The Associated Press reports that local Baltimore residents and organizations have called for a ceasefire starting Friday, August 4 to Sunday, August 6, 2017, to reduce the alarmingly high rate of bloodshed on the streets of the city.

Violence in Baltimore has skyrocketed in recent years.

More than 200 homicides have been recorded in just 2017 alone, a disturbing new record.

To try to stop the violence, Baltimore's police department has reassigned 150 officers to areas of heightened conflict throughout the city.

Too, Mayor Catherine Pugh says that she has a plan to stop the ongoing killings. However, she has yet to reveal it.

Many residents in Baltimore have become fed up with the violence that is corrupting their neighborhoods, and have decided that they cannot rely on politicians or the police. Instead, they have decided to band together, issuing a ceasefire for the next 72 hours.

Erricka Bridgeford, one of the organizers behind the murder-free weekend, and a professional conflict mediator, said: "We want to purposefully just have a pause and a sacred space where everybody's intention is that nobody gets killed."

And that phrase is a key one for the event. The motto for this weekend is: "Nobody Kill Anybody."

Flyers promoting the event have been passed out all around the city.

Another activist, Tyree Colion, has been spraypainting the words "No Shoot Zone" on key buildings both as a reminder to hold fire and in an effort to create safe spaces where rivals can meet to mediate conflict without resorting to violence.

For many of the weekend's organizers, the mission to end violence isn't just moral; it is personal. Bridgeford first witnessed someone being killed when she was only 12 years old.

"I heard shots that woke me up out of my sleep [when] my friend Mike was shot. I saw him on the blacktop, I heard him crying not to let him die," she said. Sadly, that wasn't the last person in her life to be gunned down. "I went to funerals all through high school."

Though the city has struggled with a high rate of violence for quite a few years now, the murder of Freddie Gray in police custody definitely broke the valve.

Citizens took to the streets, rioting, looting, and killing. The city has yet to recover from the trauma.

Whether at the hand of police or other civilians, Baltimore residents have had enough.

Bridgeford told NBC News, "We don't think this is a cure. We don’t think this will even necessarily stop violence that weekend, but we know that some people have made promises that they won't, and that just might save somebody’s life."

We can only hope that everyone in the city of Baltimore honors this call to action, and that peace can be restored to Baltimore, "America's Comeback City."