This new ranking confirms allegations by cop posters that Byron is hiding real crime stats in Bflo
http://www.buffalonews.com/incoming/article263278.ece
Crime rankings put city in unenviable spot
Data casts Buffalo as 17th most dangerous place to live.
By Sandra Tan and Brian Meyer News Staff Reporters
Published:November 24, 2010, 07:42 AM
Related audio
Mayor Brown and Commissioner Derenda discuss crime rankings
Updated: November 24, 2010, 08:26 AM
The City of Buffalo now cracks the Top 20 list for most dangerous cities in America, while the Town of Amherst remains one of the safest communities.
The rankings, newly released by CQ Press and based on 2009 crime data, show that Buffalo has gone from the 27th most dangerous city in the country to 17th -- by far the city's worst rating since the rankings were first published in 1995. No other municipality in the state fared so poorly this year.
View the CQ Press report here. http://os.cqpress.com/citycrime/2010...e2010-2011.htm
The rankings list Amherst as the nation's sixth-safest city, a comedown from its second-place ranking last year. The town remains No. 1 as safest city in America among municipalities with populations of 100,000 to 499,000.
"City" is a term used in the rankings to apply to municipalities with populations greater than 75,000.
According to a CQ Press news release, the crime-rate rankings of the cities and metropolitan areas are calculated using six crime categories: murder, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary and motor vehicle theft. The categories have been used to determine crime rankings for cities since 1999.
Mayor Byron W. Brown dismissed the latest crime rankings and how Buffalo is reflected. "We don't place much stock in those figures whatsoever," Brown told reporters at a news conference in Police Headquarters. "In fact, criminologists have been very clear in cautioning against use of those figures."
Overall crime dropped by 11.1 percent between 2005 and 2009, city officials said. Police Commissioner Daniel Derenda said violent crime is down by 6 percent from last year's figures, adding that preliminary numbers for the current year show a similar decline.
Meanwhile, Amherst Police Chief John C. Askey said he was happy with the town's latest ranking and gave credit to the town's police officers, elected leaders and the public for their continuing support. "I think it's a great indicator of the quality of life that the citizens of Amherst enjoy a safe community," he said.
Askey said that while Amherst is not immune to the nation's economic struggles, it's doing better than many other locations. For instance, Amherst has more residents who are well educated and employed, and that makes it easier to keep crime levels down, he said.
Buffalo, by contrast, has seen a steady worsening of its crime rating year after year. In addition, city homicides so far this year -- 51 -- are the highest they have been since 2007. In the City Crime Rankings publication, Buffalo ranked 28th most dangerous overall two years ago, 27th most dangerous last year and 17th most dangerous this year. . . . .
stan@buffnews.com ; bmeyer@buffnews.comnull
Just like UB which repeatedly questions the value of rankings by US News etc that document its plunge down the rankings of American universities without explaining the flaws in the report Mayor Brown disparaged this report without explaining the defects in it.
WOW, you didn't blame it on Collins... i'm impressed!Originally Posted by grump
"I know you guys enjoy reading my stuff because it all makes sense. "
Dumbest post ever! Thanks for the laugh PO!
This could be a constructive response to the rise in Bflo's violent crime.
However, after appointing a less-than-qualified new police commissioner, Byron also appears to be stonewalling this new citizen police review commission.
Not good . . .
From today's BfloNews:
http://www.buffalonews.com/city/article266608.ece
Panel to assess police issues
Last outside review was done in ’90s
By Brian Meyer NEWS STAFF REPORTER
Published:November 27, 2010, 12:00 AM Updated: 06:26 AM
Two former police commissioners, a former Erie County Sheriff and an East Side activist who has been critical of Buffalo police will be included in a new commission that will spend a year charting the future of Buffalo’s Police Department.
The president of the city’s police union also is expected to be active on a panel that could review issues ranging from staffing levels and a possible return to precincts, to new strategies for community policing.
The Joint Police Reorganization Commission will conduct the first outside review of departmental operations since a similar panel recommended changes nearly two decades ago.
Among the most recognizable names on the new panel are H. McCarthy Gipson, whose four-year stint as police commissioner ended in 2009 when Mayor Byron W. Brown decided to replace him.
Richard T. Donovan, who was the last police commissioner appointed by former Mayor James D. Griffin, also will serve on a panel that could swell to 25 members.
Former Erie County Sheriff Thomas F. Higgins also will serve on the commission.
Gipson, Donovan and Higgins will lend “enormous credibility” to the panel’s final recommendations, said South Council Member Michael P. Kearns, a lead sponsor of the resolution that created the Joint Police Reorganization Commission. Other members will include neighborhood leaders, housing advocates and officials from academia. The Council is expected to finalize all appointments in the coming days.
The resolution also calls for the mayor to appoint four people to the panel. However, the Brown administration has yet to announce any appointments or even indicate whether it plans to participate.
“It’s important that we look at our Police Department with fresh sets of eyes,” Kearns said. “We can’t be afraid to have an independent look at the department. We can’t afford to bury our heads in the sand.”
Each of the city’s nine lawmakers has two appointments to the panel. Kearns appointed Higgins and Donovan. Council President David A. Franczyk appointed community activist Darnell Jackson and Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority Commissioner Joseph Mascia.
“A full airing on public safety is a good idea,” Franczyk said. “I think the Police Department is our most important department, and it’s good to step back and ask ‘how are we doing?’ ”
A retired Buffalo police detective who sits on the Council appointed Gipson to the commission. Gipson’s “rise through the police ranks” gives him a unique perspective, Niagara representative David A. Rivera said. “He’s a professional who did a good job while he was there,” Rivera said of Gipson. “He lends a lot of credibility and expertise to the process.”
Police manpower levels will be an issue, all three city lawmakers agreed. When the last reorganization was proposed in the early 1990s, Buffalo’s police force hovered around 1,000 officers. The city now has fewer than 770 officers, including some who have been off work because of injuries, according to data released this summer by city budget officials.
Rivera said he’s hoping the commission’s work will include a comparison of police manpower levels in Buffalo and similar cities.
Kearns said he also would like the panel to at least consider the pros and cons of the previous departmental structure that included neighborhood precincts. In the mid-1990s, Buffalo consolidated police operations, replacing 14 neighborhood precincts with five district stations, with officials insisting that the change would place more officers on the streets while reducing overhead.
Several months ago, Commissioner Daniel Derenda told the Common Council he believes the precinct set-up is more effective. “I was never in agreement with the district strategy,” Derenda told lawmakers.
But the mayor was quick to say that a return to neighborhood precincts is impractical for budgetary reasons. “Fiscally, right now, it’s not going to happen,” Brown said.
Derenda has been invited to serve as an ex-officio member of the new reorganization panel. No elected officials will serve on the commission. Other Council appointees to the panel include: H. Wayne Gerhart, Richard Raines, James J. Sobol, Lesley Haynes, Anthony Lebrun, Cliff Braxton, Terry O’Neill, Linwood Roberts and Ricky M. Allen Sr.
As the third poorest city in the country do these stats really surprise anyone??? For chrissakes, Amherst is not poor and so they don't have the same crime problem?? *gasp* I'm shocked!
As poor as Buffalo is I'm surprised the stats aren't worse. Besides (not that this is an absolution), how many of the crimes are related to illegal activity to begin with?
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