St. Paul community leaders, police call on residents to help curb gun violence

Tired of surging gun violence across St. Paul, community leaders and police are asking residents to help create a safer city.

The call for community support came Thursday night when officials from the St. Paul NAACP, St. Paul Police Department, Black Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance and the African American Leadership Council gathered at Arlington Hills Lutheran Church to discuss ways to decrease gun violence in the city.

St. Paul has recorded 30 homicides this year, according to a Minnesota Star Tribune database, two fewer than at this point in 2023. But four of this year’s homicides happened in the same week, frustrating law enforcement and alarming residents.

St. Paul NAACP President Richard Pittman Sr. said solutions to gun violence are “right here, in the room.” But without the community’s help, he said, their efforts could fall short.

“Over the last several weeks and months, we have experienced an uptick in violent crimes in our communities. [That’s] turned on a light bulb that it’s time [to] not have the police feeling like all the pressure is on them,” Pittman said.

“Nobody wants to the responsibility of having to shoot someone down in the street. Nobody wants the responsibility of hurting somebody’s family. We all want the best outcome.”

Attendee Carrie Johnson said she worries that generational trauma is derailing youth’s behavior, adding that she has seen boys in middle school punch girls in the face. Migdalia Baez said mothers living along Rice Street feel they have nowhere to turn for help in redirecting their children. Some worry that their child would be incarcerated if they ask for help, Baez said.

Larry McPherson, a violence interrupter for 21 Days of Peace St. Paul, said some issues arise when young people have no guidance. McPherson and others patrol crime hot spots across the city, including near the Midway neighborhood’s Kimball Court apartments where fentanyl use has been blamed for a spike in robberies and drug violations.

“We’ve got a lot of mental health [struggles]. We’ve got a lot of doggone drug addiction that’s going on in our neighborhoods,” he said. “We all got the best interests at hand for all people in our community, but we’re just not working fast enough.

“Until we get feet on the ground, people coming out of their own community and standing up for this real cause to take back the community, we’re going to have the same outcome.”

Attendees of the gathering proposed various solutions to the violence, including that churches financially support needy families and more funding be given to such organizations as 21 Days of Peace. Many suggested that promoting healthy families would prevent people from turning to crime.

Police Chief Axel Henry said 122 people were injured by gunfire last year in St. Paul; this year, he said, the city was on pace to record 104 cases. Henry said more work must be done to prevent shootings and to return to a “church frame of mind,” where families collaborate to help each other.

“The officers right now, we are so taxed that we are not getting the chance to drive up and down the streets to wave at people like we used to be able to do,” Henry said. “So we need your help. We’ve got to start creating situations and circumstances where we’re all talking.”

The City Council recently approved its 2025 budget, which includes a $1.2 million cut to police officers’ overtime budget.