They also are able to pinpoint hot spots where patrols need to be increased and community policing can be implemented.

For example, 200 vehicles were stolen within a mile of 61st Street and Peoria Avenue in 2016. Earlier this year Tulsa police assigned its first community resource officer to the area in an effort to foster relationships with locals and reduce crime through a more hands-on approach.

Police are hoping the strategies applied in the 61st and Peoria area can one day be implemented in other parts of the city experiencing high crime rates, like between Lewis and Yale avenues just north of Interstate 244. The area has seen a fair amount of auto thefts.

However, funding woes and hiring shortfalls could mean widespread community policing is a far-off reality. The recent voter-approved Vision Tulsa sales-tax extension, which promises to pay for hundreds of public safety officer jobs over the course of 15 years, will bring considerable relief to the department, but Tuell said he doesn’t expect to begin seeing an impact until probably close to 2019.

“When officers aren’t having to go call to call, they have time to be more proactive. We want to give those officers more time to do community policing, and the only way we can do that is to have more officers,” he said. “I would like to say I have a quick Band-Aid fix to it, but I don’t.”

Staff Writer Curtis Killman contributed to this story.

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