The Murdertown USA label hung over the city throughout the year as state legislators; Attorney General Matt Denn put pressure on the city and Mayor Dennis Williams, a former policeman.
Pressure built on the state to take action as major employers began to hear concerns from workers in downtown worried about their safety.
Also emerging as an issue was an election year in 2016 with a host of candidates running against the mayor whose administration has been under fire since he entered office.
There were fears that the momentum that was beginning to be seen in downtown as more residential units were constructed would be threatened by a growing national reputation as a violent city.
Williams and others in the city railed against the negative publicity brought on by the Murdertown USA article that appeared in Newsweek in late 2014.
The story quickly went “viral” in Delaware and was shared tens and perhaps hundreds of thousands of times in E-mail links and social media.
Hollywood even got involved, with ABC-TV ordering a pilot TV show carrying the Murdertown name. Residents and business leaders were outraged, although a few saw an opportunity for acting jobs in a city where a lack of economic opportunity contributes to gun-related violence among young people.
Education was in the mix, with school boundaries changed and a commission working to improve the performance of students living in the city. Areas of the city have been part of four school districts, a remnant of a desegregation order that has since ended.
Meanwhile, the Legislature and Gov. Jack Markell ordered the formation of a commission to come up with recommendations on dealing with the city’s high homicide rate.
Williams, alternating between acceptance and defiance, denounced some of the findings of the group that studied staffing issues at the Police Department, surveillance cameras that did not work, the lack of a homicide unit and other issues.
Williams went on to announce that the city was following 90 percent of the recommendations of the study commission and touted his crime-fighting strategy.
Still, the Police Department remained an enigma. Well staffed by the standards of many small cities, the department still sees staff shortages that lead to county officers and state troopers filling in at various times.
Williams’ actions took a curious turn late in the year when the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee authorized $2 million ($1.5 million for Wilmington and $500,000 for Dover) to fund additional officers.
However, the Wilmington mayor bristled at demands for the Attorney General to receive information on police deployments in the city.
The City Council, in a 10-0 vote, urged the Williams administration to provide the information. Instead, Williams claimed the state was attempting a takeover of the department.
Left unanswered was the reason for Williams not providing the information.
There were whispers of only a few police being on the streets at given times, due to staffing issues and a police bureaucracy not geared to putting more officers on the streets.
Both Williams and Attorney General Denn expressed hope that a resolution could be reached on the additional officers.
