No Boston for Cincinnati?

Mayor Mark Mallory's a little frustrated at what he sees is a holdup by some City Council members of the effort to replicate The Boston Gun Project in Cincinnati. The program, credited with reducing homicides in Boston in the mid-1990s, identifies gang-involved repeat offenders and puts them on notice that if they don't get out of the criminal life, officials will "pursue the longest amount of (prison) time in the worst place possible," the mayor said.

Cincinnati City Manager Milton Dohoney Jr.'s working out a contract with the University of Cincinnati, where policing experts will help. Subcontracts will be signed with the architect of the Boston project - David Kennedy, now at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City - and with Children's Hospital Medical Center. The hospital is the "neutral convener" of the all the parties involved and trauma surgeon Dr. Victor Garcia will be the chairman of the steering committee. He has been pushing to bring the Boston model here for years.

Council authorized Dohoney to start working out the details March 14, but decided they didn't want to give the city manager a deadline. Councilman Cecil Thomas, chairman of council's
Law and Public Safety Committee who brought the authorization measure to council, wanted the negotiations finished in the first week of April. Councilwoman Laketa Cole also asked that council see the contract and approve it first.

Mallory is frustrated by those delays. He said Kennedy is close to pulling out of the deal and going instead to one of many other cities where people want him. The UC researchers need a couple of months to organize the program and identify the players before the actual street work - Garcia wanted that started by summer - can begin.

Mallory told The Enquirer's editorial board this week: "I just need everyone to understand that we've got to move on here."

Garcia acknowledged a "palpable frustration" growing within him and Kennedy.

He offered this statistic: the average age of a gunshot victim seen at Children's: 12.9 years.