Congressman Elijah E. Cummings Proudly Representing Maryland's 7th District

When asked why he takes so much time and energy away from his expanding business ventures to raise money for youth programs," a successful local businessman who calls himself "AJ" responds without even hesitating.

"I'm doing it for my brother, who protected me even when he, himself, was drawn into the drug life - and for my daughter, who will have to live in this world that we are creating long after we are gone."

I count "AJ" as a very important ally in the continuing struggle to lift up the young people of our community. It isn't his vision of the challenges that we face, however, that make him so special.

"AJ" and all of the other community-minded people like him are important because they have transformed vision into mission - the mission of helping our younger Brothers and Sisters survive the deadly subculture of violence and drugs.

No one is safe from these dangers - not even A-student daughters living in the suburbs. The threat is most obvious, however, in the plight of our young men.

A recent New York Times article painted in chilling and inescapable detail the extent to which young Black men are being excluded from mainstream American life.

In 2004, 72 percent of young Black males who had dropped out of high school were jobless, compared with 19-34 percent of their counterparts in other ethnic groups.

Of the young Black men in their 20s who were not in college (one out of every two in this nation's inner cities), 21 percent were in jail. By their mid-30's, 6 out of every 10 Black men without a diploma had already earned at least one prison term.

These trends, I should note, are not new. In 1993, I chaired a Maryland Commission that issued an action report on the status of Black males in our state.

Our findings remain relevant today.

The Maryland Constitution, like that of most other states, guarantees every child an effective education that prepares them to earn a living wage in this high-tech, 21st century economy. If we are to salvage this generation of young people, we must demand educational programs in our public schools that work.

Second, we cannot afford to "write off" the young men who are re-entering our communities from prison. The "revolving door" must be transformed into an open door to opportunity.

I do not suggest that these recommendations will be easily achieved. My colleagues on the 1993 Maryland Commission and I have been working to implement them for more than a decade.

What I am suggesting is that we must provide the energy for a new sense of urgency- both in the political realm and in our own communities.

Politically, we must reject any concept of "economic growth" that fails to provide every American with the education, training and opportunity to work at a good job that pays a living wage.

Any other definition of "success" would accept a deadly status quo. Far too many of our young people are dying.

Consider this.

Nearly 23 million American jobs were created under President Bill Clinton's Democratic policies. The number of unemployed Americans declined by 3.3 million; and the number of Americans struggling to survive in poverty was reduced by 6.4 million.

In contrast, after five years of the Republicans' tax cuts for the rich and "trickle down" economic ideology, the number of jobless Americans has increased (by 1.2 million). More than 5 million more Americans are poor today than when President Bush took office in 2001.

The Bush Administration has slashed and burned job training programs in our communities - even as millions of jobs have been lost. Young people in our community are dying as a result.

We must do better than this.

Yet, something more than political change will be required to halt this decline.

We cannot afford to wait for the larger society to respond effectively. African American communities must do more to take care of our own.

We know from past experience that mentoring programs like ones "AJ" and his colleagues are seeking to create can forestall tragedies before they occur.

Young Black men will continue to die until their older brothers step forward to offer the safety lines that will lift them up in life.

Take it from "AJ."

"We all have the power to make our communities a better place - if we will take the time to reach out and change young lives."