The Downtown Development Authority is helping to beef up public safety in downtown Miami, pairing hands-on community programs with new technology and a bigger police presence. One of the most visible pieces of that effort was a free self-defense class hosted by local officials, aimed at teaching people in the community how to protect themselves against potential attacks.
Among those who signed up was Kiley Russell, who says she has lived in downtown Miami for nine years and has watched it change dramatically. When she first arrived, she recalls, there were only two or three high-rises in her immediate area, and now they are shooting up all around her. With that rapid growth, she says, has come more potential danger.
Russell says the transformation of the neighbourhood is part of what pushed her to attend. She still sees people who are homeless or struggling with drug addiction in the area, and she believes it is important to be able to read her surroundings and to know how to respond if she ever finds herself in a threatening situation. The trainers running the session say that is exactly the point of the class.
Beyond the self-defense training, the authority is leaning heavily on technology and policing to secure the central business district. Officials say they are expanding security and license plate readers into Brickell and are weighing the purchase of a second drone for police, tools intended to help officers monitor the area and respond more quickly to incidents.
According to the authority, those steps are already showing results. It says it has met with police and is seeing a measurable drop in crime, citing a decline of 18 percent in Brickell and of 20 percent in the central business district. The figures, officials suggest, point to progress in an area where residents have grown increasingly worried about their safety.
Much of that concern crystallised last month, when a woman was attacked and stabbed outside her apartment building in an assault that put downtown safety at the top of the agenda. Police made an arrest in the case, but the authority stresses that keeping the area safe is an ongoing process, and that a single arrest does not resolve the wider anxieties that such an attack leaves behind.