"We're teaching ... kids to fight for something they believe in"

JUPITER - Tracy Kosberg is using the opportunity to participate in the Million Mom March in Washington, D.C., to join in a small family reunion on Mother's Day.

But she is also very serious about the cause, she said Thursday.

"We're teaching our kids to fight for something they believe in," she said. So she was planning to fly out Friday morning with her two daughters, Aly, 13, and Rachel, 10, to Washington, D.C., where they will meet Kosberg's mother, Rhona Guberman, and Kosberg's sister, Shelly Preziosi, and Preziosi's 8-year-old daughter, Lindsey.

The six will then be part of the march at the Mall near the Capitol Building on Sunday. The rally is designed to promote the licens ing and registration of guns nationwide, and safety measures such as trigger locks.

It comes on the heels of several high-profile shootings involving children, including the Columbine High School massacre last spring.

The idea for Kosberg's family to get together was her mother's, Tracy Kosberg said.

"My mother read about this and she really believes in gun control," Kosberg said. "So, I said, "OK, we're there." " Her mother, who lives half the year in Boca Raton and the other half in Connecticut, was planning to drive down to D.C., picking up Kosberg's sister in Philadelphia along the way.

"My mother's mother died at the end of December last year and she really didn't want to spend Mother's Day alone," Kosberg said.

Aly and Rachel Kosberg, students at Jupiter Middle School and Jupiter Academy, respectively, are planning to keep journals of their activities during Sunday's march, their mother said.

"Twice, (Aly) has had scares at the school that she knows about and there may have been more that she didn't," she said. "They're constantly doing "Code Reds' with the bells."

The girls have visited Washington, D.C., on sightseeing tours and plan to do a little with their grandmother before the march on Sunday, she said. But the main thrust, of course, is the Million Mom March, she said.

Locally, organizers tried to put together a bus to take interested participants up to D.C., but they were not able to get enough, said Cheryl Rohed of West Boynton Beach. "We needed 49 and we had less than 20," Rohed said.

Instead, she noted Thursday, she has been referring people to a bus that was leaving from Sarasota. "Palm Beach County has been the least responsive (statewide) and that's so strange," Rohed said.

"I would think that anyone with school-aged children be focused on this," Rohed said. "Keeping our children safe, that's what the focus of this is all about."

Jupiter resident Barbara Boxenbaum, a local contact for the Million Mom March, said Friday that she was disappointed in the lack of interest but pleased to hear that Kosberg was going.

"I don't understand why people weren't serious enough to commit," she said. "It would have been nice to have a bus from here."

In addition, she also is heartened by the reports of a large turnout for a rally that has been organized at the Altala Pavilion in Tradewinds Park in Coconut Creek off Sample Road, west of I-95, from 12-3 p.m.

"One of the beautiful things about the Million Mom March is that (it) has unified so many," she said. Boxenbaum, who said that she wasn't able to go to D.C. herself, helped organize the rally, which will include speakers and activities for children, such as a clown, face painter and craft table.

In addition, Jean Elliot Brown, who is expected to challenge Mark Foley (R-West Palm Beach) for his seat in Congress this fall, will sing the national anthem to open the Coconut Creek rally, and also is scheduled to speak.

Brown, a Democrat and Palm Beach Gardens resident, believes trigger locks and background checks at gun shows should be mandatory.

"If you can wait three days to get married," says Brown, "why can't you wait three days to get a gun?"

Boxenbaum, a mother of two twin boys, ages 8, and a girl, who turns 3 in June, said that while she was pleased with Brown's support, "'there's not enough Republicans from this area. And what we're doing is not inconsistent with the Republican platform. George W. Bush, the Republican candidate for president, does support trigger locks, for instance."

Boxenbaum said that since Tradewinds Park, outside Pompano Beach just south of Palm Beach County, is close enough for people to arrange their own transportation, a bus is not needed.

Another march, in conjunction with the Million Mom March in D.C., is planned in Stuart on the north side of the Roosevelt Bridge at 2 p.m., on Sunday, said Teresa Gomez-Lansidel, Stuart organizer and mother of two. Women from Jupiter and Palm Beach Gardens have indicated that they plan to attend, she said.

No speakers or special activities are planned, just a march on the north side of the bridge, she said.

Anyone wanting more information on the Million Mom March can visit the website at www.millionmommarch.com.

The march is meeting with opposition with another group of women, the Second Amendment Sisters. They have formed a counter protest, the "Armed Informed Mothers' March," to oppose more gun controls and defend the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which grants the right to bear arms. They also advocate safety education in gun handling.

According to their website (www.sas-aim.org), the group is planning an Armed Informed Mothers March on Sunday, also in Washington, D.C., starting at 9 a.m. There are no Florida rallies planned in conjunction, according to the website.

Contact that group at 1-877-271-6216 or at moms4guns@yahoo.com.

Back to clips