The number of people shot in Rochester in a year span has dropped below 200 for the first time in four years, according to the Rochester Police Department.
That figure marks what Mayor Malik Evans called a sign of success for the city’s anti-violence efforts. The most recent 365-day tally of shootings was taken between Nov. 11, 2023, and Nov. 11, 2024, and totals 198 people shot. The last time that figure had dipped below 200 was between June 13, 2019, and 2020, when 197 people were shot in the city.
“I want this community to have no acceptable level of gun violence, no level of gun violence is acceptable,” Evans said during a news conference Thursday. “But we do need to talk about it when we are moving in the right direction, and I make no apologies for that.”
Gun violence in Rochester peaked between 2021 and 2022, with the highest number of people shot recorded over the 365-day period beginning March 16, 2021. During that time, 429 people were shot in the city.
The highest number of fatal shootings occurred over the year span beginning Oct. 7, 2021. During that timeframe, 71 people were shot to death in the city.
For the year period ending Nov. 11, 2024, that number came in at 30 — the lowest it’s been since 2020.
Since the start of 2024, there have been 45 homicides in the city, two of whom were victims from previous years that died in 2024. By this time in 2023, there were 55.
Evans said a variety of reasons have led to declining violent crime rates in Rochester. Among them are the city’s shuttering of “nuisance” properties that became hot beds for gun crime, reorganization of the Rochester Police Department, and waning of a pandemic-era spike of violent crime seen nationwide.
The city also began closing the East End to vehicle traffic on Saturday nights, limiting access to people over 21, and stationing officers in the district. Evans said he’s looking making the East End a permanent “pedestrian mall,” as well as nearby Gibbs Street.
Rochester Police Chief David Smith also pointed to more aggressive tactics in getting illegal guns off the street.
“A total of 1,174 guns have been recovered this year, and over 500 of those guns were crime guns, meaning they were guns used in a crime in the city of Rochester,” Smith said.
Smith said the declining number of shootings has given police more of an ability to do more "quality of life” policing. He pointed to walking patrols on Monroe Avenue as a prime example of those kinds of services.
Additionally, in October the department performed one of its first prostitution sting operations in several years, netting nine arrests.
Evans, in his final public safety update of the year, said he will be continuing his Gun Violence State of Emergency. He also viewed the city’s crime statistics as showing promise.
“Any homicide, any shooting, it still has one person or family attached to it, we have to remember that,” Evans said. “But we have to make sure we put out where we are, we have to put out a report card, this is our report card.”
