OUT OF
TOWN COPS
government, to be called the Camden Metro Division. They say the
closure of the 141-year-old department and the creation of a new
agency is necessary because the
existing union-negotiated police
contract is no longer sustainable in
a time of deep budget deficits.
The plan was sold to Camden
residents as a security fix: by firing
the existing police force, they were
told, millions of savings would be
redirected into hiring about 130
new uniformed officers — a 50 percent increase over current staffing.
HUFFINGTON
12.09.12
“A BULLET HAS NO NAME. IF
SOMEBODY SHOOTS AND I’M
WALKING, I COULD BE HIT.”
“It’s time to reject the status
quo and ramp this police department up to a level that it needs,”
Louis Capelli, director of the Camden County Board of Freeholders,
which would control the metro
agency, tells The Huffington Post.
City and county leaders approved the plan last year, and it
Camden
was recently
identified
as the most
impoverished
city in the U.S.