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H
e’s loud and boister-
ous. He gets heard. He’s
also charming and kind
to most, scary and firm when
needed. People respond to him.
He’s intelligent and knowl-
edgeable. People listen to him,
respect him.
Carl Cannon’s mission in life
is to get kids to stay in school
and on the straight and narrow,
to keep them from life-damning
mistakes. He’s getting it done in
an ELITE way, turning potential-
ly troubled and at-risk youth into
students he believes will some-
day be leaders in the community.
“Believe it or not, some of these
kids think prison is cool, like
some kind of badge or some-
thing. I want to destroy that myth
and teach these kids what kind
of life they can have with some
effort,” Cannon said. “Access
to knowledge is the pathway
to change. But the hardest part
about success is getting started.
So, if we can get them started,
most will have the opportunity to
succeed.
“One thing we do know is
that we cannot help them until
they figure out they have to help
themselves. Everybody is able to
give some effort, if they want,”
Cannon said.
Cannon is a native of Peoria,
the son of retired Peoria police of-
ficer Charles Cannon. But before
his father got on the police force
he worked low-paying jobs that
kept the family in one housing
project or another in Carl Can-
non’s early years. “We lived in
Taft Homes, Harrison Homes,
Warner Homes. I remember it. It
was tough. But it’s like I tell the
kids, it’s not where you come
from that matters. It’s how you
choose to live,” he said.
Cannon chose to leave Peoria
after high school, enrolling in the
U.S. Army. It became a career,
many of the years in service in
the Military Police. After retiring
from the Army after 17 years, he
chose to come home to Peoria. “I
was one of those who was in a
hurry to get out of Peoria as soon
as I could. Now look where I
came back to,” he said.
To stay in law enforcement
Cannon became a corrections of-
ficer in the federal prison system.
He was assigned to the federal
prison in Pekin, where he worked
for six years, earning such awards
as Rookie of the Year, Public Ser-
vant of the Year, and the system’s
prestigious Selective Placement
Program Manager of the Year for
the North Central Region.
That was when he decided on a
new path. “It dawned on me that
I was good at the wrong thing.
I was good at keeping them in
prison. I wanted to be good at
keeping them out of prison. I
wanted to do something to make
kids understand what prison was
like and that no matter how bad
they thought they had it, it could
always get worse. Some of these
kids needed to change their path
or it was going to get worse for
them,” he said.
He accepted a job with the
Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater
Peoria so he could have daily
contact with the youth there.
Wanting to help them find self-
worth, he approached the Peoria
Park District just before the River-
Plex opened in 2001 and asked if
they would hire some of the kids
he was working with to work at
the RiverPlex.
“I told them I would get the
kids ready for the job and be
responsible. They just needed the
opportunity,” he said. Not only
were RiverPlex officials receptive,
the next day they called Cannon
and offered him a job running the
youth department at the center.
A Two-Way
Street
Carl Cannon strives to make
respect ‘the new cool’
By Paul Gordon
Carl Cannon
18
thePeorian.com