GREENSBORO, N.C. — A group that fights gun violence is expanding its outreach in the Greensboro area. 

The Gate City Coalition plans to include Hampton Homes, an underserved community in the south of the city, in addition to the other three areas it covers in the north and east. 

That’s one step program manager and gunshot survivor Ingram Bell says will help curb violence. 

“That’s why I use my voice, because it does not make any sense to have to deal with this,” she said. “(People shouldn’t) have to feel like we feel because somebody decided to take their husband, wife, child or son.”

The coalition, which began in 2018 after teenagers were killed in a string of shootings, provides resources such as neighborhood watchers and access to food, jobs and housing to prevent crime.

Related: ‘I’m a survivor’: Greensboro woman passionate about fighting gun violence

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, roughly five North Carolinians die per day from gun violence. CDC research shows North Carolina lost 1,839 people to firearm incidents in 2021. 

Those are statistics Portia Shipman, another advocate of anti-violence efforts, is all too familiar with. 

She’s a domestic violence survivor and advocate who launched Paint The Town Purple in 2015 to promote domestic violence awareness and to stop the violence she was seeing in the Triad.

“I have seen too many cases of gun violence,” Shipman said. “I have one that happened early this year, and it was a young lady who was talking to someone else going through domestic violence and her life was taken.” 

Shipman offers a place for survivors to express themselves, a resource she says is necessary for the healing journey. 

Paint The Town Purple promotes gun violence awareness events throughout the year. 

For more information on resources for gun violence prevention, visit the North Carolina Gun Violence Coalition here.