Meet Peacemaker Pastor Meschellia Johnson, founder of Moving Mountains by Illumination (MMBI). MMBI is a grantee of the LA Peacemakers Initiative and a member of the Los Angeles Violence Intervention Coalition. UPI spoke with Meschellia about her start in the work and how sustainable funding can help her build MMBI’s capacity. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. 

Urban Peace Institute: Tell us about your organization.

Pastor Meschellia Johnson: We are Moving Mountains by Illumination (MMBI), previously Much More Bounce, Inc. We started our organization in 2002 based on what I was seeing in the community with our young girls. We are currently a gender-specific organization for girls and women, with an emphasis on no one left behind.

What were you seeing in your community that prompted you to start MMBI? 

First, I was seeing young girls with low self-esteem in community and them doing things that were not appropriate in public. By being a hairstylist and offering services to them it allowed me to have open conversations where they would share their lives. Which in return allowed me to understand where these young girls were coming from. Most of them had the same issue— abandonment, low self-esteem, their parents were incarcerated. Their grandparents, aunts, and foster care were raising them and there was such a disconnect and language barriers.

As I began to listen to their situations it was all the same hopelessness and no positive role models. There were two young girls that I watched walking down Crenshaw Boulevard. I went out of my salon to talk to these young girls, and in speaking with them, it just kind of hit me that these girls were giving up, right, they were giving up on life. They didn’t have hope, and it brought me to the place of knowing that I had to do something more. 

So then you founded MMBI?

I founded the organization a year later after a good friend (Mr. M. Hill) came to my hair salon and told me that there was a table that I needed to be at. He felt that my input and influence at the table would be valuable. The organization happened to be Stop the Violence Increase the Peace Foundation. I went to a meeting where there were Brothers at that time joining in talks and discussing peace. I was proud to be in the presence of reputable change agents coming into the city of Inglewood from about 25 neighboring communities/Tribes in representation.  The whole focus was to bring about peace. I think at the time I was the only woman at that table, and maybe another sister who came out of Imperial Courts, Sister Cynthia Mendenhall. 

Can you talk about your training getting into the work? 

I remember receiving training at Stop the Violence Increase the Peace Foundation along with receiving a certificate and a graduation to demonstrate that we understood creating peace and community organizing at its finest from a gang perspective. After that, I went to work for Project Peace Makers, a domestic violence agency as a facilitator and received trainings and certifications in the following disciplines: Life Skills, Anger Management, Conflict Resolution, Parenting and Domestic Violence. This opened the door to work on the Schiff-Cardenas Prevention Crime Act Gender Specific Contract.

I then went to the Pat Brown Institute and got certified as a gang intervention specialist. In 2002, I began to build the organization by becoming a consultant / service provider. I had the opportunity to go into schools and camps to really be instrumental in pushing peace and change.

What does it mean to create peace and reduce violence in your community? 

You know, I’m a native of Los Angeles. I was raised here, went to school here. So, to come back and create peace in my community means everything to me. It means everything to me because we’ve been dying at a rapid rate due to ignorance–the ignorance of violence. 

What are some of the ways that you approach peacemaking and working with girls and young women? 

The first way we approach peace is to embrace. We embrace, we don’t judge. Allowing girls to understand that we provide a safe environment, that we’re nonjudgmental but that education and advocacy is very important.  We do that through our life skills classes, by providing conflict resolution tools that are applicable to young people to show them how to diffuse conflict and make positive choices.

Because again, we understand that this battle is not always physical but Spiritual and Intellectual We have to have understanding, we have to learn comprehension, so that we can use what we have to navigate through some things…navigate through some of the problems, the challenges, and the trauma that we have and will have to face.

What are some of your current needs to grow the organization's capacity? 

Funding. We need funding to continue to build our staff, infrastructure and outreach efforts.   With the work that we do, we must have tools for case management, be able to provide community violence intervention advocacy, one-on-one engagement to help our clients understand what change even looks like. Because some people don’t even know what change or peace looks like, or that it is possible and necessary in the same breath.

How many current staff do you have and what’s your ideal?

Currently we are a staff of four with one part-time volunteer. I would like to have at least six case managers. I’d like to have five community outreach specialists, a Director of Finance, Director of Education, Director of Operations and a Human Resource Generalist.

I think right there is a good start for us.

What role does data play in implementing your work? 

Data plays a significant role because it tells the individual’s story, you know, if documented and written correctly. That’s what I continually share with my team that the case management / community violence intervention specialist data input work is so important because it tells the story.

It says where the client is upon entering, what services they need, what we are providing and is it working.   It shows the progress made in 30, 60, 90 days (short term goals). The data is also important because it shows the demographics and geographically underserved populations and lack of resources in those communities/areas. So, this is why the data plays a significant role in assisting us to understand as a service provider that sometimes we are trying to help with a good heart, but it really takes adequate funding to run a successful comprehensive program.  

Do you see gaps currently in existing data around intervention and peace work? How can we fill those gaps?

Of course, I see gaps. 

It seems like within the field we need a comprehensive way of collecting data from those of you working on the ground that goes beyond statistics to represent the stories and the backgrounds of the people you’re working with.

Yes, if you’re trying to make a difference. Here’s the thing, in order to make a difference, you must reflect back. And It comes with privacy; it comes with accountability. You can’t just write a note to say a specific thing, you must be mindful, you have to know how to write that note so that you are giving clear, concise information.  And to ensure that the deliverable is being met.

How can people recognize and support the role of peacemakers in creating community safety? 

People can recognize our work by remembering that we have stood on the front line with them and for them in support of families and individuals, through prayer, through monetary support, through unconditional love, through protest, through advocacy, through teaching and listening and just showing up. We have stood in the gap in many situations and circumstances that sometimes could have been detrimental to us just by getting involved. Nevertheless, I believe that there are many in the community that appreciate our role. There’s been a lot of great work that has been done under intervention and prevention with men and women in communities. We are a strong force to be recognized–as professionals. We have done the work.

People can support our work now, and in the days to come, by helping us to shape policy that reflects the importance of community safety, the CVI role in community, voting in special elections for funding that is needed in order to change our communities, and by attending meetings to give input about what they would like to see happen.

What role does CVI play in public safety and how is it different from the role of law enforcement? 

CVI when educated, trained, and committed has a tremendous role in this work. Law enforcement can’t go places that we can go. Some law enforcement officers are not respected in certain ways that we are respected in. So, people are not going to engage with law enforcement as they do some of us. If you talk about your frontline soldiers who can get in, get the ball, and get out, that’s us. Law enforcement will be here 30 minutes, CVI will be here as long as you need us to be. 

Ultimately, it’s about whoever is sincere, whoever is accountable, whoever is true, and whoever wants to see change—those that are willing to will see change.

Thank you to Pastor Meschellia Johnson and the MMBI team for their dedicated efforts to create peace, especially for young girls and women, across Los Angeles.