Toledo's mid-year crime report shows continued, but slowing, progress

Toledo’s mid-year crime statistics painted a murky picture, with increases in homicides and shootings in the first half of 2024 compared to the first six months of 2023 but decreases in all other categories.

The biggest improvement came in theft from motor vehicles and auto theft, which fell by 33.7 and 11.6 percent, respectively. Burglary and robbery fell by single digits.

However, homicides rose from 15 to 19, and shootings rose from 103 to 109. While the increase in homicides represents a troubling 26.7 percent jump, Toledo Mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz noted that, if measured through the current date, the homicide rate has actually held exactly even compared to last year.

“We’re not going to use phrases like what’s expected or acceptable,” the mayor said. “That’s not how we do this. But if you do look at what the 30-year average has been, now, even on homicides and other violent crime metrics, we are not at what we saw even three or four years ago. We are at what the 30-year average for Toledo has been.”

The mayor praised Toledo Police Chief Michael Troendle and his force for their efforts to continue reducing crime in the area. In particular, he pointed to Mr. Troendle’s ability to grow the size of the force and his willingness to try new approaches.

In addition to two regular foot patrol areas around East Toledo and Dorr St reet, the police department has also i mplemented a new policy of rotating patrols through different communities for shorter periods of time.

“We’re doing a one-month initiative in each area, and it includes foot patrol and bike patrol, but also some suppression activities,” Mr. Troendle said. “I am pleased on our results so far. We’re seeing some huge success in those areas.”

In the first month of the patrols, which took place off of Sylvania Avenue, the area saw a 76 percent decrease in crime, which far outpaced the rest of the city over the same period. The second month, which was on the East Side, also saw a much greater decrease compared to the rest of the city.

Mr. Troendle then discussed the growth in the Link Toledo Program, which has integrated 1,116 cameras from private houses and 643 from local businesses to provide officers with more information to aid their investigations.

Despite relatively promising overall numbers, both Mr. Kapszukiewicz and Mr. Troendle acknowledged that juvenile crime and gun violence remained areas of significant concern.

“As much as we might celebrate the general movement in the right direction, we do continue to have too many cases where young people are involved either as the perpetrators of crime or victims of crime,” the mayor said. “That is something that does stick out. So even as the numbers continue to come down, juvenile crime is still higher than we want it to be.”

Neither the mayor nor the police chief had specific numbers to quantify the extent of the issue, which community leaders have been concerned about for a long time. Mr. Troendle said the department has worked to enforce the city’s youth curfew more strictly in recent years to keep children off the street at night.

However, he acknowledged that this was not an ideal solution. Councilman Brittany Jones, vice chair of the city council’s housing and community development committee, believes that any efforts to reduce juvenile crime must come from within the community.

“It really does stem with more of what is going on internally in the community, and how we can reach the youth,” Ms. Jones said. “There has to be something we can do to fill in the gaps, especially when it comes to youth programming as well. That is something we have to invest more in.”

She pointed out that, particularly in low-income communities, many parents have to work full-time and overtime to support their children, making it more difficult to supervise them at all times.

With that in mind, Ms. Jones urged parents to come together and look after each other, whether that means help with supervision, providing meals, or any other responsibilities they can share. That kind of work can be more impactful than any kind of government intervention, she suggested.

“We just have a deep responsibility to our youth, to the next generation,” the councilman said. “In a way, it does impact the life in our city. … How can we work together in order to bring these rates down? It should not be this high among the youth. So what is missing when it comes to that?”

Addressing gun violence specifically, Ms. Jones highlighted some of the work that the 2023 Mayor's Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement initiative has been doing to limit gun violence, address its effects, and record statistics.

When asked about those efforts, Mr. Kapszukiewicz praised the organization, although he did not address any specific metrics or statistics about their effectiveness.

“I think it is one of the things that makes a difference,” he said. “It is not the only thing. All of our efforts should be seen in the context of a menu of initiatives that maybe each one of them, in and of themselves, wouldn't be impactful, but when you stack them together as a whole, I do think they all add up.”

In other cities around the country, homicide rates have been down by 13 percent and gun violence by 18 percent during the first half of 2024. As Toledo aims to match these trends, Mr. Kapszukiewicz acknowledged that there is still room for improvement.

“What we are doing is generally working,” the mayor said. “Again, we’re never satisfied. We won’t be satisfied until there are zeros in these [statistics].

“But we can celebrate how much these numbers have gone down just over the last couple of years.”