In Houston, an unsolved crime spawned community unity, after-school programs and safe spaces for children and families

Words by Juan Antonio Sorto.

In May of 2016, Stella Mireles-Walters was newly retired and at home, watching a tragic story on the local news of a sixth-grader who was stabbed to death while walking home from school.

The tragedy hit close to her heart and home. It happened in the community where she had lived for years, Northside, just two miles north of city hall and downtown Houston. Northside’s population is 82% Latino, mostly migrants and first-generation residents, and the neighborhood has, so far, avoided the rapid gentrification of other communities near downtown.

For Mireles-Walters and residents of Northside, the tragic event in the spring of 2016 set the stage for a positive response, not demands for retribution but a community drive to create a safe and accessible local space for children and families. Northside residents worked with law enforcement, policymakers, and civic groups to make the space happen.

*Houston news cameras captured the immediate action by Northside community after the death of Josué Flores. Image by ABC-13 Houston*

Born of tragedy

Eleven-year-old Josué Flores was the sixth-grader who was stabbed and killed in broad daylight as he walked home from school. His death, which remains unsolved, shook a community and a city that, at the time, had one of the lowest, per-capita murder rates in the country. Mireles-Walters said that within days of the murder, the community met with elected officials and law enforcement. She remembers the tension in that first meeting, as public officials offered no viable solutions.

“Residents were not only grieving the loss of Josué, but also felt helpless by the lack of answers they were receiving from law enforcement,” Mireles-Walters told palabra. “Equally, elected officials were not offering the community a solution on how to prevent a similar event from taking place. Naturally, there was sadness and anger around the room.”

‘While everyone was screaming and yelling, Stella (Mireles-Walters) was observing and taking notes. I sensed that she was one of the few people with the ability to lead the community under this stressful situation’

It was during this first town hall meeting that several community members approached Mireles-Walters to take an active role in leading a grassroots effort to hold elected officials and law enforcement accountable for the safety of the children and community. Edgar Gil, who was at the meeting, remembers asking her to lead because of what he said was the poise she showed during the meeting.

“What stood out to me was her composure in the situation,” he said. “While everyone was screaming and yelling, Stella was observing and taking notes. I sensed that she was one of the few people with the ability to lead the community under this stressful situation. I am glad my intuition was correct.”

Mireles-Walters, who had no prior grassroots leadership experience, recalled her hesitation.

“Trust is key towards building relationships and why I wanted to help my community. … I did not think I was the right person to lead a grassroots effort because I had been away from my community for years,” she said, noting that her job led her to raise her children elsewhere, before returning to Northside as a retiree. “The community nonetheless became restless as time passed because Josué’s murder had not been solved and residents were afraid, knowing that a killer was still out on the loose.”

Mireles-Walters said she’s a devout Christian and turned to prayer and the community’s Catholic Church for guidance. “I sat down with the priest to organize a second community meeting. We felt that the church was an ideal setting to host the community meetings because emotions can be contained, and people are free to express themselves in a respectful manner. The church served as an ideal space where the community, law enforcement, and public officials could talk freely.”

A safe walk home

Subsequent meetings led to the creation of Safe Walk Home Northside, providing students and their families protection from criminal activity as they walked to and from school.

Project organizers offered first-hand accounts of problems associated with poverty and crime, and the use of public space as a remedy. The organization set out to change the way public space was viewed by the largely migrant and first-generation Latino community in the context of crime prevention.

The group, originally called the Northside Mothers Group, started with a neighborhood watch for school children. Duties were rotated among mothers whose children walked to and from school.

*Northside shops proclaim support for neighborhood groups creating after-school programs and safe spaces for children and families. Photo by Juan Antonio Sorto*

Mireles-Walters recalled how, for a few weeks after Josué‘s murder, she drove around the community and saw men, many of them unhoused, congregated around the community’s schools and library. She was shocked, she said, to see how the men, children, and families all jockeyed for the public space. She feared this created a potentially dangerous environment.

“I became appalled to see how these families and children were navigating these crosswalks to avoid the homeless, and vice versa,” she said. ”I also saw some children’s aggressive behavior towards one another, a result of not having their parents around after school.”

Northside’s poverty rate is higher than Houston’s average of 21%, and many wage earners among its working-class families hold multiple jobs.

The importance of church bells

Mireles-Walters emphasized the important role of the Catholic Church: The church bells were “literally brought to life” once the program started.

“One day, I asked the priest why the church bells never rang. He said that the motor that operated the bells quit working and the church figured it would be expensive to replace, but that he would investigate the cost. Within a few days after we spoke, the priest came back to me and said that it was only $10 to replace the church bell’s motor and that the bells would now ring when it was time for the children to walk to and from school,” she said.

The bells were considered crucial for a diverse community more accustomed to police sirens.

“We are not a police organization,” Mireles-Walters added. “We are a community organization whose membership is made up by our residents. The consideration of our cultural differences has been key to the success of the program.”

The organization also put up signs and drew support from local businesses. Today placards announcing “Safe Walk Home Northside” are often seen at popular establishments, such as bakeries and taco stands.

A law, but no funding

The inclusion of local business also motivated the organization to push for policy changes. In 2017, the group successfully advocated for Texas Senate Bill 195 (The Josué Flores Bill) to become law. The initiative was supposed to fund after-school programs, but no public money has been delivered.

During the fall, 2021 election cycle for the Houston Independent School District School Board (HISD), community members asked candidates about the funds, to no avail.

Vicky Salinas Colorado, a community member of Near Northside, said she is disappointed that the promised funding hasn’t come.

“It seems as if all the energy went to getting a bill passed without any substance. Safe Walk is still active, but the funding has yet to reach the group,” Salinas said, adding that she continues to press elected officials because after-school activities for children and families need professional staffers.

the biggest success of the program so far has been the ability to unite our community to work together on addressing social issues beyond criminal activity

While the COVID-19 pandemic created challenges, Safe Walk Home Northside was nonetheless able to greet students when they returned to in-school learning on October 19, 2020.

Two Northside parents who asked to remain anonymous due to their immigration status said Safe Walk Home Northside has succeeded in making neighbors work together and families feel safe.

“While the program is meant to provide an avenue for our children to walk to and from school safely, it has also given the community a reason to get to know one another,” said one of the parents, who has lived in the community for more than 20 years and whose children currently attend a local school. “Prior to the program I rarely spoke with my neighbors, which I think enhanced many of the social problems we have experienced in our community for decades.”

Added the other parent: “I believe the biggest success of the program so far has been the ability to unite our community to work together on addressing social issues beyond criminal activity. For example, last year the city wanted to close our neighborhood clinic. Our community organized and was successful in keeping the clinic open. I don’t think we would have been able to organize effectively without the knowledge we have gained from our involvement with Safe Walk Home Northside.”

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Juan Antonio Sorto is a first-generation college graduate from El Salvador and a doctoral candidate at Texas Southern University's School of Urban Planning and Environmental Justice.

Northside Strong