Police chief outlines strategies to curb gang violence, address staffing shortage

Police Chief Luis Velez outlined several strategies Tuesday that he wants to put into action next year to tackle the city’s gang problem and the department’s staffing shortage.

Velez said the new initiatives will reduce response times and get gang members off the streets. One of the initiatives involves partnering with the U.S. Marshals Service to identify gang members through a computer program known as social network analysis. The data would show relationships between gang members.

“When you’re talking about a gang you’re talking about people that are related in many, many ways that we know of. We arrest them together. We stop them on traffic stops together,” Velez said.

He also wants to implement a demand-modeling structure. Velez said the computer software, based in Fort Collins, would help the department determine patrol officer availability.

“In a nutshell, they can place our officers in locations where they predict we’re going to get calls for service, which should create better response times for our officers and it should place us with more manpower in areas where we will wind up using them,” he said.

Velez said the program will also help the department hone in on what parts of the city are repeat problem areas for law enforcement.

“Certainly we can’t manufacture more manpower, but we can certainly try to leverage technology,” he said.

Velez told KRDO NewsChannel 13 he also wants to create a mental health response team, to help police while responding to calls involving those with mental illnesses. Velez said it’s important that the department can transition from a police response to a mental health response.

Velez said there would be no cost associated with partnering with the U.S. Marshals Service or with using the demand-modeling structure. He didn’t know how much it would cost providers to start a mental health response team.