Numbers give Walsh some political ammo
Crime drop counters Tito’s claims
Plan on an upbeat Marty Walsh rubbing the latest crime stats in opponent Tito Jackson’s face this morning when the mayor makes his monthly appearance on Boston Herald Radio.
Just last week Councilor Jackson hinted on Herald Radio he might go in a different direction in policing if he becomes mayor — code for: Boston’s top cop Bill Evans will be out of a job in a Jackson administration.
Walsh received data just last night to prove Evans is keeping our city safe with homicides down 45 percent, compared to this time last year.
Rape and attempted rapes are also down 19 percent; aggravated assault dropped 11 percent; all violent crime fell by 6 percent.
As for property crime, that’s down, too, by 13 percent, as are total arrests — down 16 percent.
Robbery and burglary did climb, by 7 and 13 percent respectively.
The data was collected from Jan. 1 to March 26, the mayor’s office told me.
These are pie charts any mayor in a re-election season can embrace. It comes as Jackson questions the leadership at BPD. Last week he told me, “I would choose leadership that is going to ensure accountability, is going to increase the solve rate that, as I’ve noted before, is 4 percent for non-fatal shootings.”
Jackson continues to demand that all city cops wear body cameras and push this pilot program into a fully enforced policy by all police in the city.
The mayoral race finally started to gain some steam last week when Jackson questioned leadership among Boston’s finest. The mayor was livid and so was the man who had a bull’seye on his back — Evans.
Clearly, the brass is fighting back by releasing this data as a reminder that Evans is the right guy to keep our streets safe.
Quality policing is a focal point of every administration and challengers will always try to poke holes. This might just not be the year to throw cops into the political ring when they appear to be doing their jobs pretty darn well.