Roanoke Metropolis has skilled a big enhance in murders, with 26 already reported in 2023, the very best quantity for the reason that Nineteen Seventies. Nicole Ross, a member of the outreach and help group FEDUP and Roanoke Metropolis’s Gun Violence Prevention Fee, expressed her considerations in regards to the impression of gun violence on the neighborhood. She believes that the neighborhood is changing into desensitized to the violence and shared a private expertise of witnessing gunshots on the Melrose library. Ross highlighted elements reminiscent of poverty, unemployment, and untreated psychological well being points as contributors to the violence. She emphasised the necessity for a change within the tradition and inspired the neighborhood to return collectively and help each other with a view to fight the anger and harm that results in violence.