The new mayor of New York, Eric Adams, had promised to improve security in the largest city in the United States. But the first three weeks of his term were marked by armed violence, which increased the pressure on this former police officer.
Last Friday, a 22-year-old uniformed officer was killed and another seriously injured in a shooting in the Harlem neighborhood, putting more pressure on the already complex resolutions. “It’s our city against murderers,” said the Democratic mayor, with a speech that is not too different from that of the zero tolerance of William Bratton, chief of police for Republican Rudolf Giuliani, when he arrived at the hospital on Friday night Harlem, where the shot officers were transferred, who responded to a call from a mother confronted with an abusive son.
Among the recent violence, one incident was particularly poignant: an 11-month-old girl was injured in the cheek by a stray bullet in the Bronx while in a parked car with her mother.
“I’m going to put a real plan in place this week when I talk to the people of New York, and we’re going to address the root causes” of crime, Eric Adams, 61, promised Sunday on CNN. “There is a sea of crime that has been fed by many rivers” and “a dam must be put in each of these rivers,” he launched.
In addition to the proliferation of weapons, the covid-19 pandemic and its social and economic consequences fueled the violence, which will surely be at the center of an upcoming confrontation between the new mayor and the left of his party over the financing of the police. and ways to fight crime.
Budget negotiations
Adams, a member of the right wing of the Democratic Party and a strong supporter of strict policing, prepares to negotiate the new city budget. The mayor said this week that he plans to keep the police and their more than $5 billion budget out of the city’s cost-cutting measures.
That stance is rejected by those in his own party who rally under the slogan “Defund the Police.”
Left-wing councilwoman Kristin Richardson Jordan won her Harlem constituency campaigning for alternative public safety systems to traditional policing.
“The death of police officers is not the abolition (of the police). The abolition is the end of all violence,” he said, after expressing his sadness at the murder of the young officer.
In 2021, police recorded 488 homicides in this city of 9 million people, 4.3% more than in 2020. Jeffrey Butts of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice noted that 25 years ago the number of homicides in New York was four times higher.
Butts says he disagrees with the “Defund the Police” principle, but maintains that allocating “more funding to the police is not an adequate response.”
“How are these resources used? What for? What is the strategy?” he asked. “The basis of our approach must be the economic well-being, the health and well-being of the population, which is a much broader topic of public policy debate.”
For congressman Adriano Espaillat, whose constituency includes Harlem and parts of the Bronx, “the federal government must play a central role” in the fight against violence. Espaillat spoke Saturday of the need for a law that requires more rigorous background checks on those who buy weapons.
Ken Sherrill, emeritus professor of political science at Hunter College, said Eric Adams had already stressed the need to “deal with the flow of guns.” If that is not done, he stressed, “you would be wasting your time”
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