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The phoenix of New Jersey?: The mayor has a practical vision for a long-neglected city (The Economist, 2/08/07)

Mr Booker is proposing a sweeping package of ethics legislation, though he admits much of his time is spent on damage control. He inherited a fiscal nightmare. Mr James boasted of a $30m surplus before he left office and promised a 5% cut in property taxes. State auditors then discovered there was no surplus, but instead a $44m deficit. So Mr Booker had little choice but to raise property taxes almost immediately. He still delivered Newark's budget on time on January 12th, a first in almost 20 years.

Mr Booker is overseeing a lot of firsts. One of his top priorities is to make crime-ridden Newark safe so he can attract more residents and jobs. Last month he and Garry McCarthy, his police director, unveiled a new crime initiative. For the first time, Newark will have a centralised intelligence-gathering narcotics division. Drugs have been openly sold on city streets for decades, but fears of police corruption prevented a programme before now.

Guns are cheap and plentiful and even available to rent by the day. Mr Booker recently joined the Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition, formed by Michael Bloomberg, New York's crime-fighting mayor, to help get them off the streets. A video surveillance programme, with gunshot detection technology, will soon be ready. Still, the year is barely a month old and the murder count in Newark, a city of 280,000, is already at 12. The 2006 death toll of 104 was the highest in over a decade. The murders are overshadowing the progress being made to make Newark a safer city, but overall crime is down 35%. Shootings, robberies and car thefts experienced double-digit drops.

Mr Booker is also working on Newark's long-term growth and development. He is trying to rationalise the archaic city zoning rules by creating a new Planning Department. He is talking to national retailers about opening branches in Newark, long ignored by major chains and department stores. There's a long way to go: but at last something seems to be happening.