The nation finally took notice of Chicago’s epidemic of gun violence after 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton was fatally shot January 29. Pendleton was the city’s 42nd victim that month, but her appearance at President Obama’s inauguration just weeks before pushed her death to the center of a national conversation on gun control. Since 2008, more young people have been killed in Chicago than in any other American city—a statistic that has sent city officials in search of solutions to plug loopholes in gun policy and crack down on gang violence.

But Veronica Morris-Moore, 20, a community organizer from Chicago’s Woodlawn neighborhood, believes politicians are looking for solutions in the wrong places. “If they’re not going to talk about the economic violence that causes gun violence, then I’m not interested in the conversation,” she says.