Greensboro Group Offers To Escort Muslim Women

The Piedmont Neighbors Program will provide volunteer female escorts for Muslim women who need to go grocery shopping and do other errands.

Faith Action, an interfaith charitable organization in Greensboro, is sponsoring the program in response to requests from the Muslim community.

Mark Sills, director of Faith Action, said the program is temporary and will continue only until Muslim women regain a sense of normalcy in their lives. "It could last only three to four weeks or as much as three to four months," Sills said.

Since the events of Sept. 11, the Greensboro Islamic Center has received several threatening phone calls. Police have since arrested two men linked to the threats.

And on Sept. 16, a Lebanese student at UNC-Greensboro was beaten.

Islamic law requires Muslim women to wear hajabs, scarves covering their heads and necks, easily identifying them as Muslim women and making them targets to those angered by the terrorist attack.

"Muslim women are afraid to leave their homes," Sills said. "The escorts will provide a buffer of confidence.

"The program is just getting started, and we have no concept of demand," Sills said. "Word has just gotten to the Muslim community."

He said mosques in the greater Greensboro area announced the program during services after it began.

Faith Action estimates that about 2,500 Muslim families live in the greater Greensboro area.

More than 50 individuals have volunteered to accompany Muslim women who fear leaving their homes alone.

Sills said the volunteers include business women, retired women, schools teachers, social workers, homemakers and graduate students.

He said he expects about 30 of the women will complete the required orientation class and become escorts.

Since the inception of his Piedmont Neighbors Program, Sills said, groups in High Point and Raleigh have contacted him wishing to replicate the service.

"They think it's a good idea," he said. "I doubt we are the only organization in the country doing this."

Charles Lyons, director of the International Center at UNC-G, said Muslim women across the country are concerned for their safety in the aftermath of last month's terrorist strikes.

But Lyons said he questions the necessity of a volunteer escort service, especially for students at UNC-G.

"I just don't know," he said. "I see Muslim women walking on campus."

The State & National Editor can be reached at stntdesk@unc.edu.