2024 Is Off To A Great Start!

Happy 2024!

January has been a very fast month and 2024 is off to a great start.

Norfolk Police Department Chief Mark Talbot presented the 2023 city wide crime statistics to Norfolk City Council in January. Read on for the data. These are 2023 numbers compared to 2022. Below is a link to the video from the Norfolk City Council Meeting in January where Chief Talbot presented this data. Start watching at 31:08.

Category of Crime – 2023 vs. 2022

Overall Crime: -24%

Homicides: -33%

Robbery: -31%

Aggravated Assault: -23%

Total Violent Crime: -24%

Burglaries: 1%

Residential Burglaries: -10%

Larcenies: -26%

Stolen Parts from Auto: -41%

Stolen Vehicles: -20%

Ward 2 Crime Total Crime Statistics:

Year 2021: 2040

Year 2022: 3064

Year 2023: 2284

Other good news shared by Chief Talbot included that we have 521 sworn police officers in NPD with 22 recruits totaling 543. We have an authorized strength of 617. We are doing very well in terms of building back our police force workforce.

And, I had the great opportunity to attend the latest Police Academy graduation. 15 new officers joined the ongoing effort of making Norfolk safe. It is humbling to see family members pin the badge to their loved one at the ceremony. They are so proud. I am thankful for these brave men and women who are willing to serve our great city.

Norfolk has been a leader in using data to inform, educate and enable City Administration to make good decisions for our community. I am pleased to share that Norfolk was recently recognized as one of only eight cities to be awarded the Bloomberg Philanthropies What Works Cities Certification at the Gold Level because of our superb use of data. I encourage you to use the open data portal at https://data.norfolk.gov/ that is publicly available to all. This is another example of being transparent and open with our community.

Below are some great pictures from January. I included a few of Grady as I neglected to include Grady’s pictures in my last email! I had people reach out to me and ask if Grady was still alive. Yes, he is alive and well and still acts like a 2 year old in a 6 year old body. You will also see pictures from the NPD Police Academy Graduation and just beautiful pictures of other sites in the city.

Best to you for a wonderful weekend.

Cheers!

Courtney