The Atlanta Police Foundation is seeking donations to fund an estimated total of $1.625 million in public safety programs called for in the new “Buckhead Security Plan.”
Unveiled earlier this month, the plan calls for better funding for and coordination between existing public and private security programs. It also politically challenges Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms to denounce crime.
The plan came from concern about a wave of gun violence and quality-of-life crime in the neighborhood. Those concerns have crystallized with the Dec. 21 shooting of a 7-year-old girl as she rode in a car on Peachtree Road near the Phipps Plaza mall. The plan was spearheaded by the Buckhead Coalition, the Buckhead Community Improvement District and the Atlanta Police Foundation.
The entire plan can be read online here.
The foundation is now accepting tax-deductible donations specifically dedicated to the plan’s programs on its website at atlantapolicefoundation.org. Any funds received will be invested “only with the concurrence of the Buckhead Coalition and the Atlanta Police Foundation,” according to a donation form.
Specific programs for which the foundation is seeking donations, and their estimated costs, are as follows:
- Operation Shield surveillance cameras and license-plate readers: $800,000
- Buckhead supplemental security patrol (off-duty officer patrols in commercial areas outside the current Buckhead CID in central commercial area): $500,000
- Crime Stoppers of Greater Atlanta reward pool and tip line: $150,000
- COMNET radio system, to connect APD with private security patrols: $75,000
- At-Promise Youth Initiative, the foundation’s youth and community center program: $50,000
- “Other community policing initiatives,” including APD training, officer support and performance incentives: $50,000
Correction: An earlier version of this story partly misidentified the organization accepting donations as the police department rather than the Atlanta Police Foundation.