Donald Dorsey, Gang Intervention Specialist with the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe, fired questions at the young people gathered in a side room at Messiah Lutheran Church.

“What does a gang member look like?” Dorsey inquired.

“Baggy clothes … bandanas on their heads,” came the responses.

“So, if I see someone walking down the street with baggie clothes and bandanas, that automatically means they are a gang member?” Dorsey continued.

“No,” the kids answered in chorus.

At Dorsey’s elbow stood Lawrence Stone of East Tacoma, former gang member, former drug dealer, present good guy.

The kids were among 300 parents, teens and community members who came to Messiah Lutheran Church recently to hear Dorsey, Stone and others talk about how gangs, juvenile issues, graffiti and similar issues are affecting Auburn.

And they came to learn about strategies for keeping gangs away from the city.

Stone, who uses his street knowledge to teach adults and teen audiences how to unravel the appeal of youth gangs, laced his message with hard lessons gleaned from a misspent youth.

As founder of Big Homies, an organization of former gang members that works with kids, Stone urged Auburn parents to “create things culturally relevant to their kids,” or lose them to someone who will.

If there is a vacuum, Stone said, someone will step into that vacuum.

Auburn School District Superintendent Kip Herren and Auburn Mayor Pete Lewis have established an ongoing gang task force that will meet regularly to share information important to the community and the safety of the community’s young people.

“We’re aware of the fact that prevention is the best way to eliminate the possibility of gangs,” Herren said. “We’re also aware that interventions are necessary to have kids be actively engaged in wholesome activities. That requires us to come up with strategies that basically keep kids engaged before school with positive activities with positive adult figures.”

Herren added that the task for has been designed to share information given a community with such changing demographics.

Sponsoring the forum were the City of Auburn, Auburn Police Department, the Auburn School District, and other local youth organizations.