Columbia city officials to conduct their own downtown night walk without advance notice
Olivia Hayes
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
City of Columbia officials will conduct their own walk around downtown Columbia, but they won’t announce the date and time in advance, a city spokesperson said Monday.
Spokesperson Sydney Olsen said Mayor Barabare Buffaloe and city leaders are planning their own walk-through of downtown that will not be publicized in advance. Officials want to “organically review the environment without drawing attention with a large crowd,” Olsen said.
University of Missouri President Mun Choi walked through downtown this past weekend — an off weekend for Missouri football — after a shooting the week before that injured two and killed one. Columbia Police pledged to step up patrols to help stop the violence.
A spokesperson with the Columbia Police Department said this past weekend went well, and extra patrols will continue.
Capt. Brian Leer said the Boone County Sheriff’s Office has assigned four deputies to assist CPD officers on Friday and Saturday nights.
“They patrolled the downtown area to assist CPD as needed. I think they made a couple of traffic stops, checked a couple of subjects, and backed CPD on various incidents,” Leer said.
Leer said the department’s regular patrols were not impacted as this was an additional detail of deputies placed in downtown.
Sarah Yoro-Massad, a spokesperson for the University of Missouri’s Police Department, said MUPD officers made arrests over the weekend in downtown.
On Friday and Saturday nights between the hours of 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. MUPD data shows officers responded to four liquor law offenses, an assault and a traffic offense.
CPD dispatch logs on Friday and Saturday nights, also between the hours of 9 p.m.-6 a.m., CPD officers made nearly 50 traffic stops and had more than 50 check subject calls. Officers were sent to five calls for reports of a disturbance, one call specific to a peace disturbance and six calls to assist a citizen in the downtown area.
Officers were also dispatched eight times for a foot patrol and called to assist another officer or first responding agency five times.
The extra officers did not go un noticed by locals in the area. Janine Daniels, a manager at Tellers, told ABC 17 News she saw more officers on foot patrolling the area and on the streets pulling cars over.
Daniels said she often works at night downtown and the extra officers make her feel safer. She explained that Tellers has started locking its doors earlier at night because of the recent safety concerns. Staff also walks in groups to their cars during the late night hours.
She appreciated the other proactive crime efforts of CPD, like ticketing people for jaywalking, but she claims people loitering and the lack of action toward people who have open containers is influencing Columbia’s crime problem more than jay walking.
CPD’s Street Crimes Unit arrested a man with a gun during a traffic stop Friday night at Eighth and Cherry streets, according to a CPD news release. Damion Hunt was arrested on suspicion of illegal gun possession, the release says. Hunt was convicted of second-degree assault in connection with a 2019 downtown shooting, making him a felon.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol had troopers assisting operations as well. Sgt. Kyle Green said the highway patrol will not release manpower numbers for downtown patrol operations.
No city leaders were present at Saturday’s walkthrough.