Actionable Hope! Metaphysical Accomplishments!!!

Above is an Official “CityofTrentonNJ” YouTube video. It was recorded yesterday and shows our Indicted Occupant and members of his staff actively lobbying members of the NJ Legislature in favor of the IO’s latest public safety “plan.”

So, we ARE taking action to rid our streets of crime! We ARE doing something!

On the other hand, I really don’t know how effective it’ll be, cold calling an Assembly member’s or Senator’s assistant to say, “I wonder if [fill in the blank] would be interested in writing a bill to hire police officers for the city of Trenton?”

The IO says he and his colleagues are getting a good reception from this effort, releasing a press release today that says in part, “The responses have been largely positive, especially from districts representing cities. The vast majority of respondents asked whether our district delegation (Turner, Watson-Coleman, & Gusciora) would be introducing bills in support of Mayor Mack’s crime reduction plan. We were delighted to read, yesterday, that all three elected officials said they were in support of our efforts.”

Uh huh. Sure thing.

One piece of advice, Mr. Mack? If you are trying to get on the good side of the Legislature, it would probably help if you spell the name of the Senate Majority Leader correctly. Just saying.

The press release offers a glimpse into some of the calculations used to come up with the dollar request that has struck many observers in the press and public as somewhat high. This also addresses another criticism, that any new officers hired with additional state funding would not be ready to hit Trenton’s streets for several months. The release states,

Lastly, there have been a number of questions related to how soon officers could start if the State approved our funding request. We would refer your attention to the ‘Rice Bill’ which was signed into law by Governor Christie in 2010. This bill would allow Trenton to hire from a list of police officers that were laid off from agencies throughout the State. This would greatly reduce the amount of time it would take to start new officers plus it gives us access to men and women with law enforcement experience.

The IO is apparently counting on many of these officers laid off elsewhere in NJ to be already trained and more senior (i.e. with higher salaries).

This might be true, in some cases. Many officers were laid off from the recently disbanded Camden PD, and may have training relevant to Trenton’s environment. But would officers trained in and serving as part of suburban forces be able to hit the ground running in Trenton without significant additional training? An officer, for instance, from Sussex or Cape May Counties?

I don’t think so.

The IO is wishing and hoping that his hires – once the money is speedily approved by the Legislature and Governor – will be on the job in a month or two.

Or so I assume. It’s really hard to tell. Because even with this latest press release, there are still no details to this “plan.” No budget, no calendar, no plan of training or organization, no suggestions on how the new officers or the rest of the Trenton PD will be deployed. No nothing.

In a Letter to the Editor in today’s Trenton Times, mayoral candidate James Golden, a former Trenton Police Director, makes the same points, with his experience providing more credibility than I can:

[W]e need to understand the overall crime-fighting strategy of the police department and what benchmarks will be set to reduce violent crime. It is against these benchmarks that the police department’s real performance will be measured. Right now, it appears the only thing we can point to are record-shattering rates of violence that continue to destroy our reputation and quality of life. Throwing money at this problem without a real plan of action will only make a bad situation worse.

But the IO has not given us “a real plan of action.” All we have as of today is this desperate request for funding. And this press release. And this video.

And they are proud of their efforts!

God Help Us.