Carbondale police chief Gene Schilling acknowledged the town has seen a “spat of serious crime” over the past few years. There was a homicide and several armed robberies.
Shilling and another representative presented to the town’s board of trustees during a work session Tuesday night. The numbers they presented, culled from seven years of crime data, suggest Carbondale is seeing consistent – and sometimes decreasing – crime levels. Since 2014, fewer people have been calling the police. Between 2015 and 2016, reported thefts were cut in half.
Numbers can be misleading, and they don’t tell the whole story. Schilling told Aspen Public Radio he has reason to believe heroin and methamphetamine use has increased within the town. This was not necessarily reflected in the numbers compiled for the trustees.
The Board of Trustees asked the police department to conduct the study following a sexual assault in 2016.