After Salt Lake City police’s stepped-up enforcement along the Jordan River started up in early April, data appears to confirm the emphasis is blowing some drug dealing and illegal encampments eastward.
The city’s new police chief, engaged in a series of listening sessions with community groups, has shared newly generated maps showing that a surge in police patrols along the Jordan River Trail in the Fairpark neighborhood — including closure of a portion of the path — has shifted some concerns from west to east.
At a meeting of the Utah Homeless Services Board last week, Chief Brian Redd said that while calls for service dropped along the river trail more than a week into heightened operations, other hot spots have stayed active or popped up in other neighborhoods.
(Christopher Cherrington | The Salt Lake Tribune)
Police-generated heat maps Redd is circulating show yellow-colored areas where officers are responding to more calls for service specifically related to homelessness.
“They persisted on North Temple, but you can see down by Liberty Park and the Ballpark district, you can see yellow starting to form up in that area,” Redd told panel members. ”So, we saw movement of individuals that went over to the east side.”
Following the problems
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Belongings line the sidewalk across from Liberty Park in Salt Lake City on Tuesday, May 13, 2025.
The maps appear to confirm what many say is an enduring reality in the city’s policing of vagrancy, illegal encampments and the crime that can sometimes follow: without longer-term solutions, those targeted by police seem to just move to other pockets to avoid enforcement.
Beefed-up police operations have come this year as state officials keep a close eye on law enforcement in Utah‘s capital after leaders asked Mayor Erin Mendenhall to come up with a new public safety plan for the city.
Redd joined the Police Department after the mayor published her plan in mid-January. He replaced Chief Mike Brown, who stepped down at the mayor’s behest.
For the last week of March and first two days of April, police heat maps showed multiple hot spots along the river and nearby Redwood Road as well as along North Temple near 800 West. During the period from April 3 to April 16, several areas on the trail had been cleared up, North Temple remained active and locations in Liberty Park and the Ballpark neighborhood generated significantly more calls.
“We can decrease crime with officers and decrease calls for service, but we’re having a movement of individuals,” Redd acknowledged. “So, we’re giving temporary relief to one area and then people are moving to another area.”
Redd said his officers were encountering — and arresting — some of the same individuals on the east side that they have along the trail.
Signs of ebb and flow
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Salt Lake City police in Liberty Park on Tuesday, May 13, 2025.
In the last two weeks of April, after the department redirected officers and other resources to Liberty Park, calls related to homelessness spiked at Herman Franks Park, just south of Liberty; at Richmond Park; and in the heart of downtown. Problems remain inflamed on North Temple, too, particularly at its intersections with 800 West and with Redwood Road.
Redd and others are arguing that countering the “leaf blower effect” required better collaboration with other parts of the criminal justice system — specifically judges and officials at the county jail — to keep repeat offenders for illegal camping- or drug-related misdemeanors in custody for longer.
“A lot of this doesn’t work if we don’t hold these people,” Utah Department of Workforce Services Executive Director Casey Cameron said, “and have the opportunity to go in and provide interventions.”
On the job since March, Redd is also highlighting a need for more shelter space, adding that he has approached service providers at The Road Home and Shelter the Homeless about dedicating more beds for people referred by police.
The new chief has also implored donors to support homeless service providers, instead of giving out supplies to people camping in parks and on streets.
Driven by drugs?
As a part of his evolving take, the chief has also noted a critical trend as spring turns to summer: Officers are finding more people hanging around clusters of homeless encampments who themselves have places to live — suggesting they are frequenting the camps to find drugs.
That trend and other clues also point to a core of “high utilizers” among the city’s homeless population who are cycling repeatedly in and out of jail and other programs, including drug rehabilitation. Officials have often indicated that this relatively small population is hard to reach, yet inordinately expensive to care for.
Wayne Niederhauser, the state’s homelessness coordinator, is calling for advocates to back programs that don’t just treat people for addictions but also offer with housing and employment resources.
“If we can do anything as a board,” Niederhauser said last week, ”incentivize recovery support — so that you get clean and sober but then you have the support and the maintenance to keep you in that position, which is going to take continual follow-up.”
For now, Redd is telling advocates and community members he expects homelessness- and drug-related calls to climb as temperatures rise and residents spend more time outside.
