Recently, businesses in north Tucson met with Councilmember Kevin Dahl about the growing concerns of crime and drug activity in the area. The part of the neighborhood that is seeing this increase in crime is near the Chuck Huckelberry Loop, Tucson Mall and west Stone Avenue to First Avenue.
Dahl said that as fentanyl spreads in the area, they are seeing more shoplifting and other crimes. They’ve already implemented a bike police patrol pilot program.
“They’re very good in disrupting the drug trade,” Dahl said. “They can come up on people with out them knowing it and the stats that they produced in arrest, it’s hard to arrest people for fentanyl for various reasons but it disrupted it and the businesses noticed..”
In addition to this program, they’re working on adding more street lighting and cameras to increase security.