CHICAGO — Mayor Brandon Johnson is following through on a campaign promise to get rid of a controversial gunshot detection technology — but not until after the summer.
The Mayor’s Office announced Tuesday in a news release it will not renew its contract with ShotSpotter come Friday and will “decommission” the technology Sept. 22.
The decision comes as the city was facing a Friday deadline for its $49 million contract with ShotSpotter, which operates a network of acoustic sensors to alert police of gunfire.
It’s unclear how the city will ink a new short-term contract with ShotSpotter to allow the technology to be used during summer, when gun violence historically peaks. The city will look at other ways to reduce crime, according to the Mayor’s Office.
“In advance of the decommissioning in September, the Chicago Police Department will work to revamp operations within the Strategic Decision Support Centers, implement new training and further develop response models to gun violence that ultimately reduce shootings and increase accountability,” Johnson’s office said in a statement. “Moving forward, the City of Chicago will deploy its resources on the most effective strategies and tactics proven to accelerate the current downward trend in violent crime.
“Doing this work, in consultation with community, violence prevention organizations and law enforcement, provides a pathway to a better, stronger, safer Chicago for all,” the statement reads.
The Police Department and ShotSpotter representatives did not immediately return requests for comment.
The technology has been touted by law enforcement officials, including Johnson’s handpicked police superintendent, Larry Snelling, for identifying shootings and saving lives by speeding up emergency response times.
But it has also drawn the ire of activists, who organized around the issue and said the technology was prone to error, contributing to over-policing and depriving communities of tens of millions in city funding.
A report from the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office first obtained by the Sun-Times pinned ShotSpotter as costly and ineffective, only leading to arrests in 1 percent of cases.
Another critical 2021 report by the city’s Inspector General’s Office found only about 9 percent of ShotSpotter alerts were ultimately linked to evidence of a gun crime.
Tensions on the issue boiled over at a community meeting last week that ended in shouting matches as ShotSpotter CEO Ralph Clark defended the technology in front of dozens of protestors.
ShotSpotter has contracts with major cities across the country and had counted Chicago as its second-biggest client after New York City. Clark said at the meeting that a vast majority of clients were renewing or expanding their contracts.
Police officials at the meeting credited ShotSpotter for alerting them to a majority of incidents that do not come with a corresponding 911 call. Leaders of local nonviolence groups said they found the technology to be imperfect but a helpful tool for identifying areas where conflict was brewing.
But Johnson had remained tight-lipped about ShotSpotter since taking office. On the campaign trail, he called the soon-to-be-canceled technology “unreliable and overly susceptible to human error.”
The city’s contract with ShotSpotter, first signed in 2018, runs through Friday, public records show.
The city’s contract with ShotSpotter has been renewed twice, according to public records. In June, the Sun-Times reported that Johnson approved the contract for another $10 million. A top aide blamed the approval on an automatic signature.
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