June 1, 2021 - On Tuesday, Mayor Mike Matson announced the formation of a new Violent Crime Community Task Force in response to rising levels of violent crime in Davenport. Davenport reached an all-time high of shots fired incidents and non-fatal shootings in 2020, with the violence continuing through the first five months of 2021. 

The task force will be made up of a variety of community organizations including NAACP, LULAC, Davenport Community Schools, Vera French Mental Health Services, Genesis Health Systems, Saint Ambrose University, and Quad Cities Chamber as well as community members who are passionate about seeing solutions to the rising violence in Davenport. 

“I often hear from residents who are concerned about the increasing crime in our community, and they are frustrated,” said Mayor Mike Matson. “But for far too long, our community has placed the sole burden of preventing crime on our police department. While law enforcement is certainly a piece of dealing with rising levels of crime, they are not, and cannot be, the only people we look to for answers when dealing with crime in our community.”

Davenport Police Chief Paul Sikorski provided additional details on the nature of violent crime in Davenport, stating that these acts of violence are not random and attributing much of the violence to hybrid street gangs that are continually retaliating against one another. 

“The unfortunate reality is that these gangs are comprised predominately of minority youth, with the majority of gun crime perpetrators and victims being young African American males. Three African American teenagers have been murdered in the past nine months as a result of this retaliatory violence, and this should be completely unacceptable to our community,” said Sikorski. 

Mayor Matson stated that the task force will be responsible for bringing forth recommendations for community-based violence solutions.

“This is a multi-faceted problem, and we as a community must have a multi-faceted response, one that includes our schools, non-profits, service providers, and state and local law enforcement partners,” said Matson.