Weekly Update

Friends,

While I have written about our issues with crime and our administration’s efforts to tackle it many times in this space, we unfortunately still have a long road before us.

As you will see in the charts below, violent crime was up 13.3 percent last year.

 

However, property crime was down 9.1 percent for the same time period.

Violent crime has plagued our city for decades, and over the past year with most meaningful outlets closed due to the pandemic, almost every city across the country saw an increase.

For me personally, working to solve this problem has been one of the most frustrating and challenging obstacles I’ve faced during my time as Mayor because there is no “quick fix”. Unfortunately, the plans we make and the actions we take today do not mean our crime problem will be solved tomorrow.

It takes all of us—state and local officials, families, neighborhoods, churches, businesses—working together towards the long-term goal of reducing violent crime.

Our recently announced Group Violence Intervention Program (GVIP) will bring all these groups together to fight crime using the evidence-based practices of innovative policing and focused deterrence work. It will further be complemented by other non-police agencies who will perform intense violence interruption, intervention, prevention and outreach to the hundreds of individuals we know who are committing most of the crimes and the most at-risk youth.

Through this program, along with the many efforts already in place, we are working every day to make our city a better, safer place to live, work and play.

COVID-19: I just wanted to give a quick snapshot of what our data looks like over the last couple weeks. As you can see below, the cases have decreased by more than half, and the hospitalizations by almost half over the last 30 days.

This is largely in part because of you. Thank you for wearing your masks, practicing social distancing, and washing your hands. Keep up the good work.

 

Greater Memphis Chamber: Earlier this week, the Greater Memphis Chamber made a presentation to City Council, “From Protest to Progress”, in which they committed to push for local private industry to match the City of Memphis' livable wages and MWBE spend.

 

I wanted to again publicly thank them and welcome them to our work of growing neighborhood development, increasing public transportation and quality affordable housing for all Memphians.

 

Liquid Gold: About this time last year, there was one item that you couldn’t find anywhere—hand sanitizer. Still, today it’s not always easy to find. As you can imagine, we go through a lot of it at city government, especially at our vaccination site.

 

That’s why when the folks at B.R. Distilling Company reached out and offered to donate 16 gallons of hand sanitizer, we jumped on it.

 

I went this past Monday to pick it up. They were nice enough to show me around their facility, and I was able to thank them in person. Thanks again for your generous donation.

Have a great weekend.

Yours,