October 6, 2023

Dear Angela,

I just announced my Whole Government Response to Crime Act of 2023. I'm grateful to have the support of the majority of the Council, including Chairman Mendelson and Councilmembers McDuffie, Nadeau, Allen, Trayon White, Pinto, Lewis George, Parker, and Frumin as co-introducers of my crime response bill. This is the first in a series of bills I’ll be introducing focused on response to crime, prevention of crime, and recovery from crime. Response is first because we have to stop the violence in our city right now.

At the beginning of the summer, I was at a community meeting where students from Whitlock Elementary school stood up bravely to read out loud a letter they had written to the mayor after their classmates were shot as they were just going home from school.

I heard from a mother who has taught her 4-year-old to have her seatbelt off and be ready to run into the house as soon as they pull up to their home and the mom shuts off the car because they are scared for their safety.

Everyone rightly cares most about how we stop the shootings, the carjackings, the window smashing. We need it to end. Our kids deserve it to end. All of us deserve that. I want to be up front with residents: I don’t have a magic wand that will stop all violence tomorrow. No one does, and it adds insult to injury if we make false promises. But my crime response bill will make us safer, quickly, by fixing what’s broken in our public safety system.

With the public safety crisis we're facing now I want the Council to move this bill forward rapidly. I'll share a summary of the bill below.

Sincerely,

Robert

Improves our government's response to crime

• Quickly improves 911 operations and response with recommendations from a 911 system improvement taskforce that will provide system and leadership recommendations within 90 days.

• Expands staffing and talent at the Department of Forensic Sciences’ (DFS) Crime Scene Division, which is short-staffed and delayed in processing evidence. With the U.S. Attorney’s Office declining to prosecute a reported 67% of people arrested in the District last year, fixing our Department of Forensic Sciences is crucial to ensuring swift, certain consequences for the people committing the violence.

• Tracks where the firearms flowing into DC are coming from. By tracking the guns seized in our city to their source we can identify states, gun shops, or types of transactions that are leading to the proliferation of illegal guns on our streets.



• Creates a full-time Victim Services Coordinator to connect residents with resources like legal aid, help with medical bills, mental health support, or assistance with funeral costs so they know where to turn for help in the aftermath of a violent event.

Tackles the sharp rise in juvenile crime

• Provides opportunity and accountability to youth with a new position called Director of Emerging Adults. DC has many programs geared toward helping young adults get on the right path or stay on the right path; programs like OSSE’s Re-engagement Center; the Pathways for Young Adults workforce program for 18-24-year-olds who are not currently working or in school, and others. Even with good programs, we can’t counter the rise in crimes committed by young adults without a strategy. The Director of Emerging Adults will work directly with young adults and other experts to develop a strategy that brings all of DC’s programs to bear on reaching our young people and reversing the rise in juvenile crime.

Develops solutions to the violence in nightlife corridors across the District

• Creates a Hospitality Working Group to keep both customers and neighbors in every community safe. We heard about the recent tragic shooting at a nightclub on H Street. We hear frequent and very real concern and anger from residents near U Street. Most of us don’t want to see all of our nightlife shut down, nor can we have people living in fear. So, we need specific attention here that includes law enforcement, establishment owners, residents, and nightlife organizations.

Requires District agencies to collect data on the effectiveness of our violence prevention efforts

• Requires DC to start reporting on the work of violence prevention efforts, like Violence Interrupters, the Hospital-based Violence Intervention Program, and Roving Leaders. Residents deserve to know that we're not just responding to crime by creating new programs, but that we're following through and evaluating what works.

Watch my segment on WUSA9

Last night I spoke with WUSA9 about my crime response bill and my takeaways from yesterday's arrest of 48 people in Operation Trident.

Need to reach me or a member of my team?

My office is available to you. Connect with me and my staff via phone or email. Please call my personal office at (202) 724-8174, or my committee office at (202) 727-8270, or email any of my team members. If you have a moment, please take my 3-question constituent survey here.

  PERSONAL OFFICE STAFF

Robert White | Councilmember | rwhite@dccouncil.gov

Angela Fowlkes | Chief of Staff | afowlkes@dccouncil.gov

Katie Whitehouse | Legislative Director | kwhitehouse@dccouncil.gov

Andre Strickland | Constituent Services Director | astrickland@dccouncil.gov

Devon Haynes | Communications Director | dhaynes@dccouncil.gov

Lisa Wright | Legislative Assistant | lwright@dccouncil.gov

Sam Walden | Office Manager | swalden@dccouncil.gov

HOUSING COMMITTEE STAFF

Shawn Hilgendorf | Committee Director | shilgendorf@dccouncil.gov

Sean Cuddihy | Deputy Committee Director | scuddihy@dccouncil.gov

Caitlin Cocilova | Senior Legislative Counsel | ccocilova@dccouncil.gov

Neah Evering | Legislative Counsel | nevering@dccouncil.gov