NIAGARA FALLS — Niagara Falls police Chief John Chella said Monday he’s “disturbed” by the type of violence he’s seen lately on the city’s streets.

During a town hall meeting with residents and members of the Niagara Ministerial Council, Chella said his officers and members of other local law enforcement agencies are working together to get the gang violence and gun activity under control.

“I’m not going to sugar coat this, we have a problem lately in Niagara Falls,” Chella said during the forum held at the Doris Jones Family Resource Center on Ninth Street. “We had a problem for a while, but, unfortunately, lately, it’s progressed to the point where it’s about gunplay and I’m amazed at how senseless some of these acts of vengeance have carried out.”

Chella’s comments came just hours after Falls police apprehended an 18-year-old Ferry Avenue resident in connection with a gun battle that erupted late Saturday morning at the intersection of Pine Avenue and 30th Street. Investigators confirmed the suspect, Howard Welch, is a member of the Eighth Street Boyz gang and the shooting incident was tied to a dispute with a member of the rival Bloods street gang.

Chella said he continues to work closely with representatives from the Niagara County Sheriff’s Office, state police and other law enforcement agencies to get the situation under control. He pointed to Welch’s arrest as a sign of progress.

“We made that arrest,” Chella said. “That individual needed to be off the street. We are working diligently to make those responsible for this violence accountable for their actions.”

The ministerial council — a collection of pastors and other clergy from Niagara Falls — invited Chella, Niagara County Sheriff James Voutour and other city officials to the forum in hopes of coming up with solutions to the problems of crime and violence in the community. The event was scheduled last month. In the weeks since, several shooting incidents have occurred in the city, including one last week that claimed the life of a young man outside an apartment at Monteagle Ridge Estates.

Voutour said the numbers suggest the volume of incidents are on the rise from a few years ago. He noted the county’s emergency dispatch center received 64,000 calls for service last year, up from 54,000 in 2005. Voutour said more than 3,400 of the 2009 calls were transferred to Niagara Falls police. “The workload is getting heavier,” Voutour said.

Chella agreed, noting that overall crime incidents increased by 2 percent and property crimes climbed 8 percent last year.

Chella outlined a number of ongoing programs aimed at reducing the level of crime in the city, including the state-assisted Operation Impact program and the violent crime impact teams, an initiative involving the city and the county that puts undercover officers into high-crime neighborhoods. He said the department’s anonymous tipline has provided information that led to a number of arrests and in 2009 the city nearly doubled the amount of weapons it pulled off the street from the previous year.

“It’s working, however, we are fighting an uphill battle,” Chella said.

Residents offered some suggestions of their own.

Several suggested the city needs to provide more recreational outlets for young people to keep them off the streets, out of gangs and away from trouble.

“We are not including the youth,” said resident Gloria Dolson. “The problem is the youth. We all should be talking about how we can get the youth involved.”

Joseph Lowery, director of the Niagara Christian Basketball program in Niagara Falls, said young people often tell him that they have few options outside of the basketball program.

“Our kids are suffering because they don’t have anything to do,” he said. “We definitely need to have recreation for our youth.”

Mayor Paul Dyster agreed and said city officials are taking steps to address that concern by devoting funds to projects like the ongoing development of new basketball courts behind Harry F. Abate elementary school. Dyster said the city also intends to devote more resources to organized sports and recreation activities.

“I absolutely agree with you that that is an issue that we have to address,” Dyster said.

Ron Cunningham, a truant officer with the Niagara Falls School District, said parents need to accept more responsibility as well. Without good parenting, he argued, no kid can succeed.

“You can do all the basketball you want,” he said. “We’ve got to get back to the families.”

Councilman Charles Walker added that the city can supply funding for youth programs, but it won’t work unless residents get more involved in mentoring young people.

“Not all of our kids are bad,” Walker said. “I mean, that’s the biggest problem I see. We are so afraid of these kids. We don’t want basketball courts in our community. We don’t want them walking our streets. That’s one of our biggest problems, our fear of these kids.”

The ministerial council is planning to hold similar forums with law enforcement officials in the coming months in hopes of combating crime in neighborhoods.

“We feel that this is best accomplished through a cooperative relationship, not an adversarial one,” said Rev. B. Leslie James, the ministerial council president.