Flash forward to 2015 and the turnaround in Camden is one of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie's proudest accomplishments. NJ.com took a closer look at how and why crime has fallen in Camden. Does Christie deserve the credit? Has replacing the former city police with a Camden County Metro Division been the driver of crime-fighting success?
The new department, called the Camden County Police Department Metro Division, was established with the help of Gov. Chris Christie, who boasts about its success and is widely expected to discuss Camden across the country if he launches a presidential campaign.
"In a city suffering from epidemic crime, we acted boldly," declared Christie at his State of the State address last month.
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While the numbers have been dramatic, police department Chief Scott Thomson attributed improvements mainly to the shift toward community policing.
"What's different? The answer is everything," Thomson said. "It's a completely new paradigm of public safety for, not just this city and the county, but for the state as well. The culture of the organization is focused more on community building than conflict."
"We're not polarizing communities," he said. "We fish with a spear and not with a net. Not everyone needs to feel the weight of law enforcement because of four or five individuals."
After facing years of resistance as former chief of the Camden Police Department, the support Thomson received for implementing the new policing methods may have been pivotal.
Yet NJ.com also explores why crime ever got so bad as quickly as it did in Camden. Part of the problem was Christie's own $5.5 million reduction in state aid to Camden in 2010, plus another $7.6 million over the next year. Year-to-year statistics show rising violent crime during that period. Total 2014 murders were just one fewer than the total in 2009 before Christie took office.
Another important factor to consider is that in 2011, 42.5% of Camden residents were living in poverty, according to a report from Next City. The median income dropped from $28,720 in 2010 to $21,191 in 2011. At the same time, prior to the police overhaul, Mayor Dana Redd laid off 300 police and firefighters due to the loss of state funding.
The turnaround in Camden speaks to changes that go beyond Christie's intervention under difficult budget circumstances. The new Camden County Metro Police received approximately $5.5 million in federal COPS (Community Oriented Policing Services) grants in 2013 and 2014, providing the department with more resources, personnel, and training for better strategies to deal with neighborhood crime.
Read the full article here.