WASHINGTON, D.C. — Youth advocate Kawana Billy nearly jumped out of her chair listening to the way a white D.C. Council member described Black youth in Washington. To him, they were “dangerous” and “radioactive,” and at one point, he alleged young people carry guns and scare residents.
“It’s very interesting how folks are using these terms of young people, and then to see where our budget goes at the same time,” a frustrated Billy told Capital B.
Just days after a viral video showed police officers taunting two Black teenage girls and yanking them off electric bikes, D.C. Council members defended the officers’ actions. Some even claimed that one incident doesn’t define all police officers enforcing a youth curfew meant to combat the nationwide trend of “teen takeovers.” These large social-media-driven gatherings where teens meet up in one location have garnered national attention as some takeovers have erupted in chaos, pushing cities to enforce curfews.
This week, the council went back and forth for hours at a meeting over whether to extend an emergency order for a curfew for youths under 18. As Black council members urged their colleagues to consider that Washington — with an increased National Guard presence — is uniquely different from other cities, others saw this weekend’s incident with the two teenage girls as isolated.
For eight months, Washington and other metropolitan cities have been grappling with how to handle residents’ complaints. Activists like Billy say curfews don’t work without the input from teens on alternative third spaces for young people to gather. Baltimore, Atlanta and Chicago are among the other major metropolitan areas with curfews.
Billy, a youth advocate with D.C. Action, and other activists described both the video and the language used by council members to characterize Washington youth as “infuriating.”
The curfew policy is intended to apply only to groups of four or more minors without a parent, raising immediate questions about how, and against whom, it is being enforced.
What began as a challenge tied to gentrification, activists argue, is now evolving into a broader attack on third spaces that once welcomed teenagers. Activists say the disappearance of these spaces has effectively pushed young people into a position where they are expected to be “seen and not heard.” They also criticized what they view as the dismissal of concerns raised by community members — and even some council members — who have called the curfew a failing tool.
“It can’t be seen as a singular event. Even one interaction where a person is harmed or treated with bias is too many,” said Irene Jacobs, a policy manager for Black Swan Academy, a Washington-based nonprofit organization that concentrates its efforts on empowering Black youth.
“Teens, they have lives, they have names, they have stories. To dismiss instead of taking it as a risk to their well-being, it’s a public health crisis,” she said.
Last summer, the city imposed a daily 11 p.m. curfew for youth under 18 and authorized the police chief to set 8 p.m. “curfew zones” barring young people from gathering in groups of more than eight in designated areas. Yet after repeated extensions and promises from city leaders and lawmakers to work toward a permanent solution, the policy expired last week.
Browser signed an emergency order imposing curfews that will last until May 1, while the council pushed its vote on the emergency legislation to May 5. The D.C. Council approved permanent curfew legislation on April 21, but the new law will not take effect until the fall.
As the city moves forward with the curfew, Mayor Muriel Bowser has previously proposed eliminating several family service centers to save $3.1 million and help recover billions of dollars to address a budget shortfall in the 2027 fiscal year, according to DC News Now.
Culture, not noise
As the council neared the vote on the emergency order, parents shook their heads at anecdotes board members shared about resident complaints. But few council members brought up the lack of resources and spaces for teens in the city.
In Jacob’s bag were testimonies from teenagers directly affected by the curfew, urging council members to reconsider where teens should be allowed in the city after a certain time.
“I felt restricted because we’re growing teenagers that are soon to become adults but they’re trying to keep us confined,” Ilean, a local teenager, wrote.
Another wrote they felt trapped. “Even if you want to have fun together at the park, maybe if it’s too late, police and other people are going to come and be like ‘you can’t be out here,’” Stephen wrote to the advocacy group.
In Washington, the same neighborhoods that Black youth are being barred from were once the gathering points for their parents in the 1990s. In the fall, a video went viral of teens fighting in the Navy Yard, an area that was 95% Black in 2000 but fell to 28% in 2018, according to Census Tract 72.
“Chocolate City,” which was once home to the Black Broadway, also known as the U Street Corridor, attracted big names such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and Zora Neale Hurston. Now, U Street and the surrounding Ward 2 have undergone intense gentrification, leading to complaints about crowds of teenagers and loud music, resulting in one of the 17 zones where curfews can start as early as 8 p.m.
“The media is highlighting those instances versus acknowledging that D.C. is no longer the best place for families, for young people. It feels as if there is a focus on single, high-earning adults and businesses, and young people have been pushed out of areas where they used to gather and have a good time,” Billy said.
Back in the day, the Navy Yard, once majority Black, had bowling alleys and movie theaters that didn’t place age restrictions for those 21 and up. Now, the Navy Yard is full of bars and new development geared toward single people.
“They’ve heard these things from their parents, their uncles and their aunties. The things that used to exist in the city for them to be able to enjoy are no longer here,” she said
Nearly 60 miles away in the Baltimore area, officials are struggling to engage young audiences as fewer resources are available for those 17 and younger, but Mayor Brandon Scott has a slightly different outlook on the city’s youth.
After a series of fights broke out in the city’s Inner Harbor area, Scott released a statement encouraging community members and parents to keep a close eye on their young people. He also announced a youth engagement strategy to prevent weekend and holiday break youth crime, including the Mayor’s Office of African American Male Engagement.
“Keeping young people safe is a community effort,” Scott said in a statement in March. “While City government and public safety agencies are fully engaged in providing resources, opportunities, and attention to our young people, it is critical that parents and families are equally engaged in ensuring their teens are safe and making choices that protect themselves and their friends.”
In Washington, however, Mayor Bowser asked parents to keep their children at home, where families can supervise their own teenagers.
“We don’t want to arrest any kids,” Bowser said after the council voted to permanently implement a youth curfew. “What we want is we want their parents to supervise them and keep them home.”
She then told the crowd at a press conference that the interim chief of police has to use resources to “babysit” thousands of teens in the city.
Around Washington, teens are frequently making their own spaces in neutral areas for pop-up events in the warmer months, playing go-go music, a subgenre of funk with call and response. But transplants don’t recognize the sounds of the district, calling in noise complaints from rowdy teenagers.
“It goes back to folks who aren’t from here, who don’t understand the music or the culture, thinking that there’s noise and it’s a disruption when they’re responsible for the push out and to choose to either say nothing or be a part of the culture, but they don’t,” Billy said.
Even as the council moves to advance a permanent curfew, activists say the fight is far from over. They are urging young people to make their voices heard at the next council meeting.
