COLERAIN TOWNSHIP, Ohio — The Colerain Council of Neighborhoods hosted a community discussion Thursday night amid ongoing gun violence. They invited WCPO 9 News to facilitate the discussion after seeing our team seek solutions through previous town halls.
The council said the deadly shooting that took place last week Thursday near Colerain Avenue and Springdale Road is the eighth shooting within about 1 mile of this intersection in the last six months. That number does not include the shootout at a nearby Kroger back in May 2024.
“The type of criminal activity that is happening in Colerain Township is evolving, it’s changing, just like it is throughout the entire country,” said Edwin Cordie III, Colerain Township Chief of Police.
The discussion was mediated by WCPO 9 News anchor Adrian Whitsett, with Chief Cordie and Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey in attendance.
McGuffey agreed with Chief Cordie that crime is changing and that the number of guns on the street is rising.
“The proliferation of guns alone involved in crime is shooting up those homicides, those people who are getting shot, the children that are using guns,” McGuffey said.
At the meeting, residents in attendance were given a form to fill out. The form asked them to rank their concerns within the township, possible solutions they would like to see, what they believe is causing the issues with public safety and any other comments or concerns they may have.
Residents were also able to speak at the meeting and ask questions to Cordie and McGuffey regarding their concerns. Some concerns included gun violence, a lack of police officers, traffic issues and drug problems within Colerain Township.
Cordie said he understands residents' concerns and wants to provide them with the solutions they want and deserve, but one of his biggest hurdles is staffing cuts made to his department.
“You know, with us having two failed back-to-back levies, we had to take our officer count down from 69 down to 58,” Cordie said. “That is a massive reduction in officers when you have a smaller department.”
Cordie said studies say his department should have over 100 officers to keep up with the 45,000 calls they receive each year.
“Right now we’re reactive, and I only have the officers to handle the calls that are coming in, and we don’t even have enough of those to begin with,” Cordie said.
He added patrol officers in his department are often going from call to call all shift long.
Many solutions were proposed throughout the night to improve Colerain Township and lessen crime, such as signage to encourage people to report crimes, working with anti-violence groups and more aggressive policing.
But there was one solution that persisted throughout the night: FLOCK cameras.
Five FLOCK cameras, also known as license plate readers, would cost Colerain Township around $50,000 a year. Whereas adding one officer would cost around $15,000 per year.
The Colerain Board of Trustees has voted twice to install FLOCK cameras within the community. It failed both times.
Notes and responses from residents, speakers and forms will be shared with the Colerain Board of Trustees at their next meeting on Tuesday, Jan. 28, with the hope of making some of these solutions a reality.
