On Saturday, Gainesville residents will join a worldwide movement for gun reform.
As part of March For Our Lives, the local movement is one of 832 currently planned across multiple countries. UF mathematics and microbiology and cell science freshman Heather Yu decided to organize the Gainesville march after noticing others popping up in big cities. Yu expects about 1,000 to attend, including an 11-year-old whose mom contacted Yu through Facebook.
Yu said she created a Facebook page at 2 a.m. on Feb. 18 and contacted as many student organizations, local high schools and UF students as she could.
“I just hoped that it would catch on,” the 18-year-old said. “Since I’m a freshman, my sphere of influence is very limited.”
Mayor Lauren Poe, District 3 City Commissioner David Arreola and several Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School alumni will speak at Bo Diddley Community Plaza at 111 E. University Ave., Yu said.
Gainesville Police Department will be monitoring the march to keep participants safe, GPD spokesperson Officer Ben Tobias said. As of press time, GPD will not close any streets for the march, but that could change depending on the number of protestors, Tobias said. He’s expecting about 300.
He said the department may have undercover police officers and may call in officers scheduled to be off duty if they feel there is the need.
“Our first priority is keeping everyone safe and giving them the ability to express their First Amendment rights,” Tobias said.
Correction: A previous version of this story said GPD will have undercover police officers at the march. It has been updated to reflect GPD may have undercover officers.
Contact Robert Lewis at rlewis@alligator.org. Follow him on Twitter at @Lewis__Robert.
Contact Elliott Nasby at enasby@alligator.org. Follow him on Twitter at @_ElohEl.
More than 800 marches for Saturday have been organized worldwide. This graphic shows the locations of the U.S. marches.
