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Abdulahi Farah talks about the escalating violence among the Somali community in the Cedar Riverside neighborhood and what drives young people to gangs and violence. 

"Most of the time when we were out there doing the outreach work, what we were finding is the youth that were more likely to do something were youth that were not connected to any type of  institution. It would be just  a young crew together, and they're  just trying to do something that's fun and exciting to each other so that they can talk about it, email to each other on facebook. 

Some of those things might be criminal in nature, and some of those things might be crazy when it comes to adults, but if you don't have an adult around, if you don't have someone that could intercede before something happens, then oftentimes we hear it on the news as a Somali person or a Somali this, did this."

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Abdulahi Farah is coordinator of the Salaam Project, which hired young outreach workers to intervene in the lives of high-risk Somali youths in an effort to reduce violence.

In their own words: Abdulahi Farah

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