Mayor Mallory Boasts Initiative's Initial Success

Police Credit Change to Hands-On Approach

By Jennifer Greenup
QueenCityForum.com Magazine staff

City Hall--Mayor Mark Mallory announced last Tuesday that Cincinnati’s new Public Safety Initiatives are showing results. He cited the Cincinnati Police Department’s having taken more than 500 weapons off the streets since January and arrested more than 900 people in Over-the-Rhine since the city’s new taskforce was implemented.

“This represents what the Cincinnati Police Department is up against,” said Mallory pointing to a table filled with several types of handguns and rifles. “Good police work is what has led to these types of weapons being taken off the streets.”

Assistant Police Chief, Lt. Col. James L. Whalen said that the city’s new initiatives and changes in the department’s “policing style” has enabled police to better deal with the issues facing the city.

Whalen said that the new rules allowing police to “put people in handcuffs and take them to jail” is having a huge affect on the taskforces success in Over-the-Rhine.

“We are not going to solve all the issues of crime right away,” said Mallory. “As we find it necessary to put new initiatives in place, we will do that.”

Lt. Stephen Kramer of special investigations says the department has investigated fire arms trafficking in Cincinnati since 2004. There were four such investigations in January and February alone, resulting in 146 individuals arrested for gun possession and more than 500 guns taken off the streets so far in 2006.

In 2005 there were 14 investigations into drug trafficking, 550 people arrested, and 1562 guns taken off the street, Lt. Kramer said.

Whalen said the department will try to take this process to other troubled areas in the city now that it has been successful in Over-the-Rhine.