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After Some Reluctance, Columbus, Ohio, Is Rolling Out a Gunshot Detection Program

The city plans to implement California-based ShotSpotter equipment in three neighborhoods by the end of the year.

(TNS) — After rejecting the idea several years ago, Columbus, Ohio, now could have a gunshot detection system in place in three neighborhoods by the end of 2018.

Mayor Andrew J. Ginther announced on Monday that the city plans to roll out a yearlong pilot program with California-based ShotSpotter to install sensors in the Hilltop, Linden and the South Side neighborhoods.

Ginther announced that the city had decided to use ShotSpotter for the pilot during a news conference Monday to update the public on progress made on the Comprehensive Neighborhood Safety Strategy, a plan the city began last year to reduce violent crime.

"We know making our neighborhoods safe requires participation from all of our departments and the community," he said.

Columbus Mayor Michael B. Coleman's administration previously considered using the technology, but decided in 2011 that it was too costly.

Ginther's administration plans to ask the Columbus City Council to waive competitive bidding to hire ShotSpotter at its July 23 meeting. The city has set aside about $685,000 in the operating budget for the pilot program, said Kenneth C. Paul, Ginther's deputy chief of staff.

Paul said he hopes to have a contract with ShotSpotter by the end of the summer and the pilot could be running by the end of the year. The company will install sensors to cover a 3-square-mile area in each neighborhood.

Those sensors detect gunfire and help police determine where the shots originated, sending data to a computer center that can relay information to 911 operators. ShotSpotter or similar systems have been installed in Cincinnati, Youngstown, Pittsburgh, Chicago and other U.S. cities.

After a year, Columbus could elect to competitively bid for a permanent solution or stick with ShotSpotter, Paul said.

During his press conference Monday, Ginther also lauded progress the neighborhood safety plan has made. An advisory commission made up of Columbus residents has formed a subcommittee to look at the city's efforts to recruit minority police officers. Since May, a bike patrol that began operating in three neighborhoods has made contact with residents more than 3,700 times. The city also plans to expand a new program to respond to neighborhood violence within 48 hours of a crime occurring.

In the Hilltop, bike patrol officers are focusing on drugs, violent crime and prostitution and getting to the root cause of those crimes, said Sgt. Fred Brophy, who leads the unit in that neighborhood.

Getting out of cruisers and interacting with people in the neighborhood is helping officers crack down on crime, he said, and clean up problem locations. He cited a Sullivant Avenue carryout that was attracting drug dealers as an example.

"We need to see ourselves as members of the Hilltop community," Ginther said.

A notification process that the city started using in Linden this year to marshal counselors and other city resources to areas after a homicide will expand to the Hilltop in September and the South Side in October.

That system has been activated four times since May, prompting the city to send caseworkers into the neighborhood to distribute information about trauma care that is available and counselors to help with grief and trauma, said Dr. Mysheika Roberts, Columbus health commissioner.

"We are eager to take what we've already learned in Linden and apply it to other neighborhoods," she said.

©2018 The Columbus Dispatch (Columbus, Ohio) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.