Source: WISH-TV
INDIANAPOLIS–The City of Indianapolis has already had more than 100 homicides in 2023. That’s after there were more than 200 homicides in both 2022 and 2021.
Reverend Charles Harrison, leader of the Indy Ten Point Coalition, says he remembers when Indy ended the year with 96 murders in 2012.
“In my mind, everything changed when public safety became a lot more political than what it used to be,” said Harrison in a Friday interview with IndyPolitics.
In 2012 and prior to that, Harrison said there was a time when all levels of city government worked closely with neighborhoods to keep violence down.
“We used to have a good idea of who the young people were who were acting out in different sides of the city, but now it tends to be more widespread,” said Harrison.
He says both he and the rest of Indy Ten Point have had numerous conversations with kids who want to pick up and use guns, but his group has managed to talk them out of it. But, he acknowledges they can’t be everywhere.
“The question becomes now, ‘Can we put this genie back in the bottle and get back to the numbers we had from 1999 to about 2012?”, said Harrison.
When Harrison hears people say that violence is bad in all metro areas with Indianapolis being no different, he takes that as an excuse that is unacceptable.
“Look at Boston. Cities like that have maintained a low level of crime over the years. It can be done if Indianapolis has the right approach to dealing with the violence,” said Harrison.
The overall crime rate for Boston, Massachusetts was down 1.5% in 2022. Harrison thinks a community based approach where empathy is shown is effective, but it takes a collective effort.
