Okay, call our meeting of public safety to order, and uh uh I believe our fire chief is gonna come up first, but I'm not oh okay, not our fire chief.

Uh I'll be here in his place today.

Right on.

Um let me get the presentation up, please.

So let me walk you through the first slide.

Uh let me back up.

Deputy Chief Keith Borson.

Um, let me walk you through this slide as there's a little bit going on here.

The the gold or yellow line across the top is reported structure fires.

You can see that since 2020, that continues to trend upward.

This is calendar year reported, so we don't have uh data yet uh year to date for the reported because we have to go through and distill that down to make sure the numbers are accurate at the end of the year.

Um then at the bottom where you have the blue line since 2020 uh you will see that the actual fires that we respond to mitigate has remained fairly stagnant.

So, what I'm trying to display here is that even though the incidence of the uh alarm reporting or people calling 911 continues to trend upward, the actual fires that we respond to are staying the same.

So far, year to date, 112 actual fires within the city of Grand Rapids.

Uh the reason that those numbers are staying stagnant of the actual fires we respond to is why we're here today, and that is to touch on the efforts of the fire prevention division.

So everybody's aware, everybody sees the uh flashing lights, the siren, the big red truck responding to the emergency.

What you don't see is what goes on in the background.

And with me, I have Captain Royal Le Grone.

He is the captain of our 40-hour fire prevention inspector staff, and then Ruth Yochum, and she is our community fire prevention educator.

Um second grade presentations and many other things.

So far this year, the fire prevention division has performed 589 operational permit inspections on businesses.

In conjunction with the building department, inspectors have completed 326 construction plan reviews and over 20 250 rough in and final building inspections.

Uh, along with um the Office of Special Events, that special events take place in the city are done in a safe manner.

So if there's cooking taking place, tents, large gatherings, more than 500 people, um, fireworks or cold spark uh oftentimes in the morning, usually almost every commission meeting in the morning.

We will have a fireworks permit that comes through for commission approval as an example.

Uh the result of that is the safety and the lack of problems that you hear about at these special events.

Another component of the fire department uh is our residential safety program.

That is where we go out and to individual homes, owner occupied homes, and provide education, and install carbon monoxide detectors and uh smoke alarms.

And you'll see that so far to date, we have installed almost 5,000 smoke alarms and over 1,900 carbon monoxide alarms.

That is getting into over 800 owner-occupied homes within the city.

Since the inception, that's 88,700 smoke alarms, 20,800 CO detectors, and over 16,000 homes that we have visited.

And again, there's also a fire and life safety education component to these visits to these homes.

So that's about getting out into the community, interacting with the community, providing fire safety education.

Over 100 events so far this year, uh, such as the shoes event in the image across the street, handing out shoes.

We were there every day of that event uh with our smokehouse with Smoky, the stuffed fire dog, not smoky, the or Sparky, the stuffed fire dog, not smoky, the one that you see running around with the chief.

Um engaging with kids and their families about fire safety education.

And I'd like to note that coming in October of this year, we're kicking off fire safety week, and this year's message charge into fire safety.

The messages around lithium ion batteries, the safe storage, purchase, maintenance, and proper disposal.

That is all I have.

Any questions?

I have a couple, Chief.

I mean, I guess the first is I think you're being too modest.

Um 263 minus 238.

That's a delta, that's actually a downward drop in the last four years of about 10 percent.

And I think you know, if you were pushing hard enough, you'd you'd be able to argue statistical uh significance there.

I mean, that's a real drop in numbers.

Um it's a it's a consistent downward plot.

So um I think that's I think that's great.

Um the question I had.

Well, okay, I I guess that's my that's my first comment.

Anyone else have anything they want to say?

Just for clarification, Chief.

Uh how much do we spend a year on the smoke uh detectors?

Smoke detectors.

Off the top of my head, I want to say that the number approaches three hundred thousand dollars out of the fire department's general operating fund.

We in the past did receive and we continue to seek and write for federal grants to help fund those.

And is the um is the are we keeping up with the demand for the detectors?

Are we uh are there people who have been turned away at the end of the year because we've no sir.

Okay, no, sir.

And I actually uh Ruth recently was uh one of the RSP installers until she took over the education component.

That's why I turned in to confirm with her that I wasn't speaking out of turn.

So I I I do remember uh my two other questions.

Um one is the lithium ion question.

Um, you know, people go out and buy a scooter from a flyby net company from China that's gonna exist for three months and never be around again.

They don't have much in syncent they don't have a really huge incentives to really safety test their batteries.

Um have we seen uh like scooter and e-bag fires inside structures?

Have you thought about a program to re to just tell people?

I mean, in in my household, I'm like, look, we are not charging these things inside the house.

Um I don't care how safe they they theoretically are.

Um and I haven't seen a lot of uh community messaging on the NGR, maybe I've missed it, but if you could speak to that a little bit.

There has been some.

I'll let Captain LeGrone speak up on this.

We're the ground fire.

Uh so this this year, the NFBA National Fire Protection Association, that is their focus.

And so we uh with Ruth and we've developed uh we're trying to figure out the best way to distribute that.

And so we're gonna kick that message off um starting in October for fire prevention week, uh, because that's the that's the nationwide theme uh that fire departments around the country will be doing, so we'll have that.

But we also uh included in our RSP program and other things so that we can get that message out because it is uh uh becoming you know an issue.

Not we haven't seen it as much here as in other other cities, but uh we know we want to get ahead of it before before it happens.

So we'll we're going to increase that that messaging in the future.

Great.

Thanks.

Earlier this year, our fire marshal who couldn't be here today, uh, did have some messaging, and we invited all the news outlets um to the MLK fire station to show how we mitigate fires and then speak about the the numbers that we've been having, the trending that we've been seeing.

Um so there is more coming on it.

The fire marshal and the fire prevention division is working with community partners.

Um one of the areas that's affected within the city primarily is our waste recovery and the battery fires that they've had.

So along with the county.

Then I guess my next question is it's great that structure fires are going down.

Do we have a cry wolf problem?

And if so, why?

Um if reporting's gone up 25 percent.

And not i I think it's the city becoming busier.

More going on, more construction, more things going on.

Um so the way that those alarms are reported uh can vary a great deal.

It can be somebody calling 911 to report it, um, they're seeing something, or alarm systems in buildings that that that activate for some reason.

And we scale the response appropriately based on the information that comes in and have protocols in place to direct the resources that we send to those.

But uh the the numbers going up is just our city getting busier.

Okay, so simple things like you know, you see dust and you think it's a fire and you call it in.

That's some of it.

Um the fact that our education is working.

So the reason that the numbers of the actual structure fires are remaining stagnant or staying the same.

Your your credit going down is that our education, I believe, is being effective.

We're getting the messaging out there.

People are being notified sooner because of those smoke detectors they have in their house.

Therefore, they are able to call us when it's just a uh burned food, if you will, before it becomes an actual cooking fire.

Right.

Great.

Thanks.

Any other uh questions?

Commissioner uh Phil, committee members?

Great.

Well, thank you so much.

Thank you.

Chief.

Um excuse me, uh Chair.

Can we we just want to commend you all also?

I think you open up the Kindle station this week.

We are this week.

Friday will be the official uh ribbon cutting and and opening of the station.

So combinations in that that regard as well.

Thank you very much.

Thanks, Chief.

Uh and Chief Winstram uh talk about public safety.

Uh from his perspective.

All right, good afternoon.

Good afternoon, committee members.

Mr.

Mayor, Mr.

Manager.

Um good news continues for auto thefts.

As you can see, this is what we want to see, and uh hopefully 2026 we see a continued trend in the right direction.

So uh talked about this quite a bit, so uh won't waste your time too much.

But this is uh a very good sign for our our auto theft numbers across the city that we see them continue to decline for the historic highs back in 22.

Um same thing with the this trend.

We want to see them get lower, but they're headed in the in the right direction.

Uh robbery total is total same story.

Uh no real statistical um uh uh patterns or anything we've seen, just uh just grinding out the progress um month by month.

Uh ag assaults, uh no statistical significance.

I did do a more of a deep dive into this and see a little bit this appears to be uh sort of uh uh punishment for our own progress a little bit because many of these are lower level uh assaults which get a very quick response from the police department of you know three or four minutes.

Uh I was on listening to the radio this morning and there was uh uh one at Veterans Park and officers were there right away.

And of course, our procedure is always take a report.

Um and so uh in past years when our response time was much higher for low lower level crime, there's a chance that a lot of these smaller incidents were slipping through.

But anyway, no statistical significance in any sort of increase in danger to the public uh from the data that I can see.

Prison shot, um obviously too many uh individuals shot, but this is uh if we're looking for a trend, this is headed in the right direction.

Um still for this year through September.

Um looking at this from a statistical point of view, it uh generally speaking it mirrors the uh population density that you would expect.

So it's not that the you know west side of the city is the safest place in in the country.

Uh uh past a little a little bit past the river, it's just that uh the density of population is less and um it is what it is, but it is good to see that the trend of individual shot is dropping.

So um we have had nine murders this year, year to date at this time last year.

We uh had ten.

Last year was a very positive year statistically for improvements in violent crime.

So it's good that we're continuing to see those improvements.

But as a victim-centered uh department, it's important to focus on uh individuals, not statistics of these nine murders.

The first six on on the list have been closed by arrest and prosecution.

The other three very active uh investigations from our extremely competent detectives.

Um additional positive from the lower murder rate is the you know, statistically speaking um in a exceptional organization.

You don't want to give a murder detective more than two murders in a year, um more than that, and it's uh it slows them down.

So we have about ten detectives that that work on these.

So when they're averaging less than uh two a year, not only are they able to do uh an extremely good job on the uh murders of this year, but we've also really been able to focus on those few murders that are open.

I just did a a little media out in the hallway of a murder from January 14th of 2020, 23, where uh John Tell White was killed down in the 1900 Block of Division.

Uh we're doing a lot of work on those cases, but I I don't like to use the term cold case.

Uh you see our our statistics are very high above the the national average, but even going back to 21, 22, 23, we are still very much actively working those cases, looking for additional leads and working the evidence that we have.

So um uh I'm certain that uh in the coming months we'll have more positive uh information as far as getting um justice for victims and answers for the loved ones of the victims for the the homicides that we're investigating.

Eleven recorded fatal overdoses last year.

We were averaging uh two every month, so with a little bit of a drop there, and uh over one illegally possessed gun recovered by our officers on the street.

And uh that number is is very impressive, especially where you uh think of the fact that you're not seeing reports of these serious use of force incidents or officer involved shootings on you know, certainly not every day, and uh every one of these incidents is a potentially uh very serious or even deadly situation.

So the fact that we're get we're so good at at doing this job of successfully taking these guns off the street.

We want to be known as a city that you do not want to um illegally possess a gun, um, shoot someone, et cetera.

We want this to be a safe city for everyone.

Now I'm joined today by uh our our victim services uh manager Clarissa Novak as well as uh victim advocate Magdalene Law and I'm gonna ask Clarissa if you don't mind.

Oh, where Magalen go, she's out there.

Okay, but that's all right.

We'll call you when things get heated up here.

Uh Clarissa is been doing an exceptional job since I've been here.

Um she has gone from um being a staff of just one, a one-person uh shop running the whole thing, um uh taking over.

Uh she's taken on the position of manager of a team.

She has a large team of volunteers.

Um Magdalene, she's interns, maybe.

I don't know.

Maybe you could talk a little bit about your staff, but we have a very exciting project.

I'm gonna ask her to come up and talk about uh something that we'll be implementing in October.

So hi everyone.

Um appreciate the opportunity to talk about our projects and um I believe all of you have received at some point information about the grant that we received last year.

Uh we noticed a need to really respond differently with domestic violence, increase identification of victims or survivors who were at high risk for lethal or near lethal injury.

Um that was the main focus.

And this comes on, you know, the end of a lot of work and amazing things done in this community already, like by people who have been looking into it and trying to figure things out, and we got the opportunity and went for it.

So it's really great.

With the grant collaboration, we also work alongside Safe Haven Ministries, the YWCA.

Um they are our sub awardees for City of Grand Rapids.

Uh they have advocates funded by this grant that can respond.

We also have the domestic violence action network of Kent County has been doing uh phenomenal job of convening people, and we've been working with them, and they actually brought in the Geiger Institute once we identified the lethality assessment that we wanted to use, which I'll touch on in just a moment.

And they have really been able to um Geiger has been able to support us, help us build the foundations that we'll need to identify folks and intervene later, and it's been a really great partnership.

So I do want to note that this is not one person, one agency, one entity, this is a full-team approach.

So the first thing, um, the lethality assessment that we wanted to bring in this we chose the danger assessment for law enforcement.

It is an 11-question assessment that really goes through indicators that show us when someone is at the highest risk for lethality for potentially death.

So it is going to be done by officers on scene when they encounter a survivor victim of intimate partner violence.

There is a score if someone is over that score above the threshold.

There will be an immediate connection to victim services, victim advocacy.

What that will look like as a call to Safe Haven Ministries, they've offered to be our central line, which is amazing of them.

And safety planning will be done.

It'll be done by phone.

People will get some options, some resources.

It'll be how can we get you to a safe place?

What does that look like?

Following that, the advocates who have been brought on by this grant through both agencies, all of us will come around and try to support the person, coordinate services, and make sure that they have the information that they need, especially around their rights and safety, too.

So the DAL is the first step.

Um, and hopefully we'll increase the identification and make sure people have what they need.

The high risk team is the second step.

So this is uh multidisciplinary team.

We have our advocates identified, the grant-funded advocates, but they will later be joined by prosecution, um, corrections, and law enforcement.

So the whole purpose is to review cases, share information between all of these agencies that you know have an influence on the way that victims experience the system and the things that they go through, and then coordinate services and support.

So a measure of accountability and support for all in part of that team.

This is the timeline of when the projects will be launching.

Biggest thing we have a commitment to make the survivor center.

Like this is supposed to serve people in a different way that's actually supposed to be informed by them.

And so while we've built that in throughout, we're going to be hosting two survivor listening sessions to offer the opportunity to comment on the project to give us feedback to see the protocols and see what that is.

The first one will be October 16th.

Um, I do have information if anybody wants that, but it's for survivors of intimate partner violence, only to provide their feedback.

It'll be myself, um, Safe Haven's grant-funded advocate and the YW's grant-funded advocate who go through this and just kind of listen to folks.

We'll also have training for advocates on the original danger assessment, so the assessment from which the Dale was developed to be provided to the community-based advocates.

So they have another tool to use to more comprehensively assess risk once they finally get to that point.

Um, in November, the training for all law enforcement at GRPD will take place, um, as well as some community partners.

We'll have um prosecution court staff will also receive some training on the DAL, what that looks like, how it's utilized, and you know, kind of what we're asking so folks can be fully informed when they're using it.

Um, full implementation of the DAL will be December 1st of this year.

And then we will be collecting data as we go with the Geiger Institute.

Following that in spring 2026, we'll be launching the high-risk team officially.

So, with this, um, you know, spring is going to be spent getting everything ready, but I will say we're already working on policies on documents that we'll need for the high-risk team, identifying people.

The group does not like to sit still, so we're moving full speed ahead.

And I think the really exciting part is even though we're not to the point where we're at this high-risk team part.

Um, I've been working with the family services team, sergeant, and some other internal folks, and we have actually been bringing in the grant-funded advocates to work alongside us and meet with victim survivors jointly and be able to do like an initial warm handoff, get them connected, make sure a meeting is scheduled before they leave the room that day if they want.

It's all about what they need, what they want, but that way there's an immediate connection to people who can be their long-term support too.

So we can help on the criminal justice advocacy side if through GRP victim GRPD victim services.

Then we have our safe haven and YW partners helping with the long-term care and support for these folks.

Um, so I'm really excited and grateful to our partners that they just jumped into everything and we're testing the waters and seeing how it works and should have a better roll out of everything because of that.

And then lastly, I just wanted to highlight some of the other stuff that we have going on.

Um, figured I might as well since the mirror.

But we have Crime Victims Rights Weeks every April.

I don't know if people are aware.

Uh, Crime Victims Rights Week takes place, and so we always have observances.

Last year we did a healing and rights education session.

We do a lot of community connection and education.

Um, the victim response team, we've actually had Magdalene, who does not like public speaking, I sit in the back.

Um she has been riding with patrol two days a week on her shifts, and we've already seen early intervention connection with victims to provide services and then wraparound after that.

So I'm incredibly grateful for her work.

Not only that, but we're seeing an increase in people understanding that their services available, which I think is key because it's a newer program, and we want to make sure that people know what they have access to.

Um, crisis management briefing.

I get a lot of requests from neighborhood associations after a really large community violence event, and we didn't really know kind of how to convene people.

Magdalene and I attended training um not too long ago about um like crisis um incidents and stress management and things for intervention, but one of the things that came out of that is crisis management briefing, which will offer start pushing out in January, um, but basically an informational group that's a source of support and information for community members, mixed groups that have been impacted, but maybe not directly, um, but still need to process and get some information.

So we'll be promoting that as well.

Um, I know Chief mentioned my volunteer advocate team, they respond on scene to deaths to provide support and information for next of kin or other loved ones who are there when someone passes, and then we're also looking to get a therapy dog, and I had to add that because that's my favorite.

So we are working on that.

But yeah, it's just a lot of big things going on.

Um you'll see a lot coming from that, and I welcome any feedback, any questions as we go.

I want to be super, you know, transparent in how we're doing things and make sure that this is successful, basically, and really well advertised.

So thanks.

Um, you know, I I I certainly think this is brilliant.

Um of you, maybe not all of you know I spent uh two years in the prosecutor's office primarily working on uh domestic violence stuff.

So this is something that's uh very near and dear to my heart.

Um it looks to me like you're firing on all cylinders, you got all the all the right priorities.

Um I really uh and sounds like you've done a brilliant job interacting what we as a city are doing with um some of those key partners in the in the community.

Um I want to just like throw this out as a thought bubble and I clear this with the chief beforehand because this is very much a thought bubble thing, but um I think you're doing the right thing, and and and obviously, you know, there's those wartime idea of triage, right?

Like you you look at the at the most urgent cases first, and the the assessment of lethality, I think follows a lot of other assessments that we've done that you can you know, you can do fairly accurate, good screening of people's risk of reoffense, and we do that in the juvenile space, and so this is obviously a JSON analysis, and it's it sounds quick, easy to implement, um, and a really good idea.

Um that being said, there's uh sort of a continuum in the domestic violence space for lack of a better way to put it.

And so there are cases that are really acute, um, but there's a lot of chronic uh potentially subacute, and and some of those will may manifest in in prosecutions, some of them may not, some of them may involve police reports that don't go any further, and it's a it's a very tough space to find accountability and to find change in it's it's a really tough space to be in.

And I I you know I know that.

Um of the things I have talked with community partners about is the possibility of if we can identify some subacute cases, if you want to put it that way for lack of a better way to put it, um, to maybe get some mentoring opportunities with community partners to walk alongside people who are in those less acute cases to have positive outcomes, and that's an area where we don't necessarily need as much direct law enforcement and victim services in in support.

But but the need's still there, and and those cases can grow into bad cases if you don't um if you don't pay attention to them.

So the the analogy I'm thinking of is CASA.

Um in the and so those of you who don't know, there's in the abuse and neglect space um you have workers who are assigned to the case, but then there are volunteer members from the community who walk alongside those cases, um, are mentors for the children involved, but also sort of have their eyes on the whole situation.

And it and it's a very friendly, positive, soft touch program, but that it has incredibly high uh participation from community members.

Like there are CASA advocates available for basically every case that need ones needs one, which is awesome, but that's all a community-based initiative that it's all volunteer people out in the community who are walking alongside these cases where there's a need.

And so I would love to see a space where we can craft some kind of collaborative um work to help those subacute cases first.

And that is I'm not trying to say anything except hallelujah, this is awesome about what you're doing right now, right?

I just I'm the kind of guy that when you know when I'm looking at this, I'm like, great, what do we do next?

So I'm so excited about this, and thank you.

I'm really just so grateful to GRPD for applying for the grant on this, getting the grant, the fact that we've got this going.

Um I also any time I see a grant worry about continuity.

So this is me saying as long as I'm around, um, I'm gonna be a hundred percent supportive of doing this kind of work.

And Chief R I appreciated you pointing out like we can't point out often enough that like all of this work has to center on victim needs because nobody chooses to be a victim.

Uh it's something that happens to them, and they and it doesn't happen to the court and it doesn't happen to the officers, and it doesn't happen to anybody involved in the system, it happens to that victim.

And so listening to them and prioritizing them and building a culture where we really prioritize uh victim needs is it it is should be should be our our North Star on everything we're doing, and this looks to me like it completely the lines, and I'm sorry for the sermon, but I'm really I'm really excited about this.

I I appreciate that.

May I respond for a moment?

Sure.

Sorry.

Um I want to give credit.

So the domestic violence action network actually has a lot of membership where they are looking at creative ways to address not the high lethality was one strategy, but they're looking at how do we catch other people.

And one of the biggest conversations we've had lately is not everybody goes to the criminal justice system.

Sometimes it's just never going to touch them.

And so what does that look like for them, whether they're at high risk or you know, at the beginning.

And so I think anybody who's interested interested in those conversations, um, DVAN really is doing some incredible things with bringing thought partners together and trying to address them using different strategies instead of you know just law enforcement criminal justice, it's beyond that.

It's all of us.

Yeah, great.

Thanks.

Commissioner Kilgore, you had a Yes, thank you, Mayor.

Um, so thank you so much for the presentation for many years that went to the Capitol in October, uh, which is coming up for domestic violence awareness month um with advocates and we worked on state policy to where abusers couldn't um you know be given contact where you could use a PO box for court documents and things.

So um it's definitely in a line with work that I also support and very happy to see that you all are spearheading.

I had some questions too here.

One about the DAL, is that correct?

How you see it?

Um does that cover, is there a component of that that covers uh interacting with folks within the two S LGB to QIA community?

Um is that a part of that?

Is um So with the Dale training, they will go over you know the different populations, but with the tool itself, they have it in I I believe multiple languages, but it's just uh an 11 question tool.

The training is gonna provide the context for like how to utilize it with different populations and communities.

Wonderful.

And then in line with that, uh with your community partners for folks who giving these folks resources and community partners, have you reached out to um folks who are doing LGBTU plus advocacy within uh the city or the state?

We have not reached out.

I think we have a Dvan collaboration.

I think we're looking at um trying to do more of spreading, basically, right now.

Okay.

We did the setting up of the policy.

This came originally out of Dvan with that group and then kind of got refined and then going back out.

So I definitely think we can do some more.

That's my feedback.

I think you know, um uh the Grand Rapids Pride Center for resources or Equality Michigan would be, I I think they'd be very happy to be a part of this very important work.

And from my domestic violence advocacy that did for many years, um intimate partner violence within our community is often overlooked, right?

Because people just don't view it as um as respectful of a relationship or those questions are just not posed.

So I think with this resource, it'll be imperative to include our community within it.

Thank you so much.

Absolutely.

I have one uh other question, and it sort of builds off of that.

First of all, thank you for the work that you're doing.

I appreciate the department's investment in this work.

Um as our community continues to grow, we want everyone to flourish and prosper, and I think it's important to address domestic violence head on.

So I appreciate all the support coming from our mayor and city manager as well.

With regard to that, um, for those that may be listening or looking to access information, um, I'm not an expert in this field.

I I don't pretend to know any of your data, but when I see atrocities, I tend to think that those committing them probably look like me.

Um and so our victims are maybe stereotypically female in domestic violence situations.

But my question really is rooted as you talk about safe haven and the YWCA for those who are identifying as male who are feeling victimized in domestic violence, are these resources equally serving them?

And how will they feel confident to access these resources even if they tend to be in the minority of cases that we're seeing currently?

Yeah, I think that's something.

So the one of the first things we confirmed was that everybody would be eligible for services.

Um and then the Safe Haven and the YW do serve all genders.

Um and so I think that that is a really good affirmation from our partners.

They have programming like you know, different support groups and things.

And so I think the other thing is um, you know, we do have the survivor feedback and things from what we're getting as well.

And so one of the I I'm a member of some of the communities we're discussing, so I'm gonna put that out there.

We have a lot of representation.

Um, but I think one of the biggest things is like it's also a lot of education on us, right?

Because not all look like you.

You know what I mean?

I think that people are often shocked.

And I also think that like you said, there's a lack of awareness of what violence looks like, whether that's emotional, financial, physical, no matter what.

And so I think it's on us to do a lot of education, it's on us to reach out.

But I know as far as the supportive services, um, that has been very thoroughly discussed and making sure, or with kids, like if someone has kids, can they come?

If this is like some of the buildings aren't accessible, so if it's someone has accessibility needs, they can't go to one of the shelters.

And so I think we are trying to be intentional, but I don't think we can hear enough of ways that we can do better because there's always going to be instances where like we miss something.

It's just the nature of it.

And so the more feedback we get, whether from you all from the community, from our survivor partners that we'll be at the listening sessions with, I think it's gonna be great.

I appreciate that.

I really think that it's a matter of helping people who like me who are under informed or undereducated, just see the inclusive language and know that those services may exist for someone that didn't pop in my mind initially, whether those are kids or non-traditional relationships, et cetera.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Pastor?

Just uh one give a special shout out to the VRT.

I think I got to meet them a couple years ago.

Um and actually just excited about what you all are doing and grateful for the grant.

You know, that's that's a blessing in and of itself.

Uh I was curious to know um what are your statistics like as it pertains to on average, you know, the number of calls that you have received or throughout the course of this year, if you can give any that you may be aware of.

Uh and then secondly, uh finally I look forward to attending the training uh in November.

So hard, I'll be honest.

So I know um we will serve, I think it's on average about uh a hundred people a month, like comprehensively.

Um the first three years I worked, I know I reached out to six thousand people.

Um we typically reach out to a lot more than we're serving just for communication, or we have people call us and they'll say, I just want to know about this one bit.

Um and sometimes they reconnect and sometimes they don't.

I think with our domestic violence, the uh and our family services team, those and the detectives that investigate have really brought us in more and more.

And so it used to be we knew that you know survivors had supports in the community, but they didn't have them necessarily um for certain crime types.

So domestic violence had support, human trafficking, sexual assault.

If you were randomly assaulted on the street, there was really nothing for you.

And so that was the focus initially.

After we started expanding, that focus has changed.

And so now our stats have changed as far as what crimes are represented because we've opened ourselves up more to the department.

But I can definitely follow up with some statistics and break down whatever you all would want to know for sure.

Thanks.

Go ahead.

Thank you so much for your work.

I really appreciate you going thorough and then the department's um attention that they're paying to this.

In the Dale assessment, who initiates the the officer initiates the deal for the danger assessment, it's the advocate after.

So the person can decline the deal.

Um they can it's when it's on scene when they're called.

So if it's they go in, it's intimate partner violence scene, separate people give the lethality assessment um to the person who's the victim, and then they would score that.

And then that's where that starts.

The person can decline and say that they don't want to complete it.

Um, or there can be an officer override as well, which will teach where there can be um maybe they answer half and the person's like, I think there's a lot of things, but they don't have time, or like there's different ways, but um it will be officer initiated and then followed up with advocacy.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Uh Chief, I don't want to let you off the hook uh so easily since you you gave a bunch of statistics at the beginning, and we rolled into the second presentation.

So thanks.

Thanks so much for the presentation.

Um if I could just touch on what Clarissa said real quick.

Um Two things, Mr.

Davy, you you said it uh very well when you said how important it is to address uh domestic violence, intimate partner violence head on.

I believe in that's something that's changed in the 25 years I've been a police officer.

Um sometimes getting a perspective outside of policing profession.

So I just want to give a shout out to Clarissa.

She's literally making us a better department.

She's one of the people that's really making us a better department.

So I really really value her.

Um statistic-wise, uh uh Pastor Goldston, I think sometimes when we talk about this and we talk about the lethality assessment, you'll get people like that lethality assessment.

That's pretty serious.

Yeah, it is.

Uh somewhere north of 10%, uh 10 to 20 or so of our uh homicides every year are domestic uh related in nature.

And even the ones that aren't, um studies have been shown that um I believe it's somewhere around 60 percent of all homicide offenders recorded in the country have some history, even if it's not a domestic related murder.

There is history of domestic violence.

So when you talk about lethality assessment, yeah, it is that serious, and this is that important to us.

So um nothing but praise for uh Clarissa and the the team she's assembled.

Um any other uh any other questions, Mr.

Mr.

Mayor.

Yeah, if I if I can run you through paces and then others can ask questions.

Uh first of all, the auto thefts numbers, which are amazing.

Uh is that uh like if you do you continue to emphasize that on a staffing level or what are you attract I mean look that couldn't couldn't be a better curve.

Um you got any oh you know, I I don't we're always we're always careful about causation and correlation or all that.

And I don't you know what you don't want to take a victory lap.

I get that.

Oh, yeah.

And this has been all hands on deck, and I think unfortunately just uh being the realist that I am at some point in time, you're gonna see that flatten out, and it and uh you know it won't be zero zero probably until we're uh until the robots are driving us all around or something.

Um robots will be stealing cars then.

That's gonna be a different set of set of crime, yeah.

But this was an all hands on deck approach from um everyone, I know Mr.

Brown Brown isn't here today, but um everybody from just the appeals uh across the board of from parents, pay more attention.

What are your kids, you know, you know, what vehicle are your children getting into?

And we've seen the support of the parents, we've seen these nonprofit groups who've seen cure violence and others take an interest in these kids, let them know.

The uh the prosecutor, Chris Becker's got on board, and uh Pastor Gaddy came in from uh his mindset, he came from the east side of the state with it with a program called the Grand Rapids Alternative Corrections Experience, where we were literally arresting young people as young as 11 years old every day in a row.

We we were arresting young people three days in a row for stealing a car.

We knew we would arrest them, prosecutors what we have.

Thank you, send them home.

Thank you, send them home.

So we saw there was a problem uh of accountability, all the system parts weren't working, and some of that was left over from from COVID, that there was uh just as far as uh criminal justice system for juveniles was failing on all sorts of places.

So everybody got together, not um found ways to hold these young people accountable, but not simply lock them up, throw away the key, alternative ways to make sure that they were um guided down uh better path.

That combined with um uh a uh communication campaign by us and others sharing how easy it is with the club, if you're uh you know, my age or about there, or some other basic vehicle locking device, and then the assistance we got from literally Hyundai and Kia themselves to come into town and say, hey, we'll replace the our faulty ignition systems for free.

So everybody got together, and you can see it took us a while, but we're making progress.

Okay.

Um thanks.

So next question.

R uh robbery totals also going down uh nicely.

And uh again, don't want to claim victory here, it's a non-zero number.

Um but I had a couple questions on that.

One is my intuition would be Amazon is not a decline a company in decline.

I'm not seeing less things dropped off on people's porches uh or fewer things.

My my kids always want to coach me on less and fewer, but fewer things on people's porches.

So there's probably greater community opportunity for robbery, um, but we're seeing declining numbers.

Like, yeah, is your guess part of this is tied to like the rise of ring cameras?

And if so, then my question would be do you guys is it time for you guys to start acting like ring cameras are the policing equivalent of fire detectors for the fire department, maybe start convincing people to get ring cameras or I'm I don't know if I've spoken a lot to uh community groups to business groups uh since the day I got here and question I always get you know, what can we it was it's it's usually what what are the police doing and what can they do better?

And then I'll get the polite question in the crowd hey, what can we do as a community?

First thing I say is if you're a business, put put uh you know good quality surveillance cameras on and don't hide them, they don't have to be secretive.

Let people know, hey, if you're in my parking lot, if you're outside my business, this is what and that goes for ring doorbell cameras as well.

There are whole sections of the the city uh I came from where there would be incidents on a block of uh you know pattern burglars, and it would literally be these three houses were burglarized.

This one wasn't, these three were.

This was the only one with a with a uh doorbell camera or something else.

So the more that that happens, it is a a huge deterrence.

Yeah.

And that's so that's certainly one thing I would credit that with.

We don't do not see um the issue when you talk about robberies a lot of time it's a scary thing for an individual to be robbed.

Um when you think about visitors, think about our prize, um, our downtown area.

There are cities across the country, including the one I came for, where you hear every day people getting mugged on the street in the downtown area while they're just gonna trying to go to a restaurant and going uh getting out of their car, walking into the house.

These robberies, uh many of them have a a criminal element to them where I was robbed while I was delivering a uh package of fentanyl or something, literally.

Those are the sort of arbitrary.

So we do not generally get um personal personal robberies when we do, our detectives are extremely effective at identifying them, apprehending them.

I know I said personal person robberies, what uh what I mean by that is we do not get um armed mugging confrontations, you know, person with a bandana, give me all your money.

There is not one block in this city that I I would not walk down in flip-flops, shorts, t-shirt, no gun, no badge, and not feel uh safe in and I'm I'm so proud of that.

I know we can do better.

I want uh everybody to to to feel that way.

Um but but I I love the progress we're making.

Yeah I uh agreed.

So the last thing I want to compliment you on and thank you for so much for including person shot as part of the rubric so really appreciate it.

Great to see those numbers going down.

Um I know having looked at a couple of those we've got a non-zero I don't know what w term you use but pop-up parties.

Um and I know uh some of those shootings have been like flash parties and um I know you have been focusing on those and I know from right around that you're like your guys know the problem spots the problem business owners or property owners who let this stuff happen.

I don't know obvious obviously you're making progress here.

So if you could speak to I I know not all of our murders probab we're probably never going to be pre ab able to prevent all of our murders, but like these are flashpoint things I know you've identified.

So if you have a chance to speak to that.

I mean again great progress here.

Like we we are seeing progress and things like the pop-up parties the the the car meetups a a lot of times those are long-term solutions.

It's working with business owners with a with you know steel case let's talk about the parking lot down there or Amazon um uh uh code compliance as far as problem locations where you know you're not supposed to be having a party at four in the morning here and you've got five hundred people and and that uh you know uh unlawful behavior breeds more and that ends up in in a shooting so once we identify a problem like that so a lot of them are long term so our we have two officers uh uh assigned a code compliance they have been working very hard in in the three plus years I I've been here um all these long term solutions now that we have uh higher staffing level to reach out to the communities our business partners is saying what else can you do even as far as design of a parking lot to prohibit these car meetups um and we're seeing that that pay off more and more that plus as I keep saying excellent work by uh not only our our community partners of getting our young people on a better course but also our detectives and and with a very high clearance rate word spreads in the criminal community very quickly that this it's probably better to do a crime even a low level crime somewhere that you're not gonna get caught.

And if you're if there's an expectation that you're gonna get caught even if it's just a ch a ticket for a uh a car meetup party you're gonna do that somewhere else.

Yeah and I guess that brings us to the cleared homicide rate like you may hit a hundred I mean I don't I don't curse you but like the fact that you are are there's a legitimate possibility that you in a hundred hit a hundred percent clearance rate this year is just sort of stunning.

So thank you for all the work on that.

Thank you.

Yeah and that's a tribute to the professionalism of the detectives certainly the uh the uh support uh of the city and getting our staffing up to the point where we don't have it's not you know three years ago certainly to in the year uh 2020 when we had 38 murders and you've got uh you know detectives who should be doing no more than two investigations a year are doing four investigations and um you're just not gonna get the same quality of work so um making making significant progress there I hope nine is the the number that that we're left with at the end of the end of the year and that we have answers for all nine of those uh individuals' families so Chief um thank you for your presentation always and thank you for this wonderful work um our deputy fire chief was up earlier today and I had the pleasure of hearing from our fire team when I was serving on a neighborhood association board regarding the trends in our community around fentanyl earlier in your presentation you referenced a decrease in fatal overdoses in our community and I'm curious is that because we are doing a better job with Narcan and interventions are we noticing that the legalization of cannabis and the regulation of that or is the use going down or are the overdoses going down?

Are they running parallel what kind of information does our community have regarding fentanyl and and these harmful drugs?

It's when you're talking about crime statistics and it is difficult for uh for anybody to come up with that this is the answer.

But I will tell you you hit the nail on a head as far as the Narcan without Narcan uh these numbers would be exponentially higher.

So if it were not for that, we would be talking about numbers uh much higher.

Uh there are efforts we've we've seen a decrease total in Narcan, I mean in uh fentanyl recovery, so either by the DEA or by local uh police.

I don't really know what to make exactly of that trend.

There is uh obviously since uh January a lot of talk about the border and different level levels of that, but uh the the uh drug game has changed so much in I don't want me to call it a game, but the the the illegal drug activity has changed so much in in my 25-year career used to be if you were overdosing on something, it originated from China.

There was a very long route that it would take through Central America up.

So much is synthetic now that um uh it's literally changing by year, by month, even that we don't know if we can stop it coming in because you could make it you know very close to to home with just the precursors if you're able to get them.

So there's so many moving parts to it.

I could have uh actually maybe I will let next uh next time I'll have our our vice lieutenant come and talk about it because it is such an important thing in it and 11 lives lost just in our city of 200,000 is a significant amount of lives lost.

So if there's more that we can do, but very interesting books are being written about it.

Um I don't have all the answers, but I like to talk as you can tell.

I appreciate you, thank you.

Since you'd like to talk, Chief.

Yes, sir.

Uh thanks so much for all that you all continue to do.

Look forward to next month, hopefully meeting some of the new CPU CPOs.

Um and the program starts uh that capacity.

Deputy Chief Drake is pretending he's not paying attention.

But uh I'll just give you a quick a quick update on that.

Yeah, hope hopefully next week we'll we'll uh actually be able to do a presentation on it.

But um Deputy Chief Drake has spearheaded this project.

We literally have have completed our uh interview process for the community policing officers.

Uh we've identified the first five community policing officers.

We're confident with with staffing with everything that we can get them.

I believe unless there's some bad news at a fiscal uh committee this morning, we have body worn cameras for them.

We are firing on all cylinders, and we're very excited about it, and I think it's gonna be a game changer.

And I think uh headed into the cooler months, it's always a great time for us to catch our breath and and make these big changes like this and get them going.

And next summer, I think we're just gonna be talking about such such a high level of success.

Thanks.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Um point of privilege.

Uh I wanted to elevate a very important conversation that took place and it relates to this body.

We had three citizen members attend a use of force training that was hosted by the police department.

And it's important because there were two judges there.

There were attorneys from my office there, there were police officers, citizen members, and there were members from OPA.

And it's not every day that you get that diverse group of perspectives in one room to learn more and to have um maybe challenging conversations around the professionalists, professional policing and and the law and all the dynamics that go into that.

And so uh much appreciation of the police department and the training unit that put that training on.

Thank you for those of you that took time out of your days to attend that training and and ask the the good questions.

And I look forward to hopefully taking part in some more of those in the future.

Mayor.

I'd also like to uh thank the chief for the presentation and Clarissa for the work.

And I uh just like uh youth violence is s cyclical.

Uh primarily we notice a spike in the summer.

Uh I believe, Chief, with uh domestic violence, we notice a spike oftentimes in the winter.

And the fact that you are implementing or launching it uh this December, I think that's good good timing.

Yes, sir, thank you, Mr.

City Manager.

Of course, there would there wouldn't be a bad time the sooner the better, but you are you are spot on, yes, sir.

Thank you, Chief.

All right.

Uh we had 90 minutes for a meeting.

We pull it off in 56.

So quick question if possible.

Any update, Mr.

Mayor, on uh the impact of the feds coming to our city.

Uh any quick comment.

Yeah, I I guess quick comment what I said.

Yeah, what I said at public safety.

I mean, I guess this is a uh as good a time as any to reiterate.

Um I I don't know what I I'm I'm not gonna really soften my language here.

I was shocked and appalled uh to see the Supreme Court say that uh that particularly for immigration control that it was appropriate to use uh skin color as a part of a probable cause assessment for arresting people.

And I said then that uh it will be a cold day.

Uh that I have no doubt at all that that is not something that's not a metric or a rubric or uh or an assessment that our public safety is going to use ever.

Uh and that our leadership is united on that.

And I know our police chief uh chief and our all of our everyone in our force uh is committed to uh a city with true racial equality, and that all of our public safety work is premised on uh on a groundwork value uh of equality.

And so um nine people in robes may have made a terrible decision, but uh which I can clearly see as unconstitutional.

Um but that means that uh that that uh decision is not something that's going to be extrapolated in our law enforcement efforts in our city.

And I guess that's the most important thing I can say.

Um secondly, um we remain committed, and I and I suppose the chief can answer this, but this is something that comes from the commission down through our city manager who is equally committed down to the chief and down to his leadership.

But I think I'm I think I'm safe saying for all of us that we are committed to making it a safe city, and that our public safety work in this city is not going to be focused on uh a federal agenda.

It is going to be focused on keeping every single resident in our community as safe as we can keep them, whether it's safe from traffic accidents or from fires or from crime, that is our focus, and we are not in the business of doing uh legwork for a federal government for agendas that may depart from that those priorities, and that we are going to keep uh ourselves focused on the great public safety work that you, Chief and all of your folks and everybody in this city, and it's not just uh a uh police issue, it is a and it's not just a fire issue, it is an every member of our community issue, keeping our community safe.

Um we're gonna keep focusing on that.

And frankly, I think it's important uh that we lift up how that we have plans.

We're not just looking at the past and saying things were great yesterday.

We are looking at what are the next things we can do to make our city safer, and we are working in those directions, and that those are plans that are rooted in the values of this community and the resources of this community.

And the these are places where we may welcome help, but at the end of the day, this is Grand Rapids working to make Grand Rapids safe, and we have expertise and we have talent and we have values and we have a vision and we're implementing it.

And at the end of the day, I'd say that our public safety officers are ground zero or the bedrock or however you want you want to put it of that work.

Um, but that work involves the whole community.

And it does, and we don't need um outside entities coming and uh redirecting our values, and we have no interest in having that happen.

Let me uh add to uh Pastor Golson's question specifically like what you're seeing in Memphis and other uh cities or states around the country with the um use of the state National Guard.

We were asked that question at City uh commission meeting as well.

Um that is not a city jurisdiction.

Uh the governor has jurisdiction over National Guard and I think has made uh it clear that she does not need uh her guard focusing on those federal issues, and so I want to um just affirm that that there's no decisions that the city needs to make regarding those resources.

Those are uh resources directed by the governor.

Thanks everyone.

Good meeting.