More than 200 Newark police officers may face layoffs due to $16.7M budget shortfall
Published: Thursday, July 15, 2010, 7:43 PM Updated: Thursday, July 15, 2010, 10:34 PM
Police officer Marvin Madura, who was awarded a medal of merit, along with other officers, salutes during the Newark Police Annual Awards Ceremony in this May 2010 photo. NEWARK — If Newark can’t close a $16.7 million deficit in its police department’s budget by November, the administration would have to lay off 263 police officers in a city historically plagued by crime, according to budget documents obtained by The Star-Ledger.
Even if the department makes several cost-cutting measures — including civilian layoffs and eliminating school crossing guards from the police department’s 2010 and 2011 budgets — the agency would still face an $11 million shortfall and be forced to layoff 181 officers, the document said.
These layoffs would only be necessary if police unions won’t agree to furloughs and uniform and gas allowances, Mayor Cory Booker said.
"There’s a way to get through this last $17 million without laying off one police officer," Booker said. "But the unions have to be flexible."
Union leaders, who represent about 1,300 officers, say the city has had budget crises for years, and their contract was negotiated just last year. They said they’re not willing to make concessions.
"I’m not going to be the culprit in this political game that he’s playing," Derrick Hatcher, president of Newark’s Fraternal Order of Police, said of Booker. "He’s going to have to answer to his constituents for the lack of police services that are provided to them."
County law enforcement officials criticized any plan to layoff officers, saying it could prompt a surge in shootings and homicides, and produce little cost savings.
"Quick-call savings are negligible," said Acting Essex County Prosecutor Robert Laurino. "If you talk to people at University Hospital, they look at crime as a public health crisis. It’s essentially a domino effect, there are no savings when you cut back on police."
Former Police Director Anthony Ambrose, who now serves as the prosecutor’s office’s chief of detectives, said the potential loss of manpower is comparable to 1978, when the layoff of 200 officers sparked a major setback in fighting crime.
"It took Newark a long time to rebound from that," Ambrose said. "It’s definitely going to be a strain on the crime fighting, without a doubt. It’s going to be a shame with all the hard work that’s gone into the communities by the police and the prosecutor’s office."
Booker said a suggestion that Newark would return to the crime levels of decades past was "fear mongering." "That just will not happen on our watch," he said.
Police Director Garry McCarthy said that if the layoffs happen, police would still be able to bring crime rates down, as they have done over the past four years. "We’ll do better with what we have," he said.
Overall, Newark is facing a $180 million deficit in the 2010 budget caused by the loss of one-time revenue makers and state budget cuts. So far, about 100 city employees have been laid off and remaining employees will be furloughed two days a month for the rest of the year, two libraries were shut and others have had their hours reduced. The city will also have another 650 lay offs by the end of the year.
The city’s police budget was thrown in turmoil after Trenton made nearly $60 million in direct and indirect cuts, Booker said.
"We knew we were going to have to do major downsizing in government," he said. "Our plan was to leave public safety intact. Where the game changed was additional cuts that put public safety in play."
More than 200 Newark police officers may face layoffs due to $16.7M budget shortfall | NJ.com
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