SafeWalks Provides Walking Home Partner

“Whatever your political stance is [or] your religion, just hit us up and someone will come and walk you,” said Peter Kerre, executive director of SafeWalks. Kerre and other volunteers will walk anyone who needs to get somewhere safely. 

Following recent attacks against women in New York City, Kerre claims the organization is fighting for change, beyond just walking people to safety. He believes everyone must face “hard truths” and stresses leaders must listen to the community besides organization initiatives. 

Founded in 2021 by Kerre, SafeWalks is a free New York City-based community initiative where volunteers will walk residents from one place to another. 

If you are at a Brooklyn bar at 2:30 in the morning and worried about the walk back home, you can request a SafeWalks. 

Those who wish to use the service can request a SafeWalker by using the link on their Instagram bio. ”Based on how populous New York City is and added to our volunteers being volunteers who have day time jobs, we usually try to ask folks to request as early as they can.”

SafeWalkers serve the New York City area with the exception of Staten Island. “Folks go to our website. We have our form that they fill out for the request. And the request comes through the back-end to our team’s slack,” Kerre said. 

He also said the communications team reaches out to the requester to verify all information from the form: “Once they verify the information, verify the dates and everything, then the request is channeled on to the greater team, to the slack channel with all the team members.”

As a long-time DJ, Kerre realized most partygoers were students who were far from their families. 

“What I noticed is that any time something went wrong or something happened, there was no support structure for them,” explained Kerre, who said he would be contacted following an incident after a party simply because he was the DJ.

Kerre said he first noticed an increase in women and Asian Americans in New York City getting assaulted during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“Why does this keep happening? Where is enforcement? Where are all the people who are actually paid to protect people?” he asked.

After seeing pictures of women hurt in the subway, he decided to go to the Morgan Avenue station in the hope of deterring any perpetrators from assaulting women. He mentioned that seeing pictures of women with swollen eyes upset him. “I just jumped on my bike and went down there and posted up,” he said.

The idea of Safewalks was born from Kerre’s protest movement, Street Riders NYC, which was founded in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd. This initiative involved over 10,000 bicyclists riding around New York City to raise awareness of police brutality. 

Video editor and photographer Natalie Nguyen requested a SafeWalker in January of 2023. 

“I used Safewalks following an assault I experienced at Grand Central station on a Friday evening after work headed back home,” Nguyen said. She found the organization through social media.

Nguyen walking with SafeWalks volunteers in 2023. Courtesy of Natalie Nguyen.

“Physical attacks on women have surged a shocking 41% over the last four years,” according to the NYPD data obtained by the New York Post.

Nguyen requested the service through a Google form on the SafeWalks website. She said the form asked where to meet, what time, and where she wanted to be dropped off. 

“Very shortly after submitting the form, Peter reached out to me to organize the walk. He let me know three men and their names who would meet me at my pickup point near Penn Station and drop me off to wherever I was comfortable. In my case it was in front of my apartment in Brooklyn.”

Kerre takes background checks on volunteers very seriously. 

“It would be actually probably around six months before [prospective volunteers] even get to walk someone,” he said. 

Kerre explained that this process includes making sure a volunteer has some type of social media account to confirm their identity.

“The overall experience was very pleasant and never awkward. I was able to chat with the men and felt very safe, often taking note of their eyes scanning the area,” Nguyen said. 

She also highlighted that during the walk, the volunteers joked about their bright and reflective vests, making the experience for Nguyen comfortable. 

Before SafeWalks, Kerre shared an Instagram post of himself at the Morgan Avenue subway station on the Street Riders NYC instagram account. The post included the Street Riders email in case anyone who felt unsafe wanted to reach out. 

“The post was shared thousands of times,” Kerre said. He wanted to separate the two initiatives after noticing the success of SafeWalks. 

Kerre and SafeWalk volunteers at Morgan Avenue station in Brooklyn. Photo by Streetridersnyc on Instagram.

Despite that post’s popularity, Kerre said, “We don’t do this for recognition. We do this because we want change.”