Chicago City Council to host hearing on missing and murdered women of color

CHICAGO (CBS) — Chicago City Council leaders will meet with the Public Safety Committee to discuss the controversial policing technology ShotSpotter.

The city's contract with the company is about to expire. Mayor Brandon Johnson and several aldermen disagree over whether the city should keep using the gunshot detection technology.

The technology has monitored Chicago neighborhoods for more than six years and has cost the city tens of millions of dollars. Johnson has vowed to get rid of the technology altogether.

In May, the mayor doubled down on that campaign promise after the City Council passed an ordinance requiring a full council vote to stop using it. The move triggered a months-long power struggle of sorts within City Council chambers and through CPD.

The ongoing crisis of missing and murdered women and girls of color in Chicago will be the focus of a Chicago City Council Committee.

As part of this testimony, organizations will ask the city for more resources for investigations and support for families on Monday morning. The City Council Committee on Public Safety will address the ongoing issue starting at 10:30 a.m.

The Kenwood- Oakland community organization and GoodKids Mad City Englewood are just a few organizations co-sponsoring this hearing.

Organizers want to build on years of community advocacy and recent progress at the state and local levels to address the issue of missing and murdered women and girls in Chicago, specifically Black and Brown women.

For seven years now, groups have held the "We Walk for Her March" in Bronzeville.

These organizations are now calling for creating an "ebony alert" that would notify residents when young Black women and children go missing.