Almost three weeks have passed without a murder in Little Rock.
If government officials and the police department could pinpoint exactly what factors came together for that gap in capital crime, they would ensure that it continues.
But it's not that simple, the mayor, city manager and police chief told an audience of about 75 people Thursday night.
"We're doing everything we can every waking minute of every hour," Little Rock Mayor Mark Stodola said. "None of us up here are superman. We don't know how to stop speeding bullets. We don't know when the next person is going to do something crazy, pull a gun out and start shooting somebody. It's very difficult to know how to deal with that."
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"What we've got to do is change the culture. We've got to change the attitude about what's important in life. Kids don't have anything to lose right now. They want a job. They want something that is too valuable to lose," Stodola said.
The three officials had a clear message to the crowd that gathered at the Ron Robinson Theater in downtown Little Rock for a "Crime Dialogue" event sponsored by the Central Arkansas Library System. And that was: the community has a primary role in preventing factors that lead to crime.
"If you came to this meeting thinking you were going to hear a sliced bread idea from the three of us or Rex [Nelson, the moderator,] I apologize in advance," Police Chief Kenton Buckner said. "The only thing left is the heavy lifting. Parenting is the No. 1 place you need to start. And if you're looking somewhere to get engaged with your hands, your mind, your heart, start with kids."
The city funds and facilitates programs targeted toward intervention and prevention of youth criminal behavior. But the government can't do it all, City Manager Bruce Moore said.
This summer the city paid the wages of 650 youth workers to have summer jobs. Another 750 had applied for the program, but there wasn't enough funding to add more spots. The city also trains former felons in various job skills and hires some of them, but more private businesses must agree to hire these workers and youth, Moore and the mayor both said.
Thursday's town hall-style meeting was meant to address the spike in violent crime the capital city has seen this year.
As of Monday, violent crime was up 18 percent over the same period last year with 2,352 violent crimes logged so far. That includes homicides, rapes, robberies and aggravated assaults.
While locals have been buzzing about the city's increase in crime since last fall when two children were murdered in separate incidents, Little Rock received international attention this summer after a mass shooting at a downtown nightclub in July. Twenty-five people were wounded by gunfire and three others were injured during the altercation.
Buckner said Thursday that the increase in the violent crime rate this year is a reflection of what started in the latter part of last year that police have not been able to get "their hands wrapped around."
Officials have said disputes between two rival family-based gangs are at the center of much of the violence. Even with a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest in any open homicide case, police are having a hard time getting witnesses to talk.
Buckner implemented a mandatory overtime schedule three weeks ago that has put an additional 45 officers on patrol from 2 p.m. to 2 a.m. every day in hot spots across the city. Already he's seen the additional police presence correlate with fewer "shots fired" calls, he said Thursday.
Little Rock hasn't logged a murder since Aug. 20 when police say a man murdered his two young children before taking his own life in a west Little Rock home.
Those killings brought this year's total homicides to 45 -- already more than the 42 homicides that occurred in the capital city all of last year.
Stodola cautioned that it is important to look at the trend instead of just year over year. Before the recent increase crime had been at a five-year low, he said. The number of reported violent crimes don't come close to when he was Pulaski County prosecutor in the early 1990s during the "gang wars."
Back then the city reported more than 27,000 violent crimes, he said.
"We have consistently been below 17,000 three out of the last four years. We hit historic lows overall. Yes, we've seen an uptick this year, but in terms of overall crime issue, our numbers are consistently lower than they have been in years.
A young woman in her late 20s who said her name was Katy told the mayor he might be sharing facts, but she has her own facts. She lives south of Interstate 630, near Broadway and Roosevelt.
"In the past year, five times I've had to call the police because I heard shots fired from my bedroom, I've witnessed armed robbery assault in my front yard, had my car broken into twice, three blocks away a young woman like me was murdered, and I recently had a man arrested for indecent exposure on the sidewalk in front of my apartment building," she said.
Others in the audience pointed fingers at the city or questioned what more officials planned to do to address the crime outbreak, but one woman instead asked what she and others could do to help.
Buckner said that instead of just lining up to point fingers, he wished more people would line up to help out.
"If there's something that has not been mentioned, start it," he told the audience. "We can't do everything. I've got 10 or 12 programs we do to try to have contact with the community. But if you feel like that program is missing, start it. That's what the community does. And that's the only way we are going to get out of this situation."
Metro on 09/08/2017