SALT LAKE CITY — The Salt Lake City Police Department claims its violent crime reduction plan is working, and they shared the numbers Wednesday.
Department officials, along with Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall, gave an update on the data-driven plan meant to target violent crime in Utah's capital city.
Even after the department released its updated crime control plan last October, Bob Danielson, President of Alpha Munitions, remained concerned about the destructive crime in his business community.
"Every type of violent crime possible knives, firearms, fist fights," Danielson said in October.
The latest update in the crime reduction plan shows violent crime city-wide is down 16.4%. Danielson says when the police are around things are better, but there is still some concerning crime on his street.
"When they're not here it's a completely different story," he claimed.
Part of the strategic plan includes having more patrols in areas that have been identified as crime hot spots.
"We are doing targeted enforcement and deploying our limited resources into areas that statistically show higher crime we are giving our officers the opportunities to be proactive," said Salt Lake City Police Chief Mike Brown.
New statistics show business robberies are down 33.3%, aggravated assaults are down 19.4%, and gun-involved crimes are down 71.4%. Murder and individual robberies saw no change with the overall average monthly crime decreased by 10.7%.
Chief Brown and the mayor say continuing to lower violent crime is a priority.
"Here in Salt Lake City, we have taken aggressive steps to reduce violent crime since the pandemic overall crime in Salt Lake City is the lowest it's been in seven years," said Brown.
"The root of violent crime is not singular, which means the solution also cannot be singular," added Mendenhall, "that's why our violent crime control plan is expansive and focused on the long term."
The city and Salt Lake City police will now move into their mid-term strategy plan which will go into a deep analysis to try to understand the underlying causes of violent crime in particular hot spots. Officials say it will be a multifaceted approach to reducing crime.
