Community advocacy groups are hosting a public forum in Carbondale focused on gun violence.
Women For Change and 100 Black MEN are sponsoring the Boys To Men Forum.
Women For Change Founder and President Ginger Rye-Sanders says the forum will be an open dialogue for men to teach boys how to become productive in the community.
"We feel that men can teach boys, and boys can learn from men. Because some of them have gone down the same path that they've gone down, but they have gotten their lives together and turned their lives around and they are productive men in our community."
Rye-Sanders, who also is a member of the Carbondale City Council, blames says the rise in gun violence on several issues.
"I see jobs as a problem, I see affordable housing as a problem. In Carbondale - the poverty rate. There's a lot of poverty in Carbondale. The poverty rate is in the 40th percentile - that's a lot of poverty."
The Boys To Men Forum will look at better ways to settle differences without gun violence in the community.
The Forum is on March 30 at 6 p.m. at the Eurma Hayes Center in Carbondale.