Youngstown wins grant to curb gun violence

A 20 percent reduction in gun crime in targeted
areas is an expected
outcome of the grant.

By DENISE DICK

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

YOUNGSTOWN — The city is one of eight local jurisdictions and state and federal agencies to share in a $5.8 million U.S. Justice Department grant to combat gun violence.

Mayor Jay Williams joined Gregory A. White, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, and Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann on Friday in announcing receipt of the federal Byrne grant.

White said the grant will be used to target hot spots of gun violence with dedicated patrols.

In 2006, the communities participating in the grant saw 240 homicides, a 12 percent increase from the previous year, he said.

“We have younger people committing more violent acts,” he said.

The grant will fund overtime and saturated patrols in the participating cities as well as fund development and operation of the Ohio Gun Crime Center to aid local police agencies.

Besides the U.S. Justice Department, Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation and Youngstown, the grant also includes Cleveland, Lorain, Akron, Canton, Elyria, Mansfield and Toledo police departments, federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, U.S. Marshal’s Service, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Ohio Department of Public Safety, Ohio Criminal Justice Services, Ohio State Highway Patrol, Ohio High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Program and Cuyahoga County Department of Justice Affairs.

Together, they form the Northern Ohio Violent Crime Consortium.

Youngstown’s portion of the grant is $227,569. Police Chief Jimmy Hughes said it will fund overtime, saturated patrols and follow-up investigations similar to the department’s zero tolerance program earlier this year.

Information provided by Dann’s office lists a 20 percent reduction in the number of gun-related violent crimes in targeted hot spots as the anticipated long-term outcome of the grant.

Dann said the effort will include a mobile National Integrated Ballistics Information Network that can be moved around the state so that local police departments can test confiscated guns and determine if they’ve been used in the commission of crimes in other areas.

That information will be used to trace the firearms and try to determine, using mapping, databases and other technology, where they’re coming from and reduce firearm trafficking in the state.

“What we’ve got to do is cut off their service and supply,” Dann said.

White said that Ohio ranks seventh in the country in being a source state for guns.

The U.S. attorney said that the $5.8 million grant is the largest Byrne grant awarded in the country. The entities worked together to apply for the grant because gun violence doesn’t observe geographical or jurisdictional boundaries, he said.

Williams agreed, praising White and Dann.

Gun crime isn’t something that can be fought in a vacuum, he said.

The grant runs through September 2008 with applications for extensions planned.

ATF and BCI will operate the gun crime center, which will serve as a repository for gun and violent crime data in Ohio. It will also offer technological and other support to multi-agency law enforcement agencies and task forces.