The son of late West Baltimore activist Gwen Shelton, Kibwe Shelton, will be holding a sports clinic for youth on May 23. (Courtesy Photo)
The son of the late activist Gwen Shelton is starting a Saturday sports clinic for youth in West Baltimore that he hopes to run throughout the summer.
Using donations collected during a series of free fitness classes he has been offering in Druid Hill Park, Kibwe Shelton will hold his first clinic for youth ages 5-18 on Saturday, May 23. This first event will include a deejay, moon bounce, sno-balls, popcorn and face painting.
“What I’m going to try to do is, I’m going to get the kids together—we’ll talk briefly, go over the rules, we’ll stretch a little bit, I’ll give them the camp rules—and then, once I have their attention, I’m going to try to sit and talk with them for about 20 minutes, just to let them know how important they are to our community how much I need them,” Shelton said. “At some point, I won’t be able to do my job, so somebody has to do it, so I’m relying on these guys.”
The hope is that the clinic can run throughout the summer, said Shelton, and he will continue to offer his free fitness class on Saturday mornings (8:30 a.m. by the tennis courts in Druid Hill Park) as a means of collecting donations to help fund the clinic. Shelton is also collecting monetary donations via Paypal, which can be sent to him using the e-mail kibwe801@gmail.com
So far, after holding three of those free morning classes for adults, Shelton has received about $1,000 worth of donations, some of which has already been distributed to residents of Gilmor Homes as well as to demonstrators at some of the civic actions that have occurred in previous weeks in Baltimore.
The first clinic on May 23 will be held 11 a.m. at Easterwood Park, 1500 N. Bentalou St. For Shelton, the clinic is an opportunity to further his mother’s legacy.
“I don’t want her work to go in vain,” he said. “I don’t know what’s going on in the community because I’m not there every day. I don’t see what’s going on, but the work that she has done, the groundwork that she has laid, I want to keep it going.”
ralejandro@afro.com