Mobile Mayor Spiro Cheriogotis announced the new Safer Communities Task Force this week that will address root causes of crime and come up with strategies not only to reduce it but also prevent it. It’s made up of people from many different walks of life including public safety officials, mental health professionals and faith leaders. One of the members is Mobile’s Director of Prevention & Mitigation Dr. Gerard Tate, who is an expert in gun violence reduction. It’s a new position the city created, and the mayor is hopeful Tate and the task force will get results.
“I typically look around the country and find the best available evidence, what’s been working in other cities, what strategies they’ve implemented, and then how we can tailor those here,” said Tate.
Tate says in order to reduce violent crime you must connect at-risk people with a positive path forward, and that takes leaders in economic development, public health, schools, and various community partners to all get together regularly, share data and work together. Tate says as an example, if there were a school fight that police respond to, instead of taking the report and moving on, the new approach would dig deeper to determine what caused the fight and address those issues…