‘We all have so much more work to do’
City leaders, youth convene for ‘Squeegee Collaborative’
In the wake of a deadly altercation between a man wielding a baseball bat and a group of squeegee workers, Baltimore business leaders convened with city youth Thursday to discuss solutions to the persistent tension surrounding their street-corner presence.
The summit, held at Coppin State University and closed to the public, was part of what Mayor Brandon Scott promised will be a “difficult” and ongoing conversation. Leaders, who included members of the business and nonprofit communities as well as elected officials, are expected to meet again with city youth over the next several weeks.
“I will not do what was done to me. We will not kick the can down the road,” the Democratic mayor said at a news conference before the meeting, noting that squeegee workers have been a contentious topic in Baltimore since the 1980s.
“It will require us having difficult conversations — extremely difficult conversations — with a diverse set of voices who all care about the city.”
Divisiveness over the young men and women who clean windshields at intersections for money has come to a head since last week, when a man was killed in a deadly confrontation downtown.
Timothy Reynolds of Baltimore got out of his car and swung a bat at several squeegee workers at Light and Conway streets, according to police. One of the youths pulled a gun in response, killing Reynolds, police said.
ing with the bat raised. At roughly the same time as he swings his bat toward one of the workers, another throws what appears to be a rock at his head from behind. The video shows the rock hitting Reynolds’ head and bouncing off.
Reynolds, still holding his bat, turns around when a third squeegee worker pulls a handgun and starts firing. The first shot appears to hit him somewhere in the side of his body and he starts falling. As the shooter is beginning to walk away, he shoots at Reynolds four more times.
Reynolds was lying on the ground until first responders rendered aid. He died shortly thereafter.
Under Maryland law, people defending themselves have a duty to retreat, meaning they are supposed to try to leave unless doing so is unsafe or impossible. It is also against state law for people under age 21 to possess a handgun.
Outside a three-story brick apartment building in Essex where the teen was arrested on Thursday, two marked Baltimore Police cars were all that remained hours after the arrest. Family members of the teen could not be reached for
comment, and no one answered the door at the apartment. It’s unclear if the teen has an attorney.
The squeegee workers are a
mainstay political issue, and the imagery of Thursday’s shooting — a middle-aged white man chasing after a group of young Black men
with a bat — has reignited a debate with racial undertones.
For decades, Baltimore leaders have explored ways to get young window washers away from busy and dangerous city intersections. Officials say city workers frequently reach out to the youths to offer other opportunities, even jobs that pay the same, in recognition of the draw of the quick dollar and the deep-rooted issues that leave some squeegee kids in need of an immediate payout.
Accusations of violence, property destruction and harassment, sometimes substantiated, are regularly used as evidence the city must do something about the squeegee workers. There have been 59 calls for “squeegee disturbances” at East Conway and Light over the past 18 months, according to Open Baltimore data. Calls about the window washers at that intersection spiked in June, when there were 13 — more than double as many as the month with the next-most calls since Jan. 1, 2021.
The vast majority of squeegee interactions aren’t violent, and most people working intersections as squeegee workers are teens and children trying to survive and are not a threat. Many of the workers need the money to provide for younger siblings or their own children.
“If these corners were filled with white kids who squeegee the narrative would be different,” Baltimore City Councilman Kristerfer Burnett said Monday.