Portland’s Mayor Wants to Buy the Questionable ShotSpotter System to Fix the City’s Endemic Violent Crime Problem

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler has decided to move forward with a controversial technology that claims to detect and pinpoint gunshots throughout the city.

The Focused Intervention Team’s Community Oversight Group, or FITCOG, recommended the city adopt ShotSpotter in a July report. That report called the technology “a focused deterrence tool as part of the overarching gun violence response strategy” in the city.

In Thursday evening’s FITCOG meeting, Stephanie Howard, Wheeler’s director of community safety, said the decision to advance a pilot program with the technology was made that afternoon after Wheeler met with Police Chief Chuck Lovell to discuss the idea.

Continue reading Portland’s Mayor Wants to Buy the Questionable ShotSpotter System to Fix the City’s Endemic Violent Crime Problem at The Truth About Guns.