Detection plan for gunshots soon online

People in California soon will be listening for gunshots in Columbus.

The city is preparing this week to roll out a new Shotspotter gunshot-detection system on the Hilltop, the first of three pilot neighborhoods where the California-based company’s sensors will record shots and alert officers to where they originated. The others will be on the South Side and in the Linden area.

City officials stressed during a demonstration Tuesday that the technology

will not replace the need for residents who hear gunshots to call 911, but it will help officers better pinpoint where the shots are coming from and how to respond.

“This does not replace our neighbors looking out for one another,” Mayor Andrew J. Ginther said. “This is another tool for officers.”

Officers will be alerted by an alarm on their cruiser computers within a minute of shots being fired. That’s enough time for sensors placed in the area to record the shots and for someone monitoring the system in California to use technology to distinguish between gunshots and other noise, such as a backfiring car or fireworks, Columbus Police Deputy Chief Richard Bash said.

Every cruiser in the city can log into the web-based system, Bash said, but officers patrolling the neighborhood will have it open at all times. When Shotspotter detects gunshots, a map will show a circle within which the shots came from, as well as other information such as the time and number of shots and how fast the shooter was moving.

Bash said the system also can tell whether multiple guns were firing.

“This is going to give us much better information,” he said.

Bash likened the system to the voice assistant Alexa. It always will be recording, but the city will receive only recordings of gunshots, he said.

“This is not an eavesdropping mechanism in any way, shape or form,” he said.

Similar Shotspotter systems are in operation in more than 80 cities across the country, including Chicago, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh. Columbus initially rejected using the Shotspotter system several years ago as too costly but reconsidered given several factors, including its success elsewhere and the city’s record 143 homicides in 2017.

Police fired shots in the Hilltop neighborhood Tuesday afternoon to help calibrate the system, which Bash said should be up and running in the next few days.

Bash said police initially will keep one two-officer cruiser within the area to respond to reports of shots being fired.

The city’s agreement with Shotspotter is for a pilot program in 2019 that will provide coverage for three areas of 3 square miles each at a cost of about $685,000, including startup costs. The city will not own or maintain the sensors that Shotspotter uses. A full-year renewal for all three neighborhoods would cost about $585,000.

Lisa Boggs, a Hilltop neighborhood leader, said some residents have been reluctant to call 911 to report gunshots because they don’t know where they came from or have enough information for dispatchers. Now, they won’t have to provide location information but still can supplement what Shotspotter detects.

“I think this is a small price to pay for our community to be safe,” Boggs said of the cost.