{"id":6478,"date":"2022-04-01T11:27:07","date_gmt":"2022-04-01T11:27:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/9thstreetjournal.org\/?p=6478"},"modified":"2023-03-27T15:59:08","modified_gmt":"2023-03-27T15:59:08","slug":"city-council-hears-mixed-views-on-shotspotter-gunfire-detection-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/9thstreetjournal.org\/2022\/04\/01\/city-council-hears-mixed-views-on-shotspotter-gunfire-detection-system\/","title":{"rendered":"City Council hears mixed views on ShotSpotter gunfire detection system"},"content":{"rendered":"

BY ZELLA HANSON, KELLY TORRES AND ALEX KUMAR<\/p>\n

More than 1,900 shooting incidents have taken place in Durham since the start of 2020.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ve left more than 650 wounded and nearly 90 dead.<\/p>\n

\u201cFolks are asking for help,\u201d said council member Leonardo Williams at last week\u2019s Durham City Council meeting. \u201cThey\u2019re saying, \u2018Just do something more, please.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

That \u201csomething more\u201d may be ShotSpotter, a controversial gunfire detection system that the council blocked in June 2019<\/a> and September 2020<\/a>. Now, the council is one step closer to setting aside $197,500 for a year-long pilot of ShotSpotter.<\/p>\n

A majority of the council voted last month to move forward with a budget for the 2022-23 fiscal year that would include money for ShotSpotter. The council must vote on the budget before June 30, but during public comment at a council meeting last week, several Durhamites showed up \u2014 either in person or via Zoom \u2014 to oppose funding for the technology.<\/p>\n

ShotSpotter uses microphones placed around a city. When the microphones sense gunfire,\u00a0 police are notified and dispatched. By improving police response times and sending officers to scenes that might otherwise go unreported, ShotSpotter could save lives, proponents say.<\/p>\n

Mayor Pro Tem Mark-Anthony Middleton, arguably the council\u2019s most ardent supporter of ShotSpotter, said that last year in Wilmington<\/a>, two police officers received awards for saving lives after responding to ShotSpotter alerts. (Only one incident involved gunfire; in the other, someone had sustained injuries breaking a window.)<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is about when someone needs help,\u201d Middleton said. If someone is hurt, even \u201cin the middle of the night, someone will come and see about you.\u201d<\/p>\n

But does ShotSpotter work? The MacArthur Justice Center found<\/a> that in Chicago, 88.7% of ShotSpotter alerts were \u201cdead ends\u201d — incidents in which no gun was actually involved.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat ShotSpotter is<\/em> effective at is manufacturing consent for increased policing,\u201d council member Jillian Johnson said in an interview. \u201cIt increases the number of times that police are called.\u201d<\/p>\n

Naana Ewool, who is involved with Durham Beyond Policing, a coalition that advocates for \u201ccommunity-led safety and wellness,\u201d says most cities place microphones only in small areas…or in certain neighborhoods. \u201cAnd those neighborhoods are often the ones that are majority Black and brown, with a higher number of folks being criminalized.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPolice who arrive on the scene often escalate situations and introduce violence, so folks are more likely to get injured or killed,\u201d Ewool said. \u201cThere\u2019s public health research<\/a> that shows that regardless of the type of interaction, the more interaction folks have with police, the worse their health outcomes are.\u201d<\/p>\n

Danette Wilkins, a health professional and resident of Durham\u2019s Cleveland-Holloway community who works for Johns Hopkins University, implored the council to reject ShotSpotter. She cited a report<\/a> by the City of Chicago that says\u00a0 \u201cthe very presence of this technology is changing the way Chicago Police Department members interact with members of Chicago\u2019s communities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Opponents think the $197,500 would be better spent elsewhere.<\/p>\n

In general, \u201cwe need gun control, we need housing guarantees, we need a living wage,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cThat\u2019s how you end gun violence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnson said the city can \u201cinvest as much as we can into prevention and intervention techniques,\u201d like the violence intervention program Bull City United<\/a> and the We Are The Ones Fund.<\/a><\/p>\n

Middleton says these reforms and ShotSpotter are not mutually exclusive: \u201cI think the people reject the zero-sum game. It\u2019s not either\/or.\u201d<\/p>\n

He resisted comparisons to Chicago and Charlotte, which canceled its contract<\/a> with ShotSpotter in 2016. \u201cI have to govern based on data from Durham,\u201d he said. \u201cBut we don\u2019t have that, and so I really want this to be a pilot in the truest sense.\u201d<\/p>\n

In an interview, Ralph A. Clark, president and CEO of ShotSpotter, said the technology bridges \u201ca fairly significant public safety gap.\u201d He pointed out that \u201c80 to 90 percent of gun fired events go unreported. So that means guns are fired, there\u2019s no call to 911, which means there is no police response.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Oakland, California, Clark said, ShotSpotter technology has saved more than 100 gunshot wound victims. The company also says its sensors detection rate is 97%.<\/p>\n

Clark added: \u201cIt\u2019s very confusing to me to see people have a negative reaction to the idea that police are able to respond to incidents of gunfire.\u201d<\/p>\n

Williams agreed. \u201cGive us a chance to try this,\u201d he said. \u201cIf it works, it works. If it doesn\u2019t, we\u2019re going to try something else.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council member Javiera Caballero, who would prefer that the city fund other violence-reduction efforts, says officials will have six months to collect the data about the gunfire detection technology. After that, the city has to pay for ShotSpotter.<\/p>\n

She doesn\u2019t think Durhamites have had enough of a chance to hear about the technology, but she expects it to be funded when the council votes on the budget.<\/p>\n

Opponents want the city to keep searching for solutions.<\/p>\n

\u201cCommunities are dealing with so much grief and so much fear because of gun violence,\u201d Ewool said. \u00a0\u201cJust offering them something\u2014anything\u2014isn\u2019t fair. People deserve things that are going to provide real solutions and real healing.\u201d<\/p>\n

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More than 1,900 shooting incidents have taken place in Durham since the start of 2020.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ve left more than 650 wounded and nearly 90 dead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[269],"class_list":["post-6478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-government","tag-the-9th-street-journal","entry"],"yoast_head":"\nCity Council hears mixed views on ShotSpotter gunfire detection system - 9th Street Journal<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/9thstreetjournal.org\/2022\/04\/01\/city-council-hears-mixed-views-on-shotspotter-gunfire-detection-system\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"City Council hears mixed views on ShotSpotter gunfire detection system - 9th Street Journal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"More than 1,900 shooting incidents have taken place in Durham since the start of 2020. 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