Data Analytics

Smart Cities Connect 2026: How Baltimore Is Using Data To Help Cut Homicides

The city built its public safety data operation from scratch to target violence prevention efforts and find gaps in programs.

Mickey McCarter

Mickey McCarter is the senior editor of StateTech Magazine.

Baltimore recorded 133 homicides in 2025, down 31% from 194 a year earlier and far below the 300-plus annual homicides the city experienced for much of the previous decade. Baltimore officials say better use of data has been an important part of the city’s response to violence.

The data helps officials identify who is most at risk, decide where to concentrate violence prevention programs and examine whether those programs are working as intended.

Stefanie Mavronis, director of Baltimore’s Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement (MONSE), and Joseph Muhlhausen, the city’s chief of data analytics, explained the approach during the 2026 Smart Cities Connect Fall Conference in National Harbor, Md. Their session focused on the data systems that support the city’s violence prevention work.

Baltimore had endured nearly a decade of more than 300 homicides a year when Mayor Brandon Scott created MONSE in 2020. An analysis of shootings and homicides found that more than 60% could be traced to group-involved incidents, including neighborhood crews and social networks in which violence carried a high risk of retaliation.

That finding gave the city a much narrower population on which to focus.

“When we can break the cycles of violence, when we can be more targeted in our approaches, get in front of the right people instead of just overpolicing entire communities, we can make an impact,” Mavronis said.

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Baltimore Built a Public Safety Data Operation From Scratch

MONSE was created as a public safety agency outside of law enforcement, overseeing prevention, intervention and re-entry initiatives. But it began without its own data analytics operation.

When Muhlhausen joined the office, Mavronis said, MONSE had no in-house analytics capacity. His team began building systems that could give the agency a “single source of data truth” and allow community organizations working with the city to document their activities. The analytics team now has three people.

Baltimore also publishes a public safety accountability dashboard with information on violent crime and MONSE programs, including how many people have received services and how many community organizations are participating.

Creating those systems required the city to deal with data held by separate agencies and restrictions on sensitive information. Baltimore has used memorandums of understanding to establish reporting requirements and, in one instance, embedded a MONSE employee with the police department when officials could not share an entire data set.

Analytics Shows Baltimore Where Programs Lose People

Baltimore officials also use the data to look inside programs rather than relying solely on citywide crime statistics.

MONSE, for example, works to connect people at high risk of involvement in gun violence with intensive services. The agency’s data showed a gap between the number of people offered those services and the number who enrolled.

“What happened there? Where are we losing people in that pipeline?” Mavronis said.

Officials are now examining the handoffs between teams and the metrics used at different stages of the program. Mavronis said unreliable numbers could undermine the strategy itself.

Baltimore has also turned to outside researchers to evaluate its programs. Mavronis said a University of Pennsylvania analysis found that implementation of the city’s focused group violence reduction strategy was associated with a statistically significant 25% reduction in homicides and shootings, without an increase in arrests or displacement of violence to other police districts.

The broader decline cannot be attributed to data alone. Baltimore’s strategy includes law enforcement, community violence intervention and services for people at high risk of gun violence. Data determines how many of those efforts are directed and evaluated.

MONSE is now developing more internal dashboards so staff members can see how the information they enter affects decisions.

“When people really start to see how it’s factoring into decision-making, that’s how we can make an impact,” Mavronis said.

The city is also drafting its next five-year violence prevention plan. Mavronis said Baltimore’s patterns of violence have already changed substantially since 2021, requiring the city to revisit the assumptions that shaped its earlier strategy.

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