Alton Council Approves $10,000 For ‘40 Days Of Nonviolence’ Program
Six-week initiative with East St. Louis roots aims to reduce Alton youth violence through positive programming.
ALTON – In another split vote, Alton City Council members narrowly passed $10,000 in funding for a six-week program aimed at curbing youth violence in the city.
The resolution passed by a 4-3 vote tally that remained unchanged from Monday’s Committee of the Whole meeting. Aldermen Michael Velloff, Chris Bohn, and Patricia Ford voted against the item, while Aldermen Rosetta Brown, Martha Pfister, John Meehan, and Stephanie Elliott voted in favor.
40 Days of Nonviolence representatives say the initiative has had repeated success in East St. Louis, which has seen a decrease in crime and increase in youth engagement since the group’s founding in 2014. Their proposal is to help the City of Alton host six weeks of nonviolent activities promoting physical and mental health, career skills development, and more for the city’s youth.
While an exact schedule has not yet been made official, those six weeks will include an “Opening Week” of orientation and sample activities; a “Health Week” emphasizing mental and physical health; a “First Responders Week” with military, police, fire, and EMT personnel; a “Civic/Religious Org Week” with local churches, the Urban League, and the NAACP; an “Education Week” with the Alton School District, Lewis and Clark Community College, and Southern Illinois University Edwardsville (SIUE); and finally, a “Unification Week” to cap off the initiative and celebrate its successes.
The $10,000 total in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds includes $2,000 for two weeks of planning, $2,000 for two weeks of outreach, and $6,000 for the six weeks worth of programming.
A portion of the funding will be used for data analysis, leading Velloff to question the council’s earlier passage of over $14,000 for a different data study on the city’s youth needs led by an SIUE graduate student. Supporters of the initiative saw distinctions between the two data studies but emphasized a need for both to work collaboratively. More details behind the discussion are available in this previous story on Riverbender.com.
A full recording of the Sept. 24, 2025 Alton City Council meeting is available at the top of this story or on Riverbender.com/video.Dan Brannan also contributed to this story.
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Dan Brannan also contributed to this story
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