How gun violence spread across American cities

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COLUMBUS, Ohio — The sequence of events that led to the killing of Jason Keys was so confounding that friends and family did not quite believe it until they saw the video evidence in court.

Keys and his wife, Charae Williams Keys, were getting into their car after a Father’s Day visit in 2021 with her grandparents in a leafy neighborhood near Walnut Hill Park in Columbus, Ohio. A 72-year-old neighbor carrying a rifle accosted them in the belief, he later told police, that Keys had let the air out of his daughter’s tires and poisoned his lawn.

Charae Williams Keys, whose late husband, Jason Keys, died after being shot several times, in Columbus, Ohio, on Feb. 15, 2024. Keys held her late husband’s wedding ring on a necklace, which she said she rarely takes off. (Sylvia Jarrus/The New York Times)

Jason Keys, who was carrying a pistol in his waistband, and his father-in-law tried to disarm the man, knocking him to the ground, while another relative ran back inside to get a .22 rifle. While Charae Keys ducked behind the car to call 911, she heard multiple gunshots. She emerged to find her husband mortally wounded.

It took a moment for everyone to realize that the shots had come from a fourth gun across the street. Elias Smith, a 24-year-old ex-Marine, had stepped to his front door with a so-called ghost gun, an AR-style rifle that Smith had assembled from parts ordered online. Within seconds, he opened fire, hitting Keys five times.

“What are you shooting for?” a relative of Keys can be heard asking on surveillance video.

Smith answered, “I don’t know.”

It was an encounter emblematic of gun violence in America today, a dispute that might not have turned deadly but for firearms in increasingly easy reach. And it exemplified a striking spread in fatal shootings nationwide since the beginning of the pandemic in 2020 — a period in which Americans have purchased more guns, the Supreme Court has made them harder to regulate, and many states, including Ohio, have loosened restrictions on firearms.

The block, on the far east side of Columbus, had been a haven, with little if any gun violence. That kind of peace was what had drawn Charae Keys’ grandparents to the area decades earlier.

And then, a burst of gunfire would take the life of Jason Keys and with it, the neighborhood’s sense of security.

Many are closer to violence

A New York Times analysis of fatal shootings across the country found that as the toll of gun violence rose during the pandemic, the carnage expanded its boundaries. Though gun violence remains highly concentrated, more than 47 million Americans lived within a five-minute walk of a fatal shooting between 2020 and 2023, up from 39 million over the prior four-year period. In Columbus, 41% of residents lived within a quarter mile of a fatal shooting, compared with 28% before the pandemic.

The same spread of gun violence seen in Columbus took place in other cities.

St. Paul Police investigators at the scene of a shooting on the 1900 block of Marshall Avenue Monday, April 1, 2024 that is being investigated as a homicide. A report of a suicide in St. Paul’s Merriam Park neighborhood turned into a homicide investigation as police said they learned more details. (Courtesy of the St. Paul Police Department)

In Atlanta, 58% of residents lived near a fatal shooting during the pandemic years, up from 36% in the four years before 2020. In Minneapolis, half of its residents were exposed, up from a third. In St. Paul, it was 36%, up from 28%.

In 2021, the number of killings in Columbus spiked to 207, unfathomable in a city where most years saw closer to 100. Last year, there were 149.

In Columbus, as elsewhere, the carnage has been marked by the involvement of conspicuously young people. Last June, two Columbus boys, 14 and 16, were charged in the shooting death of a girl in eighth grade. In August, a 13-year-old was arrested after a 15-year-old football player was killed at a shopping plaza.

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Columbus is far from alone in its troubles. In New Mexico last September, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declared a state of emergency for Albuquerque after shootings claimed the lives of an 11-year-old, a 5-year-old and a woman who confronted a group of teenagers in her stolen car. Louisville, Kentucky, calculated that gun homicides were costing the city $104 million a year in law enforcement, medical care and lost tax revenue.

Even though the tide of shootings and killings that washed across the country with the pandemic began to ebb last year, the improvement was uneven. Columbus closed out 2023 with more homicides than the year before — as did Dallas; Topeka, Kansas; Memphis, Tennessee; and Washington.

There is optimism that 2024 is going to be better in Columbus, which has seen homicide numbers fall dramatically so far this year, with 36 as of last week, compared with 70 in the same period the year before. Gun violence nationwide is still higher than it was before the pandemic: The number of fatal shootings in the first quarter of 2024 was 13% higher than it was in the same period in 2019, according to the Gun Violence Archive.

In 2022, Mayor Andrew Ginther declared gun violence a public health crisis.

Gun regulations

For more than a decade, the Ohio Legislature had been scaling back gun regulations. In 2014, they rescinded a ban on high-capacity magazines.

Then, in 2019, an assailant in Dayton used one to fire 41 rounds in under 30 seconds, killing nine people and wounding 17.

The outcry that followed prompted Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, to promise changes that included expanded background checks and a “red flag” law allowing for the temporary removal of guns from people deemed dangerous to themselves or others. The proposals went nowhere.

Instead, in 2020 the state enacted a “stand your ground” law supported by gun rights organizations, expanding established limits on when a shooting can be deemed self-defense.

In 2022, Ohio lawmakers allowed school boards to arm teachers who completed 24 hours of training, eliminated permit and training requirements for concealed weapons, and banned cities from prohibiting gun sales during riots.

Proponents of expansive gun rights argue that increased regulation only makes it harder for lawful buyers to obtain guns for legitimate reasons, and that criminals will always find ways to skirt stricter laws.

Facing a mounting body count in 2021 and 2022, Columbus tried to test the state ban on local lawmaking. The city enacted legislation requiring guns to be safely stored around children and banning high-capacity magazines. But the measures were stalled by court challenges, one by the state attorney general, a Republican, and the other by private citizens. Columbus, in turn, has challenged the 2023 state law that prohibits cities from halting the sale of guns and ammunition during riots.

“I feel like at times we have one or two arms tied behind our back trying to fight gun violence,” said Ginther, a Democrat who just began his third term. “And it can be very frustrating because the people are angry. They want more to be done.”

The sharp decline in homicides this year is an encouraging sign, but officials say they are up against a tidal wave of guns.

In 2020, there were 11.3 million guns manufactured in the United States for domestic consumption, more than twice the number produced in 2010, according to the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. There are also signs that more guns are vanishing from the legal market.

Between 2017 and 2021, the percentage of guns recovered from crimes that had been purchased within the previous year steadily increased, according to ATF data. A short “time to crime” can indicate an illegal straw purchase intended to evade background checks, minimum age laws and other safeguards.

‘Ticking time bombs’

Walnut Hill Park Drive still has its broad front lawns, backyard play forts and late-model pickups parked in circular drives. But much has changed on the block since Father’s Day in 2021.

Elias Smith, the former Marine who shot Jason Keys, no longer lives in his mother’s basement — he is serving 15 years to life for murder. His trial included evidence that he had both post-traumatic stress disorder and a traumatic brain injury.

Charae Williams Keys with a photo of her with her late husband, Jason Keys. (Sylvia Jarrus/The New York Times)

Robert Thomas, the neighbor who instigated the episode with his rifle, was acquitted of an involuntary manslaughter charge but convicted of aggravated menacing. He was placed on house arrest at his daughter’s home and ordered to stay away from the block.

Charae Keys, who was wounded by shrapnel in the shooting that killed her husband, is still recovering both physically and mentally. She and her husband had both known victims of gun violence. That was one reason they lived in a high-security apartment complex, went to work, went to church and tried to “stay out of the way,” she said. It was not enough.

“Now we have people walking around who are just ticking time bombs,” Keys said. “I’ve done everything in my power to keep me from violence, but it’s chasing me.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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Forest Lake chooses finalists for city administrator position

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The Forest Lake City Council has selected six finalists for the position of city administrator.

The six finalists are:

Renae Fry, former city administrator in North Branch, and former administrative coordinator in Sauk County, Wis.
Joe Gaa, former city administrator in Marshalltown, Iowa, former city manager in Aberdeen, S.D., former city administrator in Dickinson, N.D., and former city manager in Chariton, Iowa
Thomas Hutka, former town manager for the Town of Newington, Conn., former city manager for the City of Port Huron, Mich., and former director of public works for Broward County, Fla.
Eric Johnson, former city administrator in Oak Park Heights, former city administrator for the Village of Winneconne, Wis., and former director of economic development for Rusk County, Wis.
Pat Oman, former county administrator for Becker County, Minn., former county administrator for Mille Lacs County, Minn., and former city administrator/executive director of the HRA of Moose Lake, Minn.
Devin Swanberg. village administrator for the Village of Osceola, Wis., former city administrator for Harmony, Minn., and former economic development director for the Pine Island Economic Development Authority

Interim City Administrator Kristina Handt, who had applied for the position, said she dropped out of the running when she realized Forest Lake “wasn’t the right fit for me at this time.”

Handt, who formerly served as city administrator in Lake Elmo and in Scandia, said she loves local government work, particularly working on basic government services like roads, water and sewer infrastructure, public safety and economic development.

In Forest Lake, the city administrator also spends a fair amount of time on the Forest Lake Airport; the Castlewood Golf Course, a 9-hole course owned by the city; boat-dock leases and other extra services — areas that are not of particular interest to her, she said.

“Forest Lake is a great community, and I hope they find the good, strong leadership they need to be successful going forward,” she said. “I’m committed to helping the city any way I can as they continue to work through this transition.”

Handt was hired as interim administrator and clerk in mid-January after the Forest Lake City Council voted unanimously to terminate former city administrator Patrick Casey’s employment contract. The vote came after a closed session to discuss Casey’s annual performance evaluation.

Final interviews for the position will be on June 20, said Bart Fischer, the management consultant at David Drown Associates who is handling the search.

A total of 45 applicants applied for the job. The advertised salary range is $151,580 to $189,475.

Fischer is overseeing the search; the city is paying DDA $24,000 for their services.

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‘It’s not a bandwagon. It’s a party bus’: Everybody is on board with the Timberwolves, even lifelong hockey fans

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Typically, in the group chat with his brothers, Tom Welle keeps the focus on all things related to the Minnesota Wild. They use the group chat as a way to celebrate the result of a game, vent about a player’s performance or opine about a trade rumor they’ve heard. In the past month or so, however, the subject matter has completely shifted.

To the Minnesota Timberwolves, of all things.

“I keep pinging them asking if they’re watching the Timberwolves,” said Welle, 58, who grew up in Paynesville, Minn. “We’ve been the biggest fans of hockey for, like, 50 years, and now we’re all watching basketball. I never would’ve guessed it. There’s something about this team.”

There are similar stories across the state.

As the Timberwolves continue their playoff run on Wednesday night against the Dallas Mavericks in Game 1 of the NBA Western Conference Finals, the bandwagon has grown seemingly by the minute. This particular group of players has given diehard fans a reason to believe while capturing a whole new group of people in the process.

That includes lifelong hockey fans who recently have turned into temporary basketball junkies.

You’ve got Jessi Pierce, a beat writer covering the Wild, who suddenly cares more about the local team on the other side of the river.

“This playoff run has been so fun,” said Pierce, 36, who grew up in Mahtomedi. “I didn’t even know my husband knew anything about basketball and suddenly he’s coming home like, ‘We’ve got to watch the Timberwolves!’ We’ve both kind of latched on. We admit to hopping on the bandwagon.”

You’ve got Kirsten Krull, an in-arena host for the Wild, who also proudly admits to hopping on the bandwagon.

“I’ve never intensely followed the Timberwolves before,” said Krull 27, who grew up in Rochester, Minn. “I’d say I’m more of a causal fan who has gotten really, really into it during the playoff run, and I’m having a great time right now, like everybody else.”

You’ve got Todd Davis, a former North Stars fan and current Wild fan, who tuned in late into Game 7 between the Timberwolves and Denver Nuggets only after checking the score on his CBS Sports app on his iPhone.

“I thought to myself, ‘Well, if they’re going to win, I might as well watch,’ ” said Davis, 55, who grew up in St. Paul. “As soon as I turned it on, they went up by 10 points and obviously they ended up winning. This is really exciting for Minnesota. We don’t get a lot to cheer about very often.”

That seems to be the common thread among everybody following the Timberwolves throughout the playoff run. There is a belief that they can win the NBA championship. It has brought people together at local breweries, neighborhood dive bars, and finished basements alike.

“To see the way in which we’re bringing people together, honestly, it gives me goosebumps,” said Ryan Tanke, Chief Operating Officer of the Timberwolves. “It really speaks to the power of sports and its ability to do that.”

Maybe the coolest thing about the playoff run besides what’s happening on the court has been watching the diehard fans embrace the people wanting to join in on the fun. There’s no animosity from the OGs who have suffered through the tough times with the franchise. Not when the current vibes surrounding the Timberwolves are so high.

You’ve got Jake Nyberg, a longtime Timberwolves fan who doesn’t blame anybody for jumping off the bandwagon.

“You break it down and sports are entertainment, right?” said Nyberg, 44, who grew up in Roseville. “If a movie is bad, the people in the crowd have every right to walk out. I don’t begrudge anybody for walking out at any point over the past 20 years. I’m just glad they’re back.”

You’ve got Steve Tran, a longtime Timberwolves fan, who has noticed some of his friends wanting now to strike up conversation about his favorite team.

“I feel like I’m a Sherpa guiding different people in,” said Tran, 40, who grew up in Woodbury. “It’s been a lot of fun for me as somebody who has been following the Timberwolves forever. It feels like everybody wants to be a part of it, and that’s really cool. All of us are craving a winner in Minnesota.”

You’ve got Barflaan Tedoe, a longtime Timberwolves fan, who has been trying to spread the love on social media.

“I’m down for anybody that wants to be cheer for them,” said Tedoe, 30, who grew up in Robbinsdale. “Why wouldn’t I be? I think part of a being a great organization is welcoming everybody and treating them like they’ve been here from the jump. We’re a big family when it comes down to it.”

As welcoming as the community has been over the past month or so, however, there does seem to be a self awareness among some of the lifelong hockey fans who have hopped on the bandwagon.

“I’m genuinely so happy for everybody that stuck around and endured all the heartache,” Pierce said. “You’ve got the diehard fans that have been around forever and they deserve this moment.”

No more than anybody else, according to Nyberg, who couldn’t care less if somebody has been cheering for the Timberwolves for a few decades or a few seconds.

“I’m here for all of it,” Nyberg said. “It’s not a bandwagon. It’s a party bus. Everybody get on because it’s going to be a fun ride.”

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Recently rebuilt segment of South Robert Street could receive additional safety improvements; residents invited to weigh in

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West St. Paul residents are invited to a public meeting next month to discuss safety and connectivity improvements for South Robert Street.

The retail-heavy stretch between Mendota Road and Annapolis Street has been under the microscope for close to a decade and received a $42.5 million reconstruction that wrapped up in 2017 with the goal of improving mobility and safety.

“Despite those improvements, the section of roadway has seen continued safety concerns for users,” according to a news release from the Minnesota Department of Transportation.

A map showing a segment of South Robert Street/Minnesota 3 in West St. Paul being studied for safety improvements. The public is invited to a June 4 meeting to share feedback about the corridor from Mendota Road to Annapolis Street. (Courtesy of Minnesota Department of Transportation)

Where South Robert Street intersects with east Wentworth Avenue and east Butler Avenue has drawn attention for its transit and walking issues, according to an online comment map that is open to the public.

Other concerns from West St. Paul residents date to the 2017 reconstruction, which added medians and reduced left-turn options to increase safety. With fewer left turn opportunities, motorists are making more U-turns at traffic lights.

More U-turns are an expected result of more medians, Derek Leuer, a traffic safety engineer for MnDOT, told the Pioneer Press after the 2017 reconstruction. For a road like South Robert, which has lots of access points to businesses, medians reduce “conflict points” by restricting left-hand turns, which are generally considered unsafe, Leuer said.

Before the reconstruction, MnDOT had deemed it a high-crash corridor due to the number of crashes and their severity. Between 2005 and 2014, the corridor’s 23 intersections were the site of 1,025 crashes.

Between 2018 and 2022, there were 462 crashes at intersections located along the corridor, according to MnDOT, and an additional 146 crashes at other locations along South Robert Street.

Additional improvements sought

The latest study of the corridor, conducted by MnDOT, runs from February 2024 to February 2025 “to identify possible improvements to safety and connectivity for people who walk, bike, use transit and drive,” per the release.

The study, which costs $175,000, will coordinate with Metro Transit to prepare the corridor for the upcoming G Line arterial Bus Rapid Transit service as it will include new on-street transit stations.

The G Line is planned to run from Little Canada through downtown St. Paul and to the Dakota County Northern Service Center in West St. Paul, primarily along Rice and Robert Streets.

Construction of the G Line project is planned for 2026-28, with a goal of completing all work on Robert Street within the G Line corridor by the end of 2028, according to the G Line project page.

South Robert Street information meeting

The public is invited to share their feedback at 6 p.m. June 4 at the Wentworth Library, located at 199 E. Wentworth Ave.

For those unable to attend the meeting, the online comment map will be open until June 9 at mndothwy3srobertststudy.com.

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