An unidentified man died of an unspecified trauma near the intersection of Broadway Boulevard and Armour Road in Kansas City early Wednesday morning.Kansas City police officers arrived to find the man unresponsive at about 5 a.m.This latest homicide case is part of one of the most violent years in Kansas City history. According to KCPD records, as of Nov. 23, Kansas City has had 151 homicides. There were 157 homicides in 2021 and a record 179 in 2020. With a month left in 2022, the last three years already have the three highest homicide totals in Kansas City history."First of all, it is wholly unacceptable. I think right now, as you may know, we're doing a search for a new police chief. I plan to ask each and every one of our police chief candidates when we have our meetings on them, what are we doing to bring down violent crime,” said Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas.The record-breaking homicide numbers come at the same time KCPD is facing a 50-year low in the number of sworn police officers on the street. Fraternal Order of Police President Brad Lemon said KCPD could soon drop below 1,100 police officers. Lemon said part of the problem is the 2021 KCPD budget fight."The department couldn't hire because we didn't know if we were going to be getting the money or not, put us in an incredibly bad position. We lost 135 officers during that year and with no recruiting classes. And, you know, this year, we will lose somewhere near 110, which will be the second largest we've ever lost," he said."I agree with Brad Lemon. I agree with the Fraternal Order of Police. We need more police officers in this city. Second to that, we need a police department that is well run," Lucas said.The mayor said part of the problem is KCPD is run by the Board of Police Commissioners, meaning he and city leaders are more limited than their other urban counterparts in making decisions.Lucas said he believes part of the answer is raising pay for police officers to help keep the ones already in the department and to help recruit more officers."I'm disappointed sometimes when I see good size, almost full recruiting classes in our suburban communities and we're having trouble getting people in Kansas City. Then I ask how much an officer is getting paid in one of our suburbs, and they're starting 3 or $4,000 more than an officer in Kansas City, Missouri. That is a huge problem to me," Lucas said.As a practical matter, Lemon said KCPD, due to the low number of police officers, is limited in what officers can do."Officers really can't proactively patrol like they've done in the past. They're mostly spending their time answering calls for service and running from call to call," he said.Additionally, KCPD is currently under a U.S. Justice Department Civil Rights investigation regarding the agency's hiring practices.KCPD records show most homicide victims in 2022 were male, younger than 35 and people of color."It is one of the greatest heartbreaks of looking at this cycle of violent crime to see how many people between the ages of 17 to 24 and frankly younger, are in these numbers. And don't get me wrong, every loss of life is a tragedy. But we are burying high school kids. We are burying young parents each and every day in this city. There is not a more important issue to the future, not just of Kansas City, but of this region, than us changing the tide on our violent crime problem," Lucas said."There's really no silver bullet to solve this problem. But I think everybody's trying to work together to figure out how to do that. But when we continue to have declining membership on the police department and increasing workloads, those two don't work," Lemon said.