How to keep reducing Chicago bloodshed in 2018
The killing in Chicago continues. Can anything stem the plague of gun violence? Yes. There are encouraging signs — which we hope deliver a relentless downward trajectory. For two years, obscenely high numbers of homicides have kept neighborhoods on the South and West sides on edge. Driveby shootings are routine. Gang members spray bullets at rivals, sometimes striking innocent children. Some Latino gangs arm themselves with assault-style rifles, as if handguns aren’t destructive enough.
The Chicago Police Department logged 771 homicides in Chicago in 2016, a body count higher than the city had seen in two decades. CPD’s tally for 2017 is lower, thankfully, but still barely fathomable: some 650 dead. New York, which has triple the population of Chicago, is on pace to report fewer than 300 homicides in 2017. It’s imperative that Chicago keep driving down its homicide toll in 2018, yet that demand comes etched with tragedy. After all, how many killings would be acceptable? Not one. With each murder, a life ends, a family suffers, a community reels. So are we to root for 300 homicides? 400? 500?
This focus on body counts is a lurid necessity to assess trends in public safety. But increases or declines in annual totals can be illusory. There are thousands, yes thousands, of shootings each year in Chicago. The difference between being wounded and killed can come down to how swiftly a victim gets to the hospital. Each shooting is a discrete event, involving a motive, availability of a gun, quality of aim, even the weather. So patterns can deceive. As Northeastern University criminologist James Alan Fox has counseled us: “Short-term crime shifts are not reliable trends. Do not make more of them than they deserve.”
This we can say as 2018 arrives: No matter a neighborhood’s income level, gun violence terrorizes its law-abiding citizens, takes them hostage in their homes. The gang warfare these citizens endure is a hopeless act of nihilism. The pathologies won’t change overnight, but actions by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, law enforcement authorities, state lawmakers and city aldermen, and members of these communities have impacts. The good news is that Chicago has made some progress. From that, entering 2018, an agenda:
The Police Department, which continues to embrace technology and data analytics as crime-fighting tools, reports the evidently resulting decline in homicides. In districts such as Englewood, CPD installed a Strategic Decision Support Center, a high-tech nerve center staffed by police and civilian data analysts. The district is wired with video cameras and ShotSpotter sensors to determine locations of gunfire. At best, support centers can anticipate violence. Shootings and homicides in highcrime Englewood were down about 45 percent in 2017. We hope more lives will be saved as Chicago opens more support centers.
Gov. Bruce Rauner signed legislation in 2017 that calls for punishing repeat gun offenders with longer prison sentences. This adds a deterrent factor and keeps violent criminals off the streets longer. The more lawmakers and judges do to discourage gangbangers from carrying weapons, the safer Chicago should be. And the more aldermen encourage communities to cooperate with law enforcement, the likelier Chicago is to stop shooters.
The most sweeping action Emanuel can take to fight violence is finish reforming CPD. The culture of policing in Chicago has long been blighted by officer misconduct. The accountability system is broken. This has turned many residents against officers who might otherwise help cops fight crime. To repair trust, Emanuel has to finish restructuring police training and procedures. He must complete negotiations with Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan on robust oversight protocols to replace a planned federal consent decree that was shelved by the Trump administration. Killings, alas, will continue. But Chicagoans often have shown they can diminish the violence. As 2017 brought progress, let 2018 intensify that trend.
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