Cory Booker
36th Mayor of Newark, New Jersey
Assumed office
July 1, 2006
Preceded by
Sharpe James
Born
April 27, 1969 (1969-04-27) (age 40)
Washington, D.C.
Political party
Democratic Party
Alma mater
Yale Law School (J.D.)
Oxford University (B.A.)
Stanford University (M.A.)
Stanford University (B.A.)
Profession
Mayor, Newark, New Jersey
Website
www.corybooker.com
Cory Anthony Booker (born April 27, 1969) is the current Mayor of Newark, New Jersey. He is a Democratic politician and former Newark Councilman and community activist who ran unsuccessfully for mayor in 2002 against longtime incumbent Sharpe James. Booker ran again in 2006 and won a sweeping victory against Ronald Rice to become the 36th mayor of Newark.
Background
The son of African-American trailblazers (Cary and Carolyn Booker were among the first African-American executives at IBM), Booker was born in Washington, D.C. and grew up in the predominantly white, affluent town of Harrington Park in Bergen County, New Jersey.[1] He is an alumnus of Northern Valley Regional High School at Old Tappan where he was an All-American football player.[2] Booker traveled west to study at Stanford University and earned a B.A. in political science in 1991 as well as an M.A. in sociology the following year. He played varsity football — he made the All–Pacific Ten Academic team — and was elected to the council of (four) presidents. While he was there, he ran The Bridge, a student-run crisis hotline and organized help for youth in East Palo Alto from Stanford students.[3]
He won a Rhodes Scholarship and studied at The Queen's College, Oxford, where he was awarded an honors degree in modern history in 1994. While at Oxford he became friends with Rabbi Shmuley Boteach and Rachel Maddow. He became the President of the L'Chaim Society,the local chapter of Chabad, and brought together a diverse community there.
After Oxford, he obtained a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1997 and, while there, started and operated free legal clinics for low-income residents of New Haven. He was also a Big Brother, and was active in the Black Law Students Association. After law school, Booker returned to New Jersey. He served as Staff Attorney for the Urban Justice Center in New York and Program Coordinator of the Newark Youth Project.
From 1998 to 2006, he lived in Brick Towers, a troubled housing complex in Newark's Central Ward. Booker organized tenants there to fight for improved conditions. In November 2006, as one of the last remaining tenants in Brick Towers, Booker left his apartment for the top unit in a three-story rental on Hawthorne Avenue in Newark's South Ward, an area described as "a drug-and gang-plagued neighborhood of boarded-up houses and empty lots." Brick Towers has been demolished and a new mixed-income development will be built there in 2010.[4]
Councilman
In 1998, Booker won an upset victory, beating a four-term incumbent to get elected to the Newark Municipal Council, a council known for its corruption and hard-fought elections.
Once on the Council, Booker proved to be an unconventional public official. In 1999, he went on a 10-day hunger strike, living in a tent in front of one of Newark's public housing projects (Garden Spires), to protest open-air drug dealing and the associated violence. For five months in 2000 he lived in a contemporary motor home, parking on street corners known to be places where drug trafficking occurred.
He proposed a variety of Council initiatives that impacted housing, young people, law and order, and the efficiency and transparency of City Hall, but was regularly rebuffed by a resistant Municipal Council and often outvoted 8–1.
While on the Council, Booker became an outspoken advocate of education reform.
2002 Mayoral run
In 2002, rather than run for re-election as Councilman, Booker decided to run for Mayor of Newark. This pitted him against longtime mayor, Sharpe James. In this campaign and the next, James' supporters questioned Booker's suburban background, calling him a carpetbagger who was "not black enough" to understand the city.[5] Booker was defeated, 53 percent to 47 percent. Filmmaker Marshall Curry chronicles the campaign in his documentary Street Fight, which was nominated for the 2005 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
After concluding his service as a Councilman, in 2003 Booker founded Newark Now, a grassroots non-profit organization. He also became a partner at the West Orange law firm, Booker, Rabinowitz, et al., and a senior fellow at Rutgers University's Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy. Booker also became a member of the Board of Trustees at Teachers College, Columbia University, a member of the Executive Committee at Yale Law School and was formerly a member of the Board of Trustees at Stanford University.
2006 Mayoral run
As expected, Cory Booker announced on February 11, 2006 that he would again run for mayor, an intention he had made clear after his loss in 2002.
On March 6, 2006, Deputy Mayor (and State Senator) Ronald Rice entered the race, adding "that Mayor James had encouraged him to run but noted that if the mayor decided to join the race, his candidacy could change."[6] On March 27, 2006, James announced that he would not seek a sixth term, preferring to focus on his seat in the New Jersey Senate.[7]
Rice ran a campaign attacking Booker for raising over $6 million for the race. Booker's campaign outspent Rice's 25 to 1. Booker tried to identify Rice as a "political crony" of former mayor Sharpe James, to whom Booker lost in 2002.[8][9]
On Election Day, May 9, 2006, Newark's nonpartisan election took place. Booker won with 72 percent of the vote, soundly defeating Rice. Booker's entire slate of City Council candidates, known as the "Booker Team," swept the Council elections, giving Booker firm leadership of the city's government.
On May 31, 2006, before taking office as Mayor, Booker sued Newark to stop the city from selling land at prices he felt were too low. The land was mainly sold at prices ranging from $1 to $4 per square foot. The city council argued that this was the only way to promote development in Newark's blighted neighborhoods. Booker was also criticized by council members because, as a councilman, he approved of some of these deals. Booker's attorneys argued that the city had violated the state's "pay-to-play" law by rewarding campaign contributors with land deals at favorable financial terms. On June 20, 2006, Superior Court Judge Patricia Costello ruled in favor of Booker, stating that his attorneys had "made a persuasive argument that campaign contributors were given discounted land deals".[10]
Days before Booker took office in late June, New Jersey investigators foiled a plot, led by Bloods gang leaders inside four New Jersey state prisons, to assassinate Booker. The plot was led by New Jersey Bloods gang leader Lester Alford, an inmate in East Jersey State Prison in Woodbridge Township, New Jersey. The plan called for prisoners in four New Jersey state prisons to riot and then for Bloods gang members on the outside to simultaneously assassinate Booker. Booker has been placed under 24-hour surveillance by the Newark Police Department. The threats against Booker are believed to be in response to Booker's campaign promises to increase the number of police on the streets and take a harder line on crime.[11][12][13]
Mayoral administration
Booker campaigning for Barack Obama in Newark.
Booker assumed office as mayor of Newark on July 1, 2006, just the third person to govern the city since 1970.[14][15][16] After a week, Booker announced a 100-day plan to implement reforms in Newark. The centerpiece was adding police officers; other changes included ending background checks for many city jobs, an effort to help former offenders find employment in the city; refurbishing police stations; improving city services; and expanding summer youth programs.[17][18]
Booker campaigned for U.S. Senator Joe Lieberman in Connecticut on August 6, 2006, two days before the Democratic primary pitting Lieberman against challenger Ned Lamont.[19][20]
On August 21, 2006, Booker formally introduced his proposed Newark City Budget before the Municipal Council for approval. Booker's $697.1 million budget called for an 8.3% increase in the city's property tax, which if passed would be one of the largest property tax increases in the city's history. The budget would also increase the number of city employees from 3,968 to 4,197.[21][22]
One of the mayor's first priorities was to reduce the city's crime rate. Booker appointed Garry McCarthy, a former police commander of Manhattan's 33rd Precinct in the late 1990s, as the director of the Newark Police Department. In response to several high profile crimes in his first term, Booker, with his security team personally patrolled the streets of Newark until times as late as 4 AM.[23]
Crime has dropped in Newark. From 2006-2008, crime dropped by the following percentages: murders 36%, shooting incidents 41%, rapes 30%, and auto thefts 26%.[23] In 2009, Newark had its lowest murder rate since 1959.[23] While McCarthy was credited with sharply reducing crime in the precinct but was also criticized by some for methods including setting up police barricades around neighborhoods to monitor the drug trade.[23][24] Despite the success indicated by these statistics, as the global economic recession set in, robberies rose 27% in 2008 and another 10% through late June 2009.[23]
In addition to lowering crime, Booker has both doubled the amount of affordable housing under development, and quadrupled the amount under predevelopment. Booker has attracted over $100 million in private donations for the city and has slashed the city budget deficit from $180 million to $73 milion. Despite criticisms, Booker has also raised the salaries of many city workers.[23]
In 2009, after President Barack Obama became president of the United States, Booker was offered the chance to head the new White House Office of Urban Affairs Policy; Booker turned the offer down.[23]
Booker's administration has held monthly office hours with city residents where residents can meet personally with the Mayor to discuss their problems.[25]
Booker is a member of the Mayors Against Illegal Guns Coalition,[26] a bi-partisan group with a stated goal of "making the public safer by getting illegal guns off the streets." The Coalition is co-chaired by Boston mayor Thomas Menino and New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg.
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