Fear vs Facts: Local Elections

Binghamton and surrounding towns and cities face mayoral elections.

It’s time to ask: what are the biggest problems we face?  

Many of us might respond: COVID and our ranking last year as 52nd out of 62 counties on health measures?  Deep poverty and the lack of living wage jobs? A shortage of affordable housing and exploitative landlords and developers? Providing treatment amidst the opioid crisis?  Turning back the highest incarceration rate in the state?

What do the candidates offer us? Here is a start, thanks to WBNG, which started by asking Binghamton’s mayoral candidates.

Question: What are the biggest issues facing the city?

Kraham (Republican):  “The two biggest issues are crime and public safety”

Burns (Democrat): “the deterioration of a lot of our neighborhoods (and) we have a high crime rate”

Its fear vs facts here: there is no dramatic, rising crime rate.
The number of major (index) crimes for Binghamton has fallen over the last four years and stands where it was in 2016, as reported by the NY State. Among violent crimes, murders are down 75% and robberies by 45%. What of gun violence, aggressively touted by both candidates? If anything, it is well below the average of the last ten years. Here again are the official state figures for Binghamton:

And Police Reform?

Many large protests and community meetings in recent years have called for an end to yearly, large increases in funding the police and jail, and a transition to re-funding health and community services. Yet last year alone Binghamton’s police budget jumped by a million dollars.

Neither candidate addresses the call for police reform. Both are proud supporters of yet more funding and the current mayor’s use of reform to expand a highly racialized police force.  Indeed, more unaccountable, and racially unequal policing, surveillance and incarceration is seemingly on order:

Kraham: I’m proud to have the endorsement of the Binghamton Police union, who’ve recognized my track record… I think what we should be doing is adding resources to make sure our police officers have the resources they need… increase the number of cops we have on any given shift, which means adding more police officers.

Burns: I support the police department, 100%; anything the chief has asked for on city council I have voted yes for…. I don’t believe in defunding the police and I have no intention of doing that…. My voting record on city council is the exact opposite…. We opened up the Crime Analysis Center at the city. I’m in favor of that. I was on the police collaborative and we did a lot of work on that. We passed it and I voted for it.

We will doubtlessly hear of more fear in the months to come.