Emanuel, McCarthy plan to revitalize CAPS program - Fox 2 News Headlines

Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Police Supt. Garry McCarthy announced their plan to reduce crime in the city.

The plan revitalizes the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy - or the CAPS program - which the nearly 20-year-old community policing program that emphasizes strong cooperation between residents and police.

"For too long community policing became a bureaucracy downtown and the headquarters," Emanuel said. "What started off as mindset, a philosophy and an approach to policing became a bureaucracy."

District commanders will also be in charge of their own programs, to fit the needs of their own communities. Emanuel and McCarthy said district commanders are in a much better position to determine what their own programs should look like than someone in the department's headquarters.

Each district will also be assigned a CAPS sergeant and two police officers.

McCarthy said this shift is the latest part of a crime-fighting strategy that's already put more police officers on the beat and tailored various strategies to specific neighborhoods.

"Previously, community policing programs were managed from headquarters which just doesn't make sense," McCarthy said. "The needs in each community we serve are unique so we can not apply a cookie cutter approach to community outreach and services."

He says the head of the department's patrol division will oversee the programs, but the individual commanders will run them.

McCarthy and the mayor say more money will not be thrown into the CAPS budget.

McCarthy said the police department has pulled 180 guns off the street since 2013 began.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.