Empowering Communities to Become Co-Producers of Public Safety: The Newark Public Safety Collaborative

• In Event: Rutgers at 50: The Evolution and Impact of Police and Community Research

Abstract

Most community policing efforts of the past share a common characteristic: the leading role of police agencies having control over both the message and the data that informs public safety priorities. These priorities, however, do not necessarily align with community expectations. The novelty brought by the Newark Public Safety Collaborative (NPSC), an anchor organization housed at the Rutgers School of Criminal Justice, is the co-production of public safety by multiple community organizations, local government agencies, and police working together towards a mutually agreed production of community safety. The result is Data-Informed Community Engagement, an innovative approach to public safety with data and analytics at the core of a collaborative effort in which organizations with diverse priorities and objectives can achieve results that would not be attainable had these organizations acted alone. This collaborative effort has helped to level the playing field between the community and the police, with no organization or group expected to lead over others, helping build trust but also sharing responsibilities in the co-production of sustainable solutions to the most pressing public safety problems.

Author

• Alejandro Gimenez Santana, Rutgers University