Portsmouth’s Wesley Community Service Center mulls extra security [Video]

PORTSMOUTH, Va. — The concerns for Renyatta Banks started earlier this April.

“It really increased when someone was killed the next block up. And it’s just so normalized, and there were children outside playing and it’s 10 a.m.,” she said.

Banks, the executive director of the Wesley Community Service Center, said the deadly shooting on the 1200 block of Duke Street — less than a quarter mile from the Wesley Center — is the first instance she felt the community hub needed to heighten its security presence.

On April 24, a day after their weekly pantry service, Banks describes how a man became confrontational inside the center, prompting an altercation where staff had to step in between them.

“Finally made it to the car, after …