It’s such a weird time to demonize America’s cities when things like this are happening:
In 2021, shortly after starting his first term, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott (D) rolled out a comprehensive plan to reduce gun violence in a city that had long been troubled by one of the deadliest homicide rates in the nation.
The strategy was to approach gun violence as a public health threat instead of simply a crime issue and to treat that threat at the source by investing in violence interrupters, community organizations and trauma-informed support systems in impacted neighborhoods. The plan’s goal: reduce shootings by 15 percent every year for five years.
Now four years in, Scott said, the plan is working.
As of July 1, 68 people in Baltimore had died by homicide this year, the fewest during the first six months of the year in more than five decades. It marks a nearly 23 percent decrease compared with the first half of 2024. Shootings where nobody was killed have also fallen by nearly 20 percent compared with the same time period last year. The falling statistics, mirroring a national drop in violent crime, follow years of similar declines.
“Everybody plays a part,” Scott said in an interview. “Yes, I’m the mayor. Yes, I had to come up with and deliver this plan. But none of it works without every single one of our partners.”
Among them, the mayor said, are the 40 or so employees of the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement; the dozens of people who work as violence interrupters with the city’s flagship gun violence reduction program, Safe Streets; the Baltimore Police Department; the Baltimore City State’s Attorney’s Office; the U.S. attorney’s office and the Office of the Maryland Attorney General.
“But most importantly,” Scott said, “the folks in the community.”
It’s not just Baltimore but his administration has done a particularly good job. I don’t hear much about this though. In fact, all we hear is that America’s big cities are nothing but expensive shitholes. Well, they are too expensive but they aren’t shitholes and at least some of it can be attributed to excellent Democratic mayors like Brandon Scott. (He also happens to be one of those Democrats who represents that generational change everyone says they want…) It’s a good story and someone ought to tell it.