MPD should get tough, build ties

Here’s an uncomfortable fact. In order to reduce incidents of violent crime, aggressive policing must be implemented. Not thuggish or harassing policing, but aggressive policing nonetheless.

Another key is having more police walking the beat in crime-ridden areas so that they can begin to develop relationships and a level of trust with the beleaguered, law-abiding citizens who live there.

This is what the city of Milwaukee needs to keep in mind while it decides who should replace Ed Flynn as police chief and what approach it should adopt to fighting crime.

Consider the case of Baltimore. Last year Baltimore, a city of some 620,000, suffered a staggering total of 343 homicides.

Yet, this is by no means a national phenomenon. New York City, which has a population of 8.5 million, saw 290 homicides in 2017.

Keep in mind that both cities have had to withstand charges of police brutality against minorities. In the case of Baltimore, it was Freddie Gray who died from a spinal injury he sustained in a police van, whereas in New York City Eric Garner died from a police chokehold.

Neither of those situations reflected well on the police. But how the two cities responded in dealing with public safety going forward is revealing.

Baltimore’s police and city leadership decided to pull back in high-crime areas, afraid of being labeled racists or worse. New York City didn’t. Under the leadership of police chief William Bratton, and his successor, James P. O’Neill, both appointed by liberal mayor Bill de Blasio, New York has continued to be aggressive in confronting crime.

Baltimore has apparently seen the light. Its mayor just fired the city’s police commissioner and replaced him with the deputy commissioner, Darryl De Sousa, who said: “I have a real strong message for the trigger pullers. We’re coming after them.”

To act upon his pledge, De Sousa has started deploying more uniformed police on the streets, and reducing the number assigned to administrative duties.

Now there’s an idea.

To be sure, the city of Milwaukee’s murder rate is not as bad as Baltimore’s, but it’s also nothing to brag about. Milwaukee registered 124 murders in 2017, and that’s with a population of about 600,000. And, aside from murders, car jackings and other violent crimes in Milwaukee have skyrocketed.

Some may simply point to poverty as being the primary culprit and undoubtedly poverty plays a role in breeding crime. For instance, Milwaukee has a poverty rate of 28%, compared with New York City’s 20% rate. Still, that 8 percentage point difference can hardly begin to explain the almost exponential difference in homicides committed in the two cities on a per capita basis.

Whoever is chosen next to lead Milwaukee’s police force shouldn’t indiscriminately target people of color, but he or she also shouldn’t take the opposite approach of standing down. Both being aggressive in fighting crime and engaging the community are important. Doing one without the other won’t work.

If mayors like New York City’s de Blasio understand that, Mayor Tom Barrett and the Fire and Police Commission should understand it, as well.

Jay Miller is a tax attorney from Whitefish Bay and an adjunct professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Lubar School of Business.