Milwaukee police want to make sure streets are safer while drivers are on the road, and are taking aim at car thefts and dangerous traffic violations.
The department is rolling out a new traffic enforcement plan just in time for the summer months.
Police Chief Ed Flynn along with Mayor Tom Barrett and dozens of other officers announced Thursday that there have been lots of concerns from families of drivers running red lights, speeding and running stop signs. They’re also tired of the carjackings and stolen cars.
To combat it, a new neighborhood-specific traffic enforcement plan will coincide with areas with high crime rates. Already this year there have been 31 traffic deaths, compared to 20 deaths at this date last year.
"We're deploying the neighborhood task force in each district with a district specific enforcement plan. Now this plan again is built along the notion of accident hot spots that happen to be collocated with crime hot spots. We're hoping to get two for the price of one in terms of our efforts, a reduction in crime as well as a reduction in crashes,” Flynn said.
Although car crash fatalities are up this year police say carjackings and car thefts are down in 2017.
