NJ. Premonition of things to come. America’s Deadliest City Set to Disband Police Force Over Budget Crisis

AP reports:

This city, long among the nation’s poorest and most crime-ridden, is on the verge of dismantling its police department and starting anew with a force run by the county government.

City officials are making the move to increase the number of officers while keeping the cost the same by averting rules negotiated with a union that city officials have seen as unwilling to compromise.

Unless the union – which is skeptical of the stated motivations for the change – reaches a deal with the county, no more than 49 per cent of the city’s current officers could join the new force and those that do will get pay cuts.

The city has the nation’s highest poverty rate with more than two residents in five living in poverty, census data show.

The big factories that once made Camden an industrial boomtown have been gone for a generation.

Over the past decade, revitalization efforts focused on expanding hospitals and universities, which brought some life to downtown but had a less discernible effect on neighborhoods where even the best-kept blocks have abandoned homes.

The city expects only $25 million of its $150 million next proposed budget to come from property taxes. Most of the rest is supplied by state aid – and that’s declining.

Teachers and schools will need to be able to maintain a safe environment in all but extreme instances.  Cuts are coming.

 

This entry was posted in General. Bookmark the permalink.