City of Champaign Updates

There was a lot of big news in Champaign City government this past month or so. A major blueprint to address local gun violence and outrage over Council member's comments dominated a lot of the local coverage. This post also covers updates on emergency services staffing issues and links to many other City government updates. Probably the most covered policy issue was the new Community Gun Violence Reduction Blueprint (fixed link / original link broken). From the News-Gazette last month:

City council members voted 7-0 at Tuesday night’s meeting to adopt a plan to reduce gun violence that has been in the works for months.

The plan will see the city spend an estimated $3.21 million annually in the form of grants and investments to address gun violence in the area.

“The primary objective of the blueprint is to identify the paths that frequently lead to interpersonal violence and homicide and closing them through early intervention,” the document says. “This will be done primarily by targeting high-risk offenders and at-risk youth, community mobilization, conflict mediation and providing outreach to ensure access to social services.”

That full article with a lot of additional details here. A full overview of the blueprint is available from the City's website here. The City Council's Study Session report on the blueprint is available here. The News-Gazette had additional coverage on issues like outreach at the street level:

Champaign will seek an entity to lead this street-outreach strategy through a request for proposals, which is “estimated to be finalized within the next several weeks,” Deputy City Manager Joan Walls said.

The city’s blueprint outlined a few key traits sought for street-outreach workers. They’ll likely be native to the community and have prior experience with gangs and street organizations. Interventionists could lean on their pasts to build relationships with at-risk youth who are most likely to perpetrate or experience gun violence.

The model takes after the methods of Chicago and Boston’s “CeaseFire” programs and Operation Peacemaker Fellowship, a 20-year violence-prevention program in Richmond, Calif., all of which used street interventionists to reduce firearm-related violence in their communities.

That full article here. And issues like Carle hospital's potential role in the changes:

Carle, which would be one of multiple organizations partnering with the city as part of the program, would cover half of the $800,000 two-year cost of staffing the hospital’s emergency room with a social worker around the clock. A grant from the city would cover the other half.

As the Level 1 trauma center for a broad area, Carle’s emergency room receives many of the victims of violence and all of the critically injured victims in the region, according to Allen Rinehart, vice president of inpatient hospital operations...

Through collaborating with the city, he said, Carle would not only have social workers available 24/7 in the emergency room to talk to victims and their families, it would also have a network of other organizations involved with the city’s program to make a rapid referral to head off potential retaliatory violence.

More at that full article here. And some of the organizational and staffing changes that have already begun:

[Rachel Joy], who currently serves as community-relations manager, has been named director of the new Equity and Engagement Department and chief equity officer, effective March 21.

The new department is actually an expansion of a current division of the city manager’s office — what has been called the Office of Equity, Community and Human Rights — and is being spun off into a new and larger department of its own as a reflection of the work that needs to be done, according to city spokesman Jeff Hamilton.

It will have three divisions, among them one that will oversee the city’s massive plan intended to address the root causes of gun violence and work partner agencies.

That article here. WCIA had a brief overview here as well.

In City staffing news, there has been a lot of recent news on staffing issues in emergency services in the last month. 

• A detailed example on the Champaign Police Department staffing issues from the News-Gazette, including comparisons to other local departments and analysis.
• The Champaign PD is hiring. Quick overview from WCIA.
• Staffing issues at METCAD, an intergovernmental dispatch service for many County and local emergency services, from WCIA. The City of Champaign plays a primary role in staffing the agency.

There was also a large outcry about a Champaign City Council member's admonishment of a couple of public speakers on gun violence in their neighborhood. Illinois Newsroom had a fairly objective overview of the incident here. Video of their last of the public comments and Council Member Alicia Beck's admonishment in the first of the Council Comments immediately afterward is available here. The opinions editor of the News-Gazette and the local GOP have depicted the admonishment as an attempt to silence local citizens. An example from one of Jim Dey's columns here. 

The context of the remarks appears to be in encouraging people to speak up for all communities dealing with gun violence, and not just when it shows up at one's own doorstep. Regardless of how the remarks themselves are being portrayed, however, it is hard to see admonishing any victims of gun violence as good politics. WCIA had statements from the Council members and Mayor assuring residents of their support for public comments here.

Tom's Mailbag has received questions on the possibility of censure or recall of City Council members (Tom Kacich notes that's not currently within the laws/statutes here). The editors of the News-Gazette chose to initially respond to the incident with an unusual opinion column on the front page, above the fold. Written by Jim Dey, his framing was seized upon and spread rapidly on local social media.

With local municipal elections still a ways away, it appears the current push is for demanding the resignations of Council member Alicia Beck for her comments and another Council member who seconded her remarks.

Other City of Champaign Updates:

• The City will be releasing its Annual Action Plan this week and will be looking for public input. From Smile Politely.
• The Champaign Police Department offered tips on avoiding many of the scams going around lately. From WCIA.
• Champaign PD also restarted its "coffee with a cop" events according to WCIA.
• WCIA also had coverage of city properties purchased by Habitat for Humanity of Champaign County. A listing of all the properties that were up for sale here.
• The City will be offering closed captioning on their television programming, also via WCIA.
• WCIA also had a blurb on Garden Hills "amenities" being developed.