Elyria mayor calls faith leaders, mental health pros downtown for 'comfort and healing'

ELYRIA — After numerous tragic events in recent months have pained Elyria and its residents, Mayor Frank Whitfield issued a call to faith leaders and mental health professionals to gather downtown Sunday afternoon for a "time of healing." Numerous residents also accepted the open invitation to join the gathering in Ely Square. Others watched it live or afterward on the "WElyria — Frank Whitfield, Mayor of Elyria" Facebook page. The event was announced Wednesday, with Whitfield writing he wanted Elyrians "to come together, to be there for one another in comfort and healing." Some of the incidents that have challenged the city and residents recently include an Oct. 12 apartment fire that killed De'Van Bogard, an Elyria High School football coach, the Sept. 27 shooting death of Lamar Hudson Sr., with the alleged gunman being his son, and a Sept. 23 crash near state Route 57 and North Abbe Road that claimed the lives of Stephanie and Betsy Bays, among other tragic events. Addressing the crowd, the mayor said the event was planned "to address the pain that so many people have been experiencing in the city." "If you're anyone who has dealt with pain in the past, you know that you either deal with it, or it deals with you," Whitfield said. "As a city, I felt like we've dealt with so much trauma over these past 18 months. But in particular over the past five or six months, from car accidents to fire accidents to violence, it's just been so much pain that I've seen people feeling." Speakers at Sunday's event offered advice for maintaining mental health during such trying times. Mark Johnson, chief of behavioral health services at the Mental Health, Addiction and Recovery Services (MHARS) Board of Lorain County, took a turn at the microphone to discuss mental health support. He asked attendees to add the phone number (800) 888-6161 to their contact lists. The number is for an emergency crisis hotline that is also attached to a "warmline," Johnson said. "That call is maybe the first step toward getting that help. You can be a resource for somebody else, or this can be a resource for you," Johnson said. The MHARS Board also offered resources at a table set up in the square. By the end of the event, an oversized notepad where attendees could write down who they wanted to honor had been filled with names including Bogard, the late community leader Dotti Washington, of Lorain, who died Oct. 8 following a brief illness, and the Nelson family of Elyria, a family of five who were found shot to death in July 2020 following an apparent murder-suicide with father John Nelson believed by police to be the shooter. The Rev. Carl Smalls of Elyria's Second Baptist Church read his own list of names he was grieving. He prayed over the attendees and recalled his own parents, who he said have been gone for eight and 16 years. "The healing process does not happen in a moment," he said. "... Every time I look in the mirror, I see my dad, and I thank God because the memory is still fresh." In a passionate prayer, the Rev. Vanessa Young of Point of Grace Ministries asked "the blood of Jesus just flow down every street, every avenue" in the region and that believers would push back against voices leading people in the wrong direction. Contact the reporter Dylan Reynolds at (440) 329-7123 or dreynolds@chroniclet.com. Follow him on Twitter @drey1357.