Pueblo businesses unaffected by public safety issues

Pueblo business owners say they aren’t affected by the public safety issues in the city.

The most recent issue is two Pueblo police officers who have called it quits. They are recent graduates of the Pueblo Police Academy.

That brings that number to four since December.

This comes on the heels of a Denver Post report that shows Pueblo has the highest per-capita homicide rate in the state.

Sgt. Eric Gonzales said some of the recruits resigned because they said it wasn’t what they expected and they thought the job was tougher than they thought it would be. Gonzales said some of the recruits resigned because of all the recent officer shootings around the U.S. and in Colorado.

The high murder rate, police staffing issues and gang violence are all images that Pueblo business and city leaders continue to battle.

“People are going to associate Pueblo with something negative,” Solar Roast Coffee marketing director David Ray said.

Despite the issues with public safety, he said business has been up at the coffee shop. The City of Pueblo has also seen a 12 percent increase in sales tax revenue in January compared to that time last year.

“We get paid to paint rosy pictures, but those are tragic events that are unfortunate for the families,” Greater Pueblo Chamber of Commerce President Rod Slyhoff said.

Pueblo Convention Center officials said even though the city has seen a high number of homicides and gang-related crimes last year, it was still a record year from them. The center said close to 500 events and almost 50,000 people were at the convention center in 2015.

“We’re not seeing a decline in that, I mean we haven’t had any calls from people saying that were cancelling our meeting or anything like that,” Slyhoff said.

There is a proposed ballot measure from the Pueblo County District Attorney to enforce a half-cent sales tax to bring in up to 50 more police officers.