with you.

- I went to a private school for high school, and there weren't really any options given to us for trades.

It was mainly pushed to do something whether it was a science, politics, medical.

- [Will] Sam?

- I mean, at least at my school, it's like freshman year and then you get to do a choose your adventure kind of thing.

So there's like a engineering type area like, that you can choose to go into that and like, a bunch of engineering classes open it up.

Even if you're in engineering, you could take like medical classes but like, you get priority in engineering.

- What about you?

- I feel like there's not many opportunities unless we ask for it.

I'm really glad that so many people are asking now because a lot of people in this generation don't really speak up for exactly what they want.

- Do you think that the guidance that you guys are getting is applicable to the world that you're going into?

Sam, let's start with you.

- I mean, yes, whenever, like an adult says, for example, they would say like their exact experience and then you take it with like a grain of salt 'cause then, you know, it's like different times now.

- Same thing, grain of salt with everybody else's opinions.

I do think that there is a little bit of a lack of understanding of what it is actually like to be in Gen Z per se navigating the world 'cause it is changing.

There's a lot of things that aren't the same anymore.

Whether it be, you know, money, or buying houses, and things of that nature.

It's much harder and I think that, you know, older generations really aren't equipped 'cause we don't know where it's progressing.

- I usually when people give me advice on where to go, I usually don't take it to heart unless they have some experience in that field.

And even then, I still don't, you know, hold it down in stone.

- Are you guys planning on staying in Michigan once you've graduated?

I see you smiling already so that doesn't bode well.

And are your peers going to be staying here?

What are the conversations that you guys are hearing amongst your friends?

- Unless you guys can like bend the climate to be a little more warm.

(laughs) Like, I don't think I can stand any more six month winters after I finish college.

- That's fair.

- Yeah, but everything here is perfectly fine.

I think some of my peers are going to stay, but me, I'm not sure I could stay.

- Sam, what about you?

Because Michigan, obviously we are, the engineering is something that we do better than a lot of people in the world.

I'm just putting that out there.

- [Samantha] I know.

- What is your thought about?

- I'm definitely gonna stay here in Michigan.

Like you said like, Michigan's like, so great for engineering.

So why would I leave?

I don't know.

I'm gonna stay, but my friends definitely want to leave.

Again, it's out of anybody's control.

It's the weather.

(laughs) - Is it really, Kendall, well, you're next.

Is it really the weather?

- Yes.

- There's snow in New York, California's on fire half the time.

- I definitely have to go somewhere like, in the middle or in the south.

I cannot stay up here.

- Okay, Kendall, are you staying here?

- No.

(audience laughs) (Will laughs) - The matter-of-factness.

So why not?

- There's a lot of reasons.

I feel like it's just 'cause I grew up here, I wanna see something different, experience kind of my own story, and not just everything I've been around my entire life.

And as for my friends, they've either already left Michigan or they are leaving.

- Personally.

- [Narrator] And you can see more of the Gen Z conversation at onedetroitpbs.org.

Plus, make sure to join us for a virtual Future of Work Town Hall On June 21st at noon on the One Detroit Facebook page.

We'll focus on all generations in the workforce in this town hall titled, "From Boomers to Zoomers: The Generational Impact on the Future of Work."

Let's turn now to the Silence the Violence march and rally held by the Church of the Messiah on Detroit's east side.

Thousands are expected to come together on Saturday June 17th to honor the victims of gun violence, and find solutions to stop the shooting.

American Black Journal host, Steven Henderson, spoke with organizer Pastor Barry Randolph about plans for the 16th annual event.

(upbeat music) - You can't believe it's been 16 years.

This will be the 16th annual Silence the Violence march.

This year, well, last year it had grown so large that other people came and said, "Hey, we need to be doing this in our city."

So we're going to be doing it in other cities across the state of Michigan.

So it's going to be in Ann Arbor, Grand Haven, Flint, Kalamazoo, Oxford, Southfield, and Pontiac.

And so there will be other cities joining us honoring the innocent victims of gun violence.

Some will hold marches, some will have prayer rallies, some will be doing sitting-ins.

And in Southfield there'll be a gun buyback.

So they're gonna be different across the state of Michigan, but it's expanding.

Last year, about a thousand people show up.

This year we expect between two and 3,000 people.

- So I wanna give you a chance just to talk a little about what's going on.

This is a strange time in the city for violence.

We've gotten through the pandemic, the awfulness of the pandemic.

Everybody, all of us had to kind of relearn how to function in the world, I feel like, after all the loss and disruption of that.

And we come out of it to what seems to be shaping up as an era of increasing violence in the city.

it's not safer, it's worse.

You see it up close with young people, you see it in the community there at the church.

What do you think is going on?

Why is this happening?

- Well, Steven that is a great question, and one of the things that I think about is now in 2023, is our leading cause of death among young people or children under the age of 17 is guns.

Something a hundred percent preventable.

This issue is not all across the world.

It is a unique American way of dying, and I think that's something that we need to look at.

It used to be accidents or illness, and now it's guns.

This is something that we can do something about.

And I always have to tell people, this has nothing to do with your Second Amendment rights being able to carry a firearm.

This is about getting it out of the hands of people who shouldn't have one.

People who don't believe in just carrying a firearm to protect themselves, but who are planning on committing murder.

That's really the issue that we're trying to get down to.

That's why we're trying to silence that violence.

But this is unique across the country.

It's not just Detroit, it's everywhere.

And firearms, there's an easy access to it, and there's a lot of people who shouldn't have it who have it, and they're taking their anger and frustration out on other people.

So times have changed.

- Yeah, I know you do a lotta work reaching out to young people in your community.

Talk about the things that we need to be doing to divert them from this kinda thing.

Obviously marches like Silence the Violence are really important, but you work all year on this issue.

- Yeah, and what I'd like to tell people too 'cause people come and say, "Well, Pastor Barry, marches don't stop gun violence."

The march is not to stop gun violence.

The march is to remember those who died because of gun violence.

So we walk around with signs and picture of those.

So we wanna remember them and we wanna honor them by creating hopefully more peaceful communities, more cohesive, strong communities.

I'll let the young people know that I'm 60 years old.

So Steven, I'm older than you and I remember a time when gun violence was not the leading cause of death, there was no such word as carjacking or drive-bys, no such words as mass shootings.

You didn't hear about this.

That wasn't that long ago.

So there was a time when this was not as big of an issue as it is now.

So it's not like we've never not had a time when gun violence was not a major issue in this country.

So we know that that can exist, and we know that that can happen, and what we're trying to do is make sure that happens.

What we need to do is to build our communities and neighborhood.

We need to have more affordable housing, we need to have job training, we need to work on business incubation, We need to work on education and skilled trades to make sure that our young people have a good, positive, strong future, and we need to teach them their value.

The value of who they are as a human being more than outward material sense.

- Yeah, the march, people, anyone can participate obviously, but I wanted you to talk just a little more about the things that you have seen about, you know, changing the sense of community around this issue from the march.

You were just talking about people saying, well, marches don't solve crimes or marches don't stop people from shooting each other.

But you are building a real sense of community around how we think about this issue, how we deal with this issue.

Talk about over the 16 years how that's changed.

- Well, I can tell you our very first march, we had 58 people and it was specifically for the community of Island View because we had a couple of unfortunate murders of young people, and we decided we were not just gonna sit back and let them be statistics.

We were going to do something.

So we created an organization to help fight crime and build community.

So it was about doing that specifically for Island View.

Then within a couple years, it became a citywide event, and then lately, it became a statewide event and so it was about bringing the resources directly to the community to those who are the most vulnerable.

And one of the things that I'm proud of over the years is that so many groups and organization that work on gun violence intervention are part of what we do every year.

So the people who do the boots on the groundwork, the people who work with the ones with the guns, the people who work in dangerous communities in the neighborhood, they come and they participate.

- [Narrator] There are a lot of events and activities in metro Detroit this weekend to celebrate Father's Day and Juneteenth.

Here's Cecelia Sharp of 90.9 WRCJ with today's One Detroit Weekend.

- The weekend is just around the corner, and there's a lot to see and do in and around the city.

So let's get to it.

On Friday June 16th, join a book talk.

"King: A Life."

The book talk launches a week of celebrations for Juneteenth, and the 60th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's 1963 Walk to Freedom in Detroit.

Also on Friday at the DIA, the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival presents Shouse: Schumann and Shostakovich with performances by the Pelia and Hesper string quartets.

The Chamber Music Festival will continue for two weeks through June 24th.

So stay tuned for more information on the performances.

If you're looking for a little more speed and thrills in your entertainment this weekend, head to the M1 Concourse June 15th through 18th for the extreme experience where you can jump into supercars like Lamborghini, Porsches, and more to drive around the world class racetrack.

On June 16th, you can listen to Ben Sharkey at Andiamo Showroom while participating in a wine tasting dinner.

Sharkey's jazz, soul, and pop music is set to pair perfectly with the meal.

And of course, there are many Juneteenth celebrations this week, including Batch Brewing Company's Beats and BBQ Block Party June 16th, the celebration of Freedom, and the Juneteenth Freedom Fest on June 18th at Eastern Markets Shed five.

There's always so much going on in and around Detroit.

Here are more events for you to check out.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator] That will do it for this week's "One Detroit."

Thanks for watching.

Head to the "One Detroit" website for all the stories we're working on.

Follow us on social media and sign up for our weekly newsletter.

- [Presenter] From Delta Faucets to Behr paint, Masco Corporation is proud to deliver products that enhance the way consumers all over the world experience and enjoy their living spaces.

Masco, serving Michigan communities since 1929.

Support for this program is provided by, the Cynthia & Edsel Ford Fund for Journalism and Detroit Public TV.

- [Presenter 2] The DTE Foundation is a proud sponsor of Detroit Public TV.

Among the state's largest foundations committed to Michigan focused giving.

We support organizations that are doing exceptional work in our state.

Visit DTEfoundation.com to learn more.

- [Presenter] Nissan Foundation, and viewers like you.

(upbeat bright music)