From Governor Malloy:
Governor Dannel P. Malloy highlighted the release today of the FBI’s Crime in the United States 2013 report, which shows that Connecticut had one of the largest decreases in violent crimes and property crimes in the nation.
According to the report, the state saw a 10.1% decrease in violent crime in 2013, compared to a 4.4% average decrease nationally. Additionally, Connecticut saw an 8% decrease in property crime over the year, compared to a 4.1% national drop. The number of reported violent crimes in the state is the lowest since 1977, and property crime the lowest since 1967.
“As the release of these national statistics today show, Connecticut is making sustained progress in crime reduction,” Governor Malloy said. “Our approach prioritizes violent crime and is based on state-of-the-art risk assessment tools. We credit our success to close collaboration between local, state and federal agencies. We also have an extraordinary array of community-based non-profits committed to prevention, especially among at-risk youth. These partnership efforts are working, and preliminary statistics are showing that this trend is continuing into 2014. Connecticut’s hardworking law enforcement professionals are making real change in our communities.”
Perhaps you remember the story of the confused homeowner who sat in his kitchen with his head in his freezer and his feet in the heated oven. On average his temperature was normal. Kind of ridiculous but it depends where and when you report the measurements, doesn’t it?
So about the Bridgeport Police Department, what do we know about it in the past several years? Well it has its own publicist. And it has four or five deputy chiefs. And it had about the same number of officers with rank as it had officers without rank. It also had a contractual change that allowed most active police officers today to get pension benefits through the CT MERF program that counts your highest three years’ earnings as your base for monthly income percentage. (But we did not hear how that is being paid for, did we, by the Mayor, the publicist or the investigative reporting of the CT Post.) And by looking at the CAFRs (external audits) for the past four years we discover that overtime appropriations have been overspent by millions in those years. What about crime? Have to leave that to the FBI? Time will tell.