Los Angeles is now one of the safest big cities in the nation. Once derided as the nation's capital of gang violence and imagined as a violent metropolis of drive-by shootings and rampant crime, L.A. has managed a dramatic turnaround.
According to statistics compiled by the Los Angeles Police Department, overall crime is down. But even more exciting is the big drop in the city's murder rate. In 2010, Los Angeles reported the lowest number of homicides since 1967 - when the city had 30 percent fewer people. There were 297 murders last year, way down from a peak of 1,092 killings in 1992.
L.A. is certainly not alone. Crime rates have significantly dropped in other major cities, such San Diego, Chicago and Detroit. Nobody can say for sure why crime is on the decline, but modern policing strategies, technological advances like DNA analysis and tougher sentencing laws have likely played a role.
And in Los Angeles, it's very likely that the remaking of the LAPD through reform and increased police hiring have played a role in the decline in crime. The LAPD is a larger, more efficient, modern and community-minded police agency than it was in the 1990s.
That's why there is so much at stake as Los Angeles and California struggle with a budget crisis that will further squeeze public safety dollars and force the public to make hard choices about where to put the diminishing resources.
In Los Angeles, that choice will come soon. In the coming months, there will be a legitimate debate between the City Council and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa over whether it makes sense to keep hiring cops while using police officers to fill vacant civilian LAPD jobs. And if the March 8 ballot measure that gives libraries more funding passes, it could force action right away.
But one thing should not be up for debate: Public safety is government's No. 1 priority. What good is regular trash pickup or Monday library hours when residents are afraid to leave their homes?
This will be an even more important question in the coming year as more criminals are put back on the streets. Strict sentencing laws have put more and more criminals in jail for longer periods. Yet, the state is under court order to reduce prison overcrowding and that could result in a mass inmate release. And those are inmates who have been largely warehoused in a violent environment, not rehabilitated, during their time in lockup. As well, Gov. Jerry Brown has indicated he will shift low-level offenders out of state prisons and into county jails, which have their own budget problems.
As city leaders strive to balance the budget in coming months, public safety, crime fighting and crime prevention should be the last services cut.
Angelenos can adjust in the short term to many reductions in city services. When the economy improves, the city can recover quickly from shortened library hours, from a delay in pothole repair and from parks gone raggedy. The city can't, however, rebound easily if criminals once again feel comfortable victimizing people in Los Angeles. And the public should never again have to adjust to living in the murder capital of the U.S.
