Columbus officials are stepping up efforts to deter crime citywide in the wake of a shooting at Sim Scott Park on Friday that injured four people.
City police plan to reopen a police substation and increase patrols at the park, as well as ratchet up patrols and efforts to communicate with citizens in identified “high crime” areas.
Further, city leaders, including Mayor Robert Smith and Police Chief Tony Carleton, plan to host three community meetings with residents of three high crime areas.
The first meeting is scheduled for Monday at Sim Scott Park. Meetings will follow on April 6 at East Columbus Gymnasium and April 13 at Townsend Community Center. All three will begin at 6 p.m.
“I’d say 90 percent of our crime is in the African-American community,” Smith said. “This is one of the reasons these are the target areas at this time … (At these meetings) we want citizens to share their ideas and suggestions, and we want to let them know what our future plans from the standpoint of the city and the police department.”
Smith said he hopes the substation at Sim Scott Park will soon be open on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and the city has already worked with the Columbus to restrict opening hours for the park to 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. (or dawn until dusk).
‘We are doing everything we can to make Columbus a safer place’
Friday’s shooting at Sim Scott Park, however, happened in broad daylight, and it left surrounding neighborhoods comprised largely of senior citizens shaken. Smith said the city’s efforts aim to rebuild those residents’ confidence in their safety and build trust between them and the police.
“Their main concern is ‘What are we going to do?'” Smith said. “Summer is approaching and spring is here, and those are typically times when crime increases … We want Columbus to be a viable place for people to live and raise a family. We want people to know that we are doing everything we can to make Columbus a safer place for our citizens, and we will continue.”
Carleton said his department would continue foot patrols of two to four officers in high crime areas as a means of building rapport in those neighborhoods and deterring criminal behavior. He said when summer begins, he also plans to deploy bike patrols that can cover more ground.
He said he had already beefed up foot patrols in some areas prior to Friday’s shooting, but even that wasn’t a perfect solution. In order to effect real change, he said citizens had to be willing to report suspicious or criminal behavior to police.
“Unfortunately, we aren’t mind readers or we could have prevented more crime,” Carleton said. “We want people to know that if they see a crime, don’t let it go unreported … We want to let the community know that we are listening, and we want them to be able to see us do something about their concerns.”
A call for community participation
Smith said even if police and city leaders stepped up their game, it would still require full community participation to make Columbus safer. He’s calling on civic groups, churches, schools and any other stakeholding organization in Columbus to aid the city’s efforts — either through awareness, providing extra eyes for police, or creating strong alternatives to crime for at-risk citizens.
Both Smith and Carleton stopped short of saying Friday’s shooting involved youth, as details of the incident are still under investigation. But they both indicated that vagrant youth accounted for more than its fair share of criminal activity in Columbus. In fact, Carleton said call volumes rise considerably after school hours and during the summer.
Smith acknowledged that sometimes kids from single-parent homes or homes where both parents work face unique challenges, but he is calling for even those parents to be as engaged as possible.
“It starts at home with more parental involvement,” Smith said. “Parents have to start taking more responsibility, and they have to start being more accountable.”
Ward 5 Councilman Kabir Karriem, who represents citizens living near Sims Scott Park, agrees there needs to be a plan for sustained safety that involves the entire community. This morning he hosted, along with the Men of Color organization, a press conference at the park formally announcing Monday’s community meeting.
“We need to get the message out to the community that illicit behavior will not be tolerated,” Karriem said. “We’ll do our part, but the community has to do their part too. I hope we all can sing out of the same hymnbook when it comes to stopping crime in Columbus.”
How to go
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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