ShotSpotter’s future in Chicago in question days before tool goes offline

CHICAGO — The City Council Wednesday could again rebuke Mayor Brandon Johnson’s plan to rid Chicago of ShotSpotter, just days before the gunshot detection technology is set to go offline.

Aldermen are set to vote on a long-shot ordinance some say would compel police Superintendent Larry Snelling to continue using the tool. As Johnson sticks to his plan, his opponents are already trying to pin him with blame for any gunshot deaths that follow, and threatening a lawsuit to try to force him to let them maintain the sensors in high-crime Chicago neighborhoods.

“If certain people are allowed to make certain decisions without certain common sense, then all I can say is, there will be blood,” said street pastor Donovan Price, known for working with gun violence victims, at a City Hall news conference Wednesday morning.

On Tuesday, Johnson poked jokes at ShotSpotter, describing the tool as little more than a “walkie-talkie on a pole,” and arguing the attempts to continue its use in Chicago were being “pushed by corporate interests.”

But the City Council has fought hard to keep the sensors — which Snelling has praised as an important aide for police — in use. Aldermen passed with a veto-proof majority in May a measure to give themselves control over ShotSpotter’s future, but Johnson flatly rejected the vote by arguing the City Council does not have power over the city’s contracts.

That decision could ultimately pit aldermen against the mayor in court. Ald. Brian Hopkins, 2nd Ward, said Wednesday the coalition of aldermen backing the technology is willing to sue to enforce the ordinance.

“If we wind up in front of a judge, we have a very strong case to make, and ultimately we will prevail,” Hopkins said. “But the easy course of action is for the mayor to do the right thing and renew the ShotSpotter contract.”

The no-holds-barred effort to keep ShotSpotter supported by many aldermen and backed by the company behind the controversial technology, SoundThinking, will include another vote Wednesday. The City Council is set to consider ordinances designed to compel Snelling and, separately, the leader of the city’s Office of Public Safety Administration to renew the ShotSpotter contract.

If it passes, the ordinance will likely face a similar rejection by Johnson. But it might not be the end of the effort to retain ShotSpotter. Ald. Bill Conway, 34th Ward, said there are a “multiple of other ways to compel” Johnson to keep the technology, including by forcing the issue during the city’s upcoming 2025 budget process.

But the clock is ticking. ShotSpotter is set to shut down on Sept. 22 at midnight after Johnson agreed in February to a final extension with the company to keep it running through the summer, according to SoundThinking Vice President Gary Bunyard.

The company and city have not been in contact to discuss how the technology will be decommissioned, Bunyard said last week. The company will be responsible for the cost of taking down the over 2,000 acoustic sensors that underlie the technology, he added.

If ShotSpotter does in fact stop functioning over the weekend, opponents of the mayor are already moving to blame him for shooting deaths. Standing alongside 15 other aldermen Wednesday morning, Ald. Raymond Lopez, 15th, said ShotSpotter is only about “saving lives.”

“How can Brandon Johnson … put a price tag on saving lives?” Lopez asked.

That cost could be lowered, as SoundThinking sent a letter to the Johnson administration offering to cut the $10 million-per-year fee nearly in half if they agree to keep using it through 2025.

ShotSpotter — which uses acoustic sensors mounted on light poles, mostly on the South and West sides, to quickly alert police about the location of suspected gunfire — has been in activists’ crosshairs for years. It gained notoriety in 2021 after a gunshot alert from a street in Little Village sent responding police running after 13-year-old Adam Toledo. An officer fatally shot Toledo during the chase.

The technology also faced harsh criticism in a 2021 report issued by the city’s Office of Inspector General that found it rarely leads to evidence of crimes, investigatory steps and gun recoveries, while tainting officers’ interactions with residents of neighborhoods most affected by gun violence. Separately, the MacArthur Justice Center is suing the city over its use of the tool, which it called “inaccurate, expensive and dangerous” in another 2021 study.

The 2021 Inspector General report called for more data, as did the ordinance passed by the City Council in May. Recent data collected by the Chicago Police Department and publicized by ShotSpotter determined police respond 2.5 minutes faster to gunshot reports when an alert is made.

Through August this year, police have rendered aid to 143 gunshot victims after ShotSpotter alerts, including seven people who were treated despite no corresponding 911 call being made, according to the CPD data.

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