NEWARK
BLUES
between police staffing and crime is
more complicated. “Simplistically, we
say, ‘crime bad, more cops.’ But that’s
not the answer,” he says.
He agrees that cities need wellstaffed police forces. But turning the
corner on crime over the long term
requires other strategies as well.
Booker says these include drug treatment, re-entry programs that connect
newly-released prisoners to jobs and
social services, and specialized courts
that aim to keep addicts, the mentally
ill and veterans from cycling in and
out of the legal system.
The Obama administration has
invested in these strategies, steering
millions of dollars to fund drug treatment, prisoner re-entry and similar
programs in cities like Newark. The
Justice Department has pushed to
reduce mandatory sentences for nonviolent drug offenders. And some recent reports suggest Obama may push
for substantial new reforms in federal
drug policy in his second term. Mitt
Romney, on the other hand, has made
little or no mention of crime, urban
policing or criminal justice system
reform in the nearly two years of his
current presidential bid.
“Mitt Romney’s policy is scary to
me,” Booker says. “He’s not talking
about the innovative programs that
Barack Obama supports. He’s not
HUFFINGTON
08.05.12
talking about the kind of funding that
would fuel an urban agenda. In fact,
I haven’t heard him talk about an urban agenda at all.” A spokeswoman
for Romney’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Yet Booker is himself not immune
to criticism on the issues of crime and
spending. To some observers of Newark politics, he has been too cozy with
Chris Christie, New Jersey’s fiscally
conservative Republican governor,
who pushed through dramatic cuts in
aid to the state’s struggling cities over
the objection of many Democrats.
Christie’s first public appearance after his election in 2009 was
in Newark, with Booker by his side.
Booker told the crowd that the new
governor had pledged to help him on
crime reduction. Since then, their
relationship has remained more than
cordial: the two have appeared in
public repeatedly and even filmed humorous Web videos together.
Booker should be criticizing Christie more vocally on public safety, says
O’Flaherty, the Columbia economics
professor. Instead, he says, Booker
has mostly given the governor a pass.
“The fact that several major cities in
New Jersey are in terrible shape is
Christie’s problem,” he says. “Cory is
letting it not be his problem.”
Booker deflects the criticism, say-