The statistics almost leap off the page of John Faso’s spreadsheet.
For the second quarter of 2025, violent crime in Niagara Falls is down by 56%. Aggravated assaults declined by 49% compared to the same period in 2024.
The city has recorded no rapes or gun-involved homicides, while robberies are down 67%.
When it comes to property crimes, the statistics are equally impressive.
Burglaries in the second quarter in a year-to-year comparison with 2024, have dropped 24%, while larcenies decreased by 21%. Motor vehicle thefts have fallen 58%.
Overall, property crime has declined by 27%.
The former Niagara Falls Police superintendent is crediting New York’s Gun Involved Violence Elimination (GIVE) Initiative for the dramatic results.
“It’s solving crime,” said Faso, who, after retiring as police superintendent, is now the city’s GIVE initiative coordinator.
Now in its 12th year, the program, a successor to Operation Impact, has pumped millions of dollars into Niagara Falls and Niagara County as part of a comprehensive crime-fighting strategy known as Problem-Oriented Policing (POP). Faso calls it “evidence-based policing.”
GIVE funding pays for the costs of two dedicated gun violence crime analysts at the Niagara Intelligence & Crime Analysis Center (NICAC), a Falls Police detective assigned exclusively to handle gun-related investigations, along with two assistant Niagara County District Attorneys and a paralegal who works only on firearms cases.
“The analysts follow the statistics and the trends to identify (crime) hot spots, top (criminal) offenders,” Faso said. “But it’s not just enforcement or boots on the ground. Community outreach is a really important part of GIVE.”
The GIVE coordinator said the outreach efforts by Falls Police officers include not only “focused deterrence”, but also connecting offenders to social needs such as addiction and mental health counseling and job training.
GIVE even incorporates crime prevention through environmental design, which examines the role of street environmental factors in the commission of crime.
At its Wednesday night meeting, the Niagara Falls City Council unanimously approved the receipt of $1,200,991 in 2025-26 GIVE funding. Faso called the funding level “about the same” as the 2024-25 GIVE grant to the city.
In addition to the Falls GIVE award, the state also allocated $328,827 in GIVE funds to the Niagara County District Attorney’s Office, $381,600 to the Niagara County Probation Department and $272,350 to the Niagara County Sheriff’s Office.
For the 2025-26 fiscal year, the state Legislature authorized more than $9.1 million for law enforcement agencies across Western New York as part of GIVE.
Statistics from the state Department of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS) show that the six Western New York communities participating in GIVE saw a 24% decline in shootings, while the number of people wounded by gun violence declined by 35%, when comparing January through June 2025 to the same period in 2024.
“My top priority is public safety, and since taking office, my administration has been laser-focused on working with local law enforcement to drive down gun violence across New York communities,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said. “New York’s GIVE initiative is a crucial part of our comprehensive plan to reduce shootings and firearm-related violent crime — and it’s working. But we will not stop fighting for safer streets until all New Yorkers feel safe.”