Salt Lake City crime down to lowest level in nearly a decade, but some challenges persist

SALT LAKE CITY — Brian Redd still remembers the "unacceptable" scene he came across when he toured the Jordan River shortly after he was sworn in as Salt Lake City's new police chief in March.

"We had children walking through drug deals. (There were) needles and all kinds of things going on," he said, recalling that trip several months later. "It had gone past homelessness to a very criminogenic location."

However, he says the data shows how things are starting to change.

Overall crime continues to slide in Utah's capital city after policing changes were implemented through a new public safety plan earlier this year. A little more than 11,500 different crimes have been reported this year, as of Sunday, which is a 4.6% decrease from the same point last year and 11.5% decrease from the three-year average.

"Crime is down, overall, in the city to its lowest level in over eight years," he told city leaders on Tuesday. "We're doing (well) on the crime reduction in the city."

Arrests and citations are up, as part of a different approach to policing. More than 9,200 arrests have been made this year, up 19%, while the close to 8,000 citations issued represent a 73% increase from 2024, per police data.

However, there are still challenges in the city's way. Violent crimes remain up 1.2% from last year, driven by a 19.6% increase in rape and sexual assault. The number of rape cases this year is also up 14.5% of the three-year average, and police don't know why.

The department recently met with the Rape Recovery Center in Salt Lake City, which hadn't seen a surge in clients. Redd believes that it could be an indication that there is better reporting in such cases, given there's "a lot of reporting that is happening at the jail," which would be encouraging.

The police chief offered both city and state leaders an overview of where things stand, nearly a year after Utah Gov. Spencer Cox and high-ranking members of the Utah Legislature called on Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall to produce a public safety plan. They tasked the mayor with handling policing and criminal justice "inadequacies" tied to crime and homelessness in the city.

Issues tied to crime and homelessness are slowly being resolved, Redd told state and city officials in separate meetings on Tuesday. Those took place on the same day that legislative audits were released on Salt Lake City police, the Salt Lake County Jail and Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill's office, highlighting concerns in past and current practices that could have factored in an increase in crime across the valley.

Making improvements

While overall crime is down, a new program to address the criminal justice system's "high utilizers" is showing promising results, too, according to Salt Lake police. "Project CONNECT," which launched earlier this year, created more coordination from various state, county and city agencies to handle some of the system's most frequent arrestees.

It focuses primarily on repeat offenders in low-level cases. Many of the people have been booked into jail over a dozen times over the past year, have dozens of warrants to their name and have "serious" behavioral health or substance abuse issues, Redd explained. They're often tied to misdemeanor offenses like trespassing, drug use or illegal camping, but handling them can strain police resources.

Officers are instructed to review options for individuals, which may include jail, a crisis center or shelter, depending on the situation, he said. Since using the new approach, arrests of these individuals are down 28% over the last six months, after a surge in arrests that peaked earlier this year.

"We're trying to give our officers tools (for) how we help these individuals," he said.

Crime around the Jordan River dropped after a shutdown of a trail segment, shortly after Redd toured it. Increased enforcement across multiple agencies since it reopened has helped out, but crime increases were then reported in downtown, Ballpark and Sugar House over the summer. Those spikes appear to be contained, but there was some spillover into Central City by November, which the department is working on, Redd said.

On top of implementing changes tied to the state's scathing audit, he said the police department is working to consolidate all its info into a "central location," while rolling out new "micro neighborhood safety collaboratives" to address every neighborhood's unique challenges.

"We're grappling with how we can make people feel safe in the city," he said. "The feeling of safety is something that we're also going to work on as we continue to bring crime down."

Receiving positive feedback

The authors of last year's letter say they're impressed with the process they've seen in Utah's capital city this year. While they say there's still work to do, they signaled that they're willing to discuss ways to help during the upcoming legislative session.

Mendenhall called for changes in the criminal justice system when she released her safety plan, pointing out that part of the problem is that many people who are arrested end up back on the streets, largely because of jail overcrowding and the lack of homeless resources. Ways to address other problems in county and state resources were also outlined in the plan, along with ways the city could improve its response.

The state could look at some of those elements next year, said Utah House Speaker Mike Schultz, R-Hooper.

"I just want to give you a huge shoutout ... for taking it seriously," he told Mendenhall. "From what I've seen, Salt Lake City's really stepped up and come to the table with solutions and leadership."

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