By Tom Allon
The thought-provoking author Malcolm Gladwell wrote a book a number of years ago called “The Tipping Point.” It espoused the now-accepted theory that there is a defining stage at which something moves into a new realm, sort of like a “critical mass.”
I believe that New York may have reached a tipping point in crime reduction and it will take a lot of unlikely factors to drive the murder rate much higher.
This might be called wishful thinking, but I believe that because of a number of factors and vigilant policing we have seen the last of multiple murders each day in New York.
In the early 1990s, during the tail end of the crack epidemic, we witnessed an average of six murders a day in New York. This year we’re averaging less than one per day.
Demographic factors as a result of Roe v. Wade and a precipitous decrease in crack cocaine use are offered as one explanation of this downward trend. Proactive policing — where officers try to prevent crimes from occurring rather than reacting after they have been committed — is another important factor.
And then, of course, there is the ever-controversial police tactic called stop-and-frisk or, more accurately, stop, question and frisk.
In the past year, the use of this extremely charged tactic has dropped significantly, yet the murder rate has actually gone down. The public outcry about the overuse of stop-and-frisk seems to have led to fewer precincts demanding a certain number of these stops from its officers.
So now, as we await Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio’s choice for police commissioner, our collective hopes are that he is able to find someone wise and strong enough to keep crime low while using stop, question and frisk only when there is a legitimate concern that the person stopped is carrying a weapon.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Ray Kelly have done an outstanding job keeping New Yorkers safe from crime and terror for a dozen years. We all owe them a huge debt of gratitude.
But now it is almost time to pass the proverbial nightstick.
I believe that because of the work done by former Mayor David Dinkins and former City Council Speaker Peter Vallone Sr., who passed the Safe Streets, Safe City program in 1991, the path was laid for Mayor Rudy Giuliani and his commissioners to tame New York’s crime epidemic. This amazing turnaround was built upon by Bloomberg and Kelly, and we are now a much better city than two decades ago.
Let’s hope that a tipping point has been reached and that the Wild, Wild West of 1970s and ’80s New York never rears its ugly head again.
Tom Allon, president of City & State NY, was a Republican and Liberal Party-backed mayoral candidate in 2013 before he left to return to the private sector. Reach him at tallon@cityandstateny.com.
