Jersey City Ratchets Up Police Efforts Against Crime
By JONATHAN MILLER
Published: March 29, 2006

JERSEY CITY, March 28 ? After a spike in crime and mounting concern from residents, the police here say they are now turning a page in their efforts to fight crime and plan to carry out a fresh strategy to deal with it.
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Those plans, announced this week, include a retooled computer tracking system for crimes, increased foot and bicycle patrols and more surveillance cameras throughout the city. On Monday, officials held a community meeting to announce the changes.

"You know the problems we've been having in the last several months," the police director, Samuel Jefferson, told about 300 people in the Public School No. 4 auditorium. "Let's pray together."

Those problems include 39 murders in 2005, up from 23 in 2004; more gang activity and drug dealing; and a recent string of high-profile muggings and armed robberies in the city's gentrifying downtown, which prompted the Guardian Angels to begin patrols there.

While the city's downtown has gone upscale in the past few years, with new office towers, luxury high-rises, cafes and young professionals, the recent increase in crime and the media attention it received blindsided leaders here.

"We thought it was time to give to citizens an idea of the work and accomplishments of the Jersey City Police Department in the past 18 months," Mayor Jerramiah T. Healy said of the public meeting on Monday.

The planned changes, according to officials, include a beefed-up CompStat program , a computer tracking system instituted in New York City in the 1990's to better understand crime patterns. Officials said versions of the program had been used previously in Jersey City but had not been effective.

"The average cop on the beat will have more information, post-CompStat, than he had before," said Lt. Thomas Comey, the police chief of staff, who said the system would give the police "real-time data" on criminal activity in the city.

"One day at a time, one block at a time, we will turn this city around," he said.

Officials commended the gang and narcotics divisions that had made thousands of arrests in the past year and a gun buyback program that has netted nearly 900 firearms.

The department's new Web site: njjcpd.org, was started on Monday. Forty-six new recruits are scheduled to join the department in April.

"We see our efforts turning the corner in 2006, " said the police chief, Robert Troy. "We see absolute success."

Officials also urged residents to report crimes and stay in contact with their police precincts. "The days of police doing it on our own are long since gone," Lieutenant Comey said.

While some residents said they were happy with the proposals, many others left the meeting skeptical and disappointed that they were not allowed to ask questions or voice complaints to the mayor and chief.

When asked what she thought of the meeting, Leila Haddad, the owner of Sweet Priscilla, a downtown coffee shop, scoffed. "Fluff," she said. "A feel-good P.R. piece."

She said she had noticed an increase in crime in the neighborhood over the past year or so, was fearful of being held up and said she was disappointed that there had not been a question-and-answer session.

A spokesman for the city, Stan Eason, said the meeting had not allowed questions for a reason. "If we opened it up, we knew we'd be there to 1 in the morning," he said, but added that officials planned to hold four question-and-answer sessions in the coming weeks .

Nilsa Rodriguez, a lifelong resident of the city and the owner of Subia's Cafe, said she had also grown concerned with recent holdups at businesses and said she had seen a decrease in police presence.

"You see no outreach at all," she said.

Officials say they are working to correct that. Their initiatives are now lumped together under a new slogan for the Police Department ? "Courtesy, Accountability, Respect and Excellence," or C.A.R.E.

Lieutenant Comey told the audience, "We want you to hold us accountable for what we do."

Mr. Healy predicted that the new efforts would significantly reduce crime within the next six months.

"We're doing the best we can," he said. "We know we need to do more."