Elmwood Avenue is a shabby gateway to Columbia. Can police, private security change that?

Elmwood Avenue is a major gateway into Columbia, but the corridor has a shaky reputation.

More than 48,000 vehicles on average travel each day down the busy downtown thoroughfare, going into or out of the city. But Elmwood Avenue is also a dividing line, separating the bustle and growth of downtown from the overlooked North Main Street district.

The corridor has struggled with vandalism, car break-ins and violent crimes, as well as loitering and a large presence of homeless residents who rely on services located downtown. But new housing projects are also being pitched in the corridor, which, nestled between Bull Street and Main Street, could be the next frontier in the expanding downtown.

This year, business leaders, elected officials and the police department are putting forward new energy, more money, and private security to refine the city gateway that some say hasn’t always shown Columbia in the best light.

Police presence and private security

“The whole end goal of this is to create a cleaner, safer community when you’re coming into Columbia,” said Columbia Police Department Lt. Jeffrey Brink.

The Columbia Police Department has increased its presence on Elmwood Avenue, with permanent two- to three-member teams stationed there for constant attention. But the department also has begun leaning on a private security firm to help patrol the corridor as well.

Columbia approved a $2 million contract with Allied Universal in July 2023 for a variety of security services across the city, including for armed security guards at fixed sites and patrol teams surveying properties for loitering and other crimes.

Brink said the Allied Universal staff are not police officers and don’t perform arrests. But the Allied security guards are empowered to address loitering. Otherwise the teams work in pairs and report back to the police department if they see a crime.

Brink said the combination of having more officers deployed in the area along with the patrols by Allied Universal have helped reduce crime and nuisance issues along the gateway corridor.

He could not provide specific data but said service calls for issues such as auto-break ins and violent crimes have noticeably declined since last May, when the police department launched its initiative aimed at addressing concerns with homeless residents and quality-of-life issues downtown.

Last year, Columbia Police Chief Skip Holbrook said two gas stations on Elmwood Avenue, both near the busy intersections with Assembly and Park streets, accounted for 1,200 service calls in the first half of 2023, often for violent crimes.

Not far away on North Main Street, near the intersection with Elmwood, the city shut down the Main’s Best convenience store for similar reasons.

“We, of course, know we’re not done,” Brink said of the progress he believes has been made on improving safety on Elmwood Avenue.

Development and change

In addition to the $2 million for private security, Columbia also invested $100,000 to expand Main Street’s “yellow shirts” program, which hires people to survey Main Street, the Vista and now North Main Street for litter, vandalism, loitering and other concerns.

“If I had it my way, the yellow shirts would go all the way down North Main,” said Sabrina Odom-Edwards, executive director of the North Main Business Association.

The $100,000 from the city has helped bring the yellow shirts from Elmwood Avenue all the way to Anthony Avenue, just past River Drive in the area of the Cottontown, Elmwood Park and Earlewood neighborhoods. They help the corridor stay clean, which helps its reputation, but Odom-Edwards said they also make people feel safer and more comfortable.

Plus, she said, it’s good to see the city investing in making the gateway more attractive.

“When you’re revitalizing an area, you don’t want people to cross the street and get a completely different image,” she said.

And the gateway is transforming. Two new apartments are planned for the entrance to North Main Street, and on Elmwood Avenue, a senior apartment complex is being converted into market-rate housing.

Another 200 apartments could be coming to the intersection of Elmwood and Bull Street, where road construction already is underway to improve that high-traffic spot.

Matt Kennell, executive director of the Main Street District, agreed downtown is expanding naturally northward.

For a long time, businesses have complained to Kennell about nuisance issues or about vandalism and other crimes in the corridor, but he said anecdotally he has seen a noticeable drop in the number of complaints he’s received from area businesses.