Last year, the city of Newark, New Jersey reported its first murder-free month in 44 years. This was a milestone of victory along a trail that has seen consistent improvement in the city for the past four years. Since 2007, when the PrayForNewark initiative began to join with local intercessors in a concentrated effort, things have begun to change significantly. Since that time, the news about Newark transformed from being almost entirely negative to being almost entirely positive. Let's look at some of that encouraging news now.
The long term trend in crime in Newark remains downward. In 1995, Newark had about 4000 crimes per 100,000 residents, according to FBI statistics. Last year, the same “uniform crime index” was less than 1000 crimes per 100,000 residents. A 75% drop in total crime is pretty impressive. There have been a lot of people praying in Newark in the past couple decades, including an active Clergy Council, 800 churches, street pastors, etc. Only the Lord knows how much they have prayed and how their prayers have contributed to this 75% drop in crime.
The intermediate trend in crime is down. According to the current crime statistics posted on the Newark Police Website, total crime is down 5% in the past 4 years—the year PrayForNewark started and Harvest Evangelism/ITN did their first event with Chief Jay Swallow. During the past 48 months, the NPD says murders are down 17%. This evidence supports the belief that the Newark street adoption effort added to the prayers of the saints that were already occurring since the time when Newark was the “most dangerous city in America” (according to a 1996 article in Money Magazine). In addition, no Newark police officers have been killed in the line of duty since PrayForNewark began four years ago.
The short term trend in crime is unfortunately up, as this Star-Ledger article recently pointed out. Though crime in the first quarter of 2011 was notably higher than in the same period last year, this is hardly surprising. For one thing, Newark made international news last year when it had its first “murder free month” in 44 years. Consequently, any murders at all in March of 2011 would indicate an exponential increase in homicides compared with a base of 0. The first quarter of 2010 was hardly a reasonable basis of comparison for quarter-over-quarter results, especially since as the graph in this more recent article shows, there has been a four-year reduction, despite the short term increase. Secondly, Newark has a $100 Million budget deficit this year and had to lay off 167 policemen. When you cut police officers by 15% in Newark, crime goes up. Four years ago crime decreased when the city hired more police officers. This relationship highlights the common-sense fact that multiple factors contribute to crime rates—police manpower is one, but fortunately prayer is another. No one can promise that crime will go to 0 when 100% of streets in a city are bathed in prayer because our God isn’t a “vending machine.” Rather than rewarding us in strict proportion to our efforts, He’s a loving God who blesses us more than we could ever expect.
Despite what some may be saying, the transformation of Newark continues to accelerate on many fronts in 2011. For example:
Last week Newark Mayor Cory Booker and NJ Governor Chris Christie had their pictures on the front cover of Time Magazine as 2 of the “100 most influential people in the world” for this year. Booker was the only U.S. Mayor, and Christie the only U.S. Governor, to make the “100 most influential” list. The writeup about Booker pointed out his remarkable accomplishments in crime reduction, as well as his current thrust in education.
Last week U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan spoke in the city and stated that Newark is poised to be a national model of school reform.
Last month Panasonic announced that they are relocating their U.S. headquarters to downtown Newark—one block from where the North American Conference is being held in July. This will bring an estimated 800 jobs and $220 million of tax revenues to Newark over the next 10 years, as well as serving as an anchor for other new businesses in the city. During the competitive bidding process, Panasonic decided to select Newark over alternative sites in Brooklyn, Atlanta, Chicago, and California.
In March the NCAA held its Eastern Region Men’s Basketball championship games at the Prudential Center—which was the 11th largest general purpose arena in the U.S. in 2010, based on ticket sales.
Just last week, the City of Chicago announced that their new Chief of Police will be Garry McCarthy, who has been the Police Director in Newark since 2006. The team who selected McCarthy stated that he was far and away the best qualified candidate they had to replace their outgoing Chief of Police.
Newark clearly has an amazing divine destiny, and its recent resurgence is not a statistical aberration, but rather signs of favor as the leaders of the city sow into its spiritual destiny. The Hopeful Signs mentioned above are showing the world that the transformation of Newark is real, and this is giving hope to cities and nations around the world. Yet as encouraging as these signs are, our ultimate focus is not crime statistics, job growth, or school test scores, but rather city transformation and the elimination of systemic poverty. We must continue to press on, confident that the Lord will show us greater things as we listen to what He is instructing us to do - and that is to continue to pray for Newark. Pray not only that crime will continue to go down, but that tangible marketplace transformation will occur on every level.
