On Tuesday, March 22nd the Syracuse Elk Lodge 31 presented the Syracuse Police Athletic/Activities League, a check for $5,000. Michael Giehl, an Elk’s Lodge Trustee, members of Elk Lodge 31, Mayor Ben Walsh, Syracuse Police Chief Kenton Buckner, Jimmy Oliver and Syracuse PAL Staff were among those in attendance.
The Syracuse Police Athletic/Activities League is a youth development program that brings youth and police officers together in a non-law enforcement setting. Part of a national organization, the National Police Athletic Leagues, Inc. says it all in their mission statement, “The National Association of Police Athletic/Activities League and its chapters work nationwide promoting the prevention of juvenile crime and violence by building relationships among kids, National PAL is an organization based on the conviction that young people if reached early enough, are more likely to become productive adults and agents of change”
In June of 2021 the Office of Community Engagement was announced, with Jimmy Oliver as its director. Syracuse PAL was created in partnership with the New York State Police, DeWitt Police, District Attorney’s Office, Onondaga County Sheriff’s Office, and various community partners. When it was launched locally, the city of Syracuse said, “The Syracuse PAL provides youth support and skill-building through mentoring and engaging activities in partnership with city, county, and state law enforcement agencies alongside community partners and volunteers.”
According to Jimmy Oliver, Director of Community Engagement for Syracuse PAL, “My job is to build positive relationships between law enforcement and our youth. PAL has been around for a long, long time originated in New York City back in the 1900’s, it’s in Albany, it’s in Buffalo.”
Oliver continues describing how Syracuse PAL began, “A group of us about two years ago, including former Commissioner of Parks and Recreation, Otis Jennings, who himself played in PAL in New York City; Jennings thought, ‘to build a relationship between our youth and our police, we need to start a PAL program.’
So, the mayor came to me and asked if I would be interested in bringing it to the city. Whether it’s through sports, whether it’s, through mentorship, whether it’s through a barbeque. We’re putting our young people, in our community in front of law enforcement to build those intentional relationships. We’re not catching it ten, we’re catching it at zero. You’ll come over and have a hot dog and have a conversation with someone, and that’s what PAL is doing. We’re planting those seeds and putting those experiences in front of our young people.”
Elk Lodge 31 Donates to Police Athletic/Activities League
Michael Giehl, an Elk Lodge 31 Trustee, explained how he became involved with Syracuse PAL saying, “Last Fall, probably in October I saw an advertisement for the PAL basketball league for youth, I have a nine-year-old grandson, he’s a high energy kid. I reached out to my daughter, by the time she got back to me to say, ‘go ahead and do it’, it was too late. I still contacted Jimmy, and he put him on the waiting list.
When we decided on our merger and we needed to make some donations, this was the first thing I thought of. I knew it was a new group/organization and I thought maybe they could use some help. I wasn’t sure how they were funded. I didn’t know if there was federal funding for something like this or not and I found out they were looking for more sponsorship or community-based funding. So, we met, and discussed it and I got a lot of good information.
And I’m glad that we did. I’m a firm believer that we need to build a bridge back between our police agencies and our youth. They’ve gotten some bad press, and I want to see the bridge get rebuilt between police, and particularly our youth. I grew up respecting the police officer, I never wanted to get in trouble and as a kid, of course I did. But I never wanted to, nothing that ever got me into big trouble, just I knew when I got home it would be worse. I want to see the bridges get rebuilt.
I heard my grandson say when he was about 6 or 7 years old how ‘cops are bad’. I have family that’s in law enforcement, I have family that’s retired law enforcement. I wanted him to see there’s good with police officers, there’s good with everybody, there’s just a small group of people that are bad, there’s a little bit of bad in everything. When I see him turn and say, ‘they’re bad’, that kind of upset me a bit. I think with the police athletic league being re-formed, kids interacting with officers, officers as coaches and mentors; for them I think that this will give children a stronger understanding of what they actually do, and why they do what they do.”
Community Engagement Staff and Board Support
The initiative has a small staff providing boots on the ground, people out in the community collaborating with community members, especially our youth. Kelly Ross- Syracuse PAL Staff, Jacob Zook- Syracuse PAL Staff, Jimmy Oliver-Executive Director of PAL Director of Community Engagement. Speaking with them, you realize this is a group of people dedicated to the work of improving relationships between law enforcement and youth. They take their jobs seriously.
Jacob Zook, Syracuse Staff, “I’ve been with PAL for almost a year, since Jimmy launched, it’s been great to see law enforcement engage with our youth. Whether that’s in sports or when we did our DJ clinic, we’re going to be doing our art class soon. It’s just been good to see our law enforcement interacting with youth in a positive manner, it’s been a lot of fun, we’ve served over one thousand kids so far and we’re not stopping there. It’s the three of us, and we’re just constantly thinking of new ideas and new ways just to step it up to the next level.”
Kelly Ross, “My experience with PAL has been eye opening, a bright spot in the community. I came on in October, so I’ve been around for about six months. Since I’ve come on, we’ve done winter basketball leagues, Turkey Giveaways for Thanksgiving, Christmas meals; we’ve done all sorts of things in the community. Aside from kids, we’ve helped people of all ages, nationalities, everyone. That’s what we’re here to do. We’re here to build relationships between the police department and the community and to ease the tensions that are here.”
From its beginning, Syracuse PAL had several athletic activities planned for July 2021. For example, registration for Syracuse PAL Sports/Arts Summer Clinics in football, soccer, dance, and basketball had 50 slots available per camp for children ages 6-13 years old.
Joseph Torrillo, Board Member of Syracuse PAL, has known Jimmy since high school said, “Jimmy Oliver and I played baseball together in we both attended Henninger. I know he’s done a lot of work with the Boys and Girls Club; he actually left and went to go down to Richmond to help start some programs down there. Came back here, and when he mentioned that he was doing Syracuse PAL, I was interested, and he asked if I wanted to help out and it matriculated into a board position.
The kids want to play, over a thousand kids that we’ve serviced so far. When we launch a new program from PAL, the registration fills up almost immediately, we launched a baseball and soccer registration at the beginning of March, within two weeks over 100 kids had signed up for both. And registration closed. So, we know the desire to play is there, it’s just about making sure the programs are available to them and without barriers to entry. The fact that PAL is being offered to our youth for free by way of donations from local organizations and state and federal grant money, that’s the difference for me and that’s why I got involved.”
Syracuse Mayor Ben Walsh and Police Chief Buckner, thanked Elks Lodge 31 for their donation to Syracuse PAL. And the Elks Lodge 31 are already looking at several area organizations which they’ll allocate funds to in the near future.
