Mayor Brandon Johnson last year decommissioned the city’s Shotspotter gunshot detection system saying it was no more than a “walkie talkie on a stick.”
On Nov. 6, after pressure from aldermen during budget hearings to add a promised financial allocation for another gunshot detection system, $5 million was listed in a line item under the “software maintenance and licensing” category in Johnson’s proposed 2026 budget.
The overall Software Maintenance and Licensing appropriation within the Office of Public Safety Administration 2026 budget is $10,595,589, the fourth highest of the OPSA’s appropriations…