By Maya Rao
The Philadelphia Inquirer
TRENTON, N.J. — Criminal enterprises will flourish in one of America’s poorest and most dangerous cities — and reach into neighboring towns — if plans to lay off half the police force take effect, a Camden police union leader told lawmakers Monday.
“All hell will break loose,” Fraternal Order of Police lodge president John Williamson testified at a hearing of the Assembly Law and Public Safety Committee.
Up to 180 officers could lose their jobs if the city cannot negotiate concessions in contracts to help plug a $28 million budget deficit.
Public-safety leaders depicted a similarly grim picture of the recession’s effects on police departments statewide. About 170 police officers are on the chopping block in Newark. Trenton will lose 111. In Atlantic City, 40 officers just lost their jobs.
In all, 2,521 fewer police officers are working in New Jersey than there were in January 2009, union leader Anthony Wieners told the Assembly panel.
Layoffs and attrition through retirement have led to a 12 percent drop in police forces, said Wieners, president of the New Jersey State Policeman’s Benevolent Association.
Assemblyman Jon Bramnick (R., Union) repeatedly pressed speakers to suggest solutions, but problems dominated the discussion.
Union leaders predicted that the result of further layoffs would be reduced response times and higher crime rates. Police would be at higher risk with fewer colleagues available for backup. Investigators would focus on shootings and murders but no longer would have the time or numbers to pursue burglaries and smaller crimes.
Gang members in Newark already are rejoicing over the cuts by donning T-shirts with the date of the layoffs, said Derrick Hatcher, president of that city’s FOP lodge.
Gov. Christie is pushing the Legislature to adopt changes in how police and fire union contracts are negotiated. The Assembly and Senate are considering proposals that would limit raises awarded through binding arbitration at the level of a 2 percent tax cap that takes effect in January.
Arbitration is a key piece of Christie’s plan to reduce the state’s highest-in-the-nation property taxes. Public-safety salaries generally are the largest portion of a municipal budget.
Bill Lavin, president of the New Jersey Firefighters Mutual Benevolent Association, questioned whether police officers and firefighters who agree to concessions in their contracts should fall within the cap, saying, “Safety is not free.”
In Camden, the Police Department has a budget deficit of nearly $14 million.
If negotiations are unsuccessful, the city plans to lay off between 150 and 180 of the city’s approximately 375 police officers in addition to 77 firefighters and 150 other employees. The cuts, described as a worst-case scenario, equal more than a third of Camden’s unionized workforce.
Williamson said he had asked the city whether there would be a guarantee that no one would be laid off if the union agreed to all the concessions sought, and was offered none.
“At what point do we draw the line?” he asked.
The union president said the department would be moving backward after the recent addition of about 50 officers to a historically understaffed force.
Meanwhile, he added, the threat of layoffs has sent morale “down the tubes.”
City spokesman Robert Corrales said in a written statement that Mayor Dana L. Redd neither wants nor favors layoffs, and the number could be minimized if unions agree on “meaningful concessions.”
He added that nonuniformed employees had made significant sacrifices by furloughs, and that even if every nonuninformed city employee were laid off, Camden would still run a deficit.
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