by Shannon Chaffers
Amsterdam News Staff, Report for America Corps Member and Tandy Lau
June 12, 2025

The pandemic-era spike in gun violence pushed the issue front and center during New York City’s 2021 Democratic mayoral primary race. With rates of gun violence in the city declining in the last three years, issues like housing affordability and subway safety have commanded more attention this primary cycle. But the violence remains a key concern among residents of communities where it is concentrated, in under-resourced, largely Black and Brown neighborhoods that have faced decades of disinvestment.

… Jeffrey Butts, a professor at John Jay College who has studied CMS’s impact, said that research supports continued investment. But he said it is difficult to predict the exact effect an expansion would have on shooting rates, and that it would depend on the implementation. “The effect of an actual specific expansion is really hard to say, because it’s like [asking], ‘does teaching work?’ Well, sure, it can work, but there are a lot of people who claim to be teachers that aren’t very good, and it’s just really hard to nail all the details down,” he explained.

… Butts said he was skeptical of plans that prioritize hiring more officers over other public safety investments. “We tend to underfund everything and then believe that all problems can be solved by increasing police power,” he said. “If you think that part of public safety is reliable food supply, safe housing, neighborhoods that are active, people that have support for trying to raise children … then you start reducing the extent to which you think you need to hire police officers.”

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