BALTIMORE-- People in Baltimore on Tuesday morning began the heartbreaking task of sweeping up broken glass and cleaning their streets after a night of riots and looting left stores vandalized and burned.
"This is not what Martin Luther King would have wanted," said Linda Moyd, president of the Gilmor Homes housing project as police and the National Guard were positioned nearby. "This makes me so sad."
Large police presence & national guard vehicles moving around penn. ave but calm, most people just cleaning/watching pic.twitter.com/heq1qHNhpZ— Megan Specia (@meganspecia) April 28, 2015
Sequoia Alexander, a mental health worker in West Baltimore, said she had come out to see how she could help.
“This is traumatizing, really, being from this area,” said Alexander. "But that isn’t a good representation of who we are… I don’t want people to be afraid to come here so that's why I am out here this morning."
kids here cleaning w parents. 26 yr old Renee from neighborhood & says she's here to "show kids how community works" pic.twitter.com/VBvYh6n7Ry— Megan Specia (@meganspecia) April 28, 2015
Baltimore's Mayor, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, put out a call on Twitter with a link to a Google doc of locations where help is needed.
Want to volunteer or looking for people to come assist your neighborhood? Check out: https://t.co/ehxVVUjApz— Mayor Rawlings-Blake (@MayorSRB) April 28, 2015
But many local business owners feared that the unrest would continue and kept their stores closed.
Ehmad Tairi, owner of the Blue Star Mart on North Avenue, said he'd quickly closed his shop on Monday afternoon.
"You fear for your life -- it’s really scary,” he said. “If something happens and I lose [the store] it might not open again because it's a small business.”
Tairi, who lives a block away from where the looting began, has a son who attends the local high school.
"I told him 'stay inside,'" said Tairi. "'And if someone comes, pull down the shades.'”
Just passed by little girl on north ave trying to walk through police line holding her fathers hand saying, "daddy, I am scared" #Baltimore— Megan Specia (@meganspecia) April 28, 2015
Everyone in the local community seemed to be bracing for more trouble on Tuesday. Maryland State Police Lieutenant Michael Gelormino said that the feeling Tuesday was “very different” that that on Monday night but that officers expected there to be more people on the streets later in the day.
Carmichael Cannady, a local resident, wondered how the city would heal.
"It's hard and it hurts," said Cannady. "This is infrastructure -- we can repair that. But we can't bring back your son or daughter."