CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) - The latest numbers show violent crime in Cedar Rapids is up 4% this first half of the year compared to the 5-year average for the first 6 months of a calendar year. The Cedar Rapids Police Department says that includes the 8 homicides this year, which is five above the average. It's the same for shots fired incidents, which there have been 78 of this year.
Chief Wayne Jerman says Risky Behavior is a factor in many of the homicides.
“If you look at the first one of the year, it involves drugs then the other two that have been solved some sort of risky behavior associated. I need to be clear I’m not bashing victims but its choices and decisions that factor into that,” he said. “Most of these incidents are targeted and being committed by persons of members of hybrid gangs.”
Jerman says he feels their most successful approach has been their PCAT or police community action team, but they along with the city are working on rolling out new initiatives soon.
“Through the Cedar Rapids Community Foundation, they are looking for a violence reduction initiative and through a number of grant-funded programs. We’re also looking at a consultant who wrote a book called, “Bleeding out” and that focuses on urban violence so those strategies and methods were interested in,” said Jerman.”We need to continue to increase community involvement and get assistance from the community, a lot of the shootings that occur involve victims who don’t want to cooperate.”
With the new reality of COVID-19, this Summer the SET or Creating Safe, Equitable, and Thriving Communities Fund launched its ReSET 2020 Youth & Family Challenge, which includes efforts of anti-violence messaging from community leaders, and engagement through street outreach team.
The Boys and Girls Club of Cedar Rapids was one of the recipients of SET funding this year. They are using it for their Street Smarts program.
“We’re using that funding trying to reach out to families and see what the needs are trying to provide them with some just basic needs,” said John Tursi, the Executive Director. “As long as they are not being supervised they are getting into more trouble and that’s the problem with most organizations we haven’t been able to do what we normally do.”
However, Tursi says the answer takes trying new approaches, which they and many others have been trying to do.
“We need to look at this in a positive manner too. You have all kinds of different groups trying new kinds of different ideas and quite frankly that’s important. The reality is we need to try new things to reach out to families that are in the most need,” Tursi said.
TV9 did reach out to the SET Fund for this story but they declined to comment.
Copyright 2020 KCRG. All rights reserved.
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