RIVER PARK

River Park is the historically black neighborhood of Naples, Fla. It was the first area of town — then considered the outskirts — where the black population was allowed to buy property in the 1960's. Now, the area is nearly in the center of Naples. Elders in the neighborhood try to instill a history and value into younger generations, often raising their grandchildren. Middle generations often struggle with drug problems and crime.

During my eight years in Naples, I have worked on various long-term stories in the River Park area, as well as numerous daily assignments. After taking a look at the photos as a whole, a portrait of the area and the families who live there has started to emerge. It is important to me to keep documenting this area because I feel it is largely misunderstood. I want to dig past headlines and arrest reports to give a voice to this community, showing also it's commitment to faith and family.

Rose Tavernier, 9, aims a toy gun and tells her friends she's a cop as they ride around on their bikes playing cops and robbers near her home at the Gordon River Apartments. The Gordon River Apartments were listed for sale at $2.75 million, and the River Park Apartments are listed at $2.2 million, according to Jim Garinger, the real estate agent handling the listing from Colliers International in Fort Myers. Rumors of evictions, raised rents, giving up pets and substandard living conditions spread through the community as the two properties went to foreclosure over the summer
   
A young woman is detained in the back of a Naples Police car after authorities raided a home for drugs in River Park East. “When you have young peoples trying different stuff, like drugs, you have to have an understanding person dealing with (them),” Pastor Joe Williams says. “If they’re going to be abused by the church they’ll say ‘Well, I might as well and stay out doing the same thing I’m doing.’ ... You got to know how to deal with people and most important, show them love. Love is great. Love is powerful. Love can stop death.”
   
"Mother" Annie Mae Perry, then 96, leads more than 200 people in a processional to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. tree in River Park East in January 2006. Mother Perry, as she is affectionately known by the community, was a matriarch of River Park. A midwife for 25 years, she delivered 514 babies. “I felt just like they was mine,” she said. “Felt just like my children.” Mother Perry was a leader by example for the community, working to make sure her children had an education in an age of segregation. She was a founding member of the Naples NAACP.
     
  
"Mother" Perry is greeted by family during her 98th birthday party as her daughter Pearline Dixon, left, sits nearby in case she needs anything. Mother Perry is the head of five generations of her family.
   
Earline Avant, second, from left, daughter of Annie Mae Perry, is held up by her family as she looks in to the casket of her mother during Perry's funeral in October 2008. "She's the best earthly friend I ever had," said Avant about Mother Perry when she addressed the crowd of more than 500 people. Mother Perry died at the age of 98. Her funeral lasted three and a half hours.
  
Joe Williams, center, talks privately to a girl who grew up in the neighborhood on a recent afternoon in front of his River Park East home. Williams is approached daily by people in the community asking for advice. Should I fight a foreclosure? What major should I choose? Should I terminate this unwanted pregnancy?
     
  
Rev. Joe Williams, 73, watches over the neighborhood from his porch, a daily activity, with his great-grandsons Eric Porter, 3, left, and Charlie Porter, 4. The boys, and their older brother, have lived with Williams since 2008 when they witnessed their mother get shot and killed by her friend's ex-boyfriend. Williams has lived in his home since 1963 and raised several of his grandchildren. He jokes that he sits on the porch with the phone in his hand so he can call the cops if anyone starts "aggravatin'" him.
   
Joe Williams places his hand on his great-grandson Charlie Porter, 4, one day while hanging out together on his porch in Naples. "The Bible say if you want to be loved, first you got to show love," Williams said. "And when you show love, you gain love."
   
The ninth of twelve children, Nick Chandler grew up in the River Park Apartments in world of poverty, abuse and drugs. At 17, he went to prison for the first time. He ended up in prison seven times, serving for a total of 22 years. Now in his late 40's, Chandler is trying to turn his life around and wrote a book about his experiences, though he's the first to admit that it's been a struggle. "I started doing coke when I was 16. I went to selling ... and I seen the fast money and I got hooked on that and the coke, and then I had to support my habit. Things just went like that until I wasted 22 years of my life."
     
  
Residents from the Gordon River Apartments in Naples receive free groceries to from a mobile pantry. The Coller County Hunger and Homeless Coalition, partnered with Meals of Hope, St. Matthew's House, Collier Harvest, Capital Grille and the Harry Chapin Food Bank offered a hot meal to the Gordon River Park Apartment community and handed out about 50 pounds of groceries to families through a mobile pantry. The organizations are working to offer these free services to different low income communities each week in Collier County.
  
Ruth Pierre, 10, right, and others from the Gordon River Apartments, wait in line to receive a box of groceries to from a mobile pantry.
  
Christine Jones, 4, waves to the ice cream man as he drives in to her community Thursday at the Gordon River Apartments on 5th Avenue North in Naples just west of the Gordon River. Everyday for the past 12 years, the ice cream man, Larry Ozturk, has driven his truck through the River Park area. Ozturk feels like a mentor to the kids. "It's like I'm their teacher," he says. He teaches them to throw their trash away in a hole on the side of the truck, "to keep their neighborhood clean," and to say please and thank you.
     
  
Eric Porter, 3, is being raised by his grand parents and great-grandfather in River Park. His mother, Shaniqua Williams, 22, was shot and killed in front him and his siblings in 2008. Eric, the youngest, doesn't speak his mother or the incident.
   
“A lot of peoples forget where they come from and that is one thing that you never should do,” said Rev. Warren Adkins, pastor of Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church. “We never should forget where we come from, because you may have to go back that route again.” In the lifetime of this church, race relations have shifted from forced segregation to legally mandated integration — and now the Sunday bulletin includes a quote from the country’s first black president.
   
Members of Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church clasp hands during a final song and prayer at Macedonia on Third Ave. N. in Naples. This church started in 1929 in an area of Naples near the water called Ditch Bank. By the ’50s, Naples’ black families left Ditch Bank to make way for development, moving to River Park. The church’s current home at 1006 Third Ave. N. opened in 1954, after the Watkins family, owners of the Naples Beach Hotel & Golf Club, donated land.
     
  
A member of Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church prays for her community during worship service in Naples. Macedonia started serving the black community in Naples in 1929.
   
Rev. Warren Adkins, background, who has been a member of Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church for 58 years and its pastor for 36, sings The Lords Prayer over Kamora Johnson, 15, as she is held by members of the church, Alma Williams, left, and Barbara Denson during a Sunday service. Macedonia is Naples' oldest black church and is located in River Park. The church is central to many in the community and offers several youth programs for area kids.
   
Tyquasia Morgan, 18, right, sits on the porch with Rev. Joe Williams, a regular evening occurrence. Morgan lives with her grandma and great grandma who have been neighbors with Williams since 1963. Morgan, like many in the neighborhood, calls Williams granddad.
     
  
Brothers Eric Porter, 3, right, and Keylijah Williams, 5, center, get a drink after dinner in the home they share with their great-grandfather Joe Williams. The boys and their other brother have lived with Williams and their grandparents, Shirley Williams and Charlie Byrd, since their mom was killed in Lehigh Acres in October 2008. "They're lovable kids," said Williams. "I look at them and feel sorry because of their mother - she loved her kids." The three boys were in the house when their mom and her friend were shot.
  
Jose Vega, 9, from left, Jonathan Perez, 7, and Vega's brother, Michael Rodgriguez, 6, hang and climb the fence surrounding the George Washington Carver Apartments in River Park — one of several low-income complexes in the River Park area. A proposed sale of the apartments is a recurring issue, raising questions about the longevity of subsidized housing contracts. Such a sale could change the face of the community and displace hundreds of families.