Crime over the Summer
The Downtown Tulsa Public Safety Forum on August 26th marks the first meeting since an officer-involved shooting where five people were shot and one man died near 2nd and Elgin in May. Just after that, a man was shot and killed during a Juneteenth celebration in Tulsa’s Greenwood District and seven others were injured. And recently, a woman was injured in a stabbing while on board a Tulsa bus.
“When we started off the summer, we did have some several high-profile violent events that happened both downtown but also citywide,” said Major Mark Ohnesorge with the Tulsa Police Department.
Downtown Curfew Update
A lot has changed since the last Downtown Public Safety Forum meeting, including a new curfew for minors after multiple downtown shootings. Major Ohnesorge says those incidents drove the city to act fast, including creating a summer task force.
“It seems to have done a great job because after that point, our summer kind of cooled off a little bit downtown; we weren’t seeing the huge crowds of kids that were coming downtown that we saw previously,” Major Ohnesorge said.
Gaining Clarity
Marta Young used to live downtown and is in the process of moving back. She says she came to the forum to gain some clarity about what to do during situations like that…