16-Nov-16 – Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s ambitious plan to add 970 police officers, detectives, and sergeants over the next two years is “a good start,” says his Vice Mayor, but not good enough.

“The greatest challenge our downtown [police] commanders have, frankly, is lack of resource,” says Brendan Reilly, alderman of the city’s 42nd Ward that covers most of the Loop and neighborhoods north and west of the Chicago River. The 970 additional personnel included in Emanuel’s $8.2 billion budget, he says, is not enough to keep up with attrition and retirement.

“We need to have more coverage not only in the high crime areas, primarily in the south and west sides of Chicago, but we also need to protect the central core of the city.”

While crime in any neighborhood is unacceptable, says Reilly, it is a challenge downtown, where much of the city’s tourism tax dollars come from. He says organizations such as Choose Chicago that promote the city must compete with headlines about violent crime.

“We are playing a bit of a tug-of-war across 50 wards for very limited, finite amount of police resource. So, it’s my hope that [by] prioritizing public safety in this year’s budget and hopefully in subsequent budgets, we can get the police force to a level where we need it to be.”

The budget was approved by the City Council on Wednesday. Reilly made his remarks on Tuesday at the annual meeting of River North Residents Association.