Police Department Shifting 500 Officers to High-Crime Areas

By Chuck Sudo in News on May 24, 2011 4:40PM

A day after the FBI announced that violent crime fell in Chicago by 11 percent in 2010, the Police Department announced they'll be shifting 500 officers to the neighborhoods hardest hit by crime for a three-month period.

Most of the officers will come from the Department's Mobile Strike Force and Targeted Response Unit, Officers from those two units and other officers will be transferred to districts in the following districts: Grand Crossing, South Chicago, Calumet, Gresham, Englewood and Chicago Lawn, Harrison and Austin. These temporary reassignments are being used by Acting Superintendent Garry McCarthy to gauge the effectiveness of having boots on the ground in these high-crime areas versus the response of the two units, which were championed by former Superintendent Jody Weis.

If the results are satisfactory, the Moble Strike Force and Targeted Response Unit could be disbanded. The reassignments also help to partly fulfill Mayor Emanuel's campaign pledge to add 1,000 police officers to the streets, without having to make new hires.