Newark, N.J., Public Safety Director Resigns Post

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(TNS) — Newark Mayor Ras J. Baraka named his fourth public safety director in eight years on Tuesday, choosing longtime city police officer and chief to replace an outsider who resigned last week two years after the mayor hired him.

The new director is Emanuel Miranda, a 23-year veteran and the outgoing chief of the Division of Police, which Baraka paired with the city’s fire department in 2016 to create the Department of Public Safety, with a civilian director in charge of both.

Miranda, who will also oversee the city’s office of emergency management, replaces Fritz Fragé, whom Baraka named public safety director in July 2022, the same year Fragé retired as a lieutenant colonel with the New Jersey State Police, where he had spent the bulk of his law enforcement career.

In an announcement of the leadership changes on Tuesday, Baraka praised Miranda for his service to the police force, though he said little about Fragé’s leadership or why he resigned.

“The City of Newark is pleased to welcome Emanuel Miranda, Sr., as its new Public Safety Director, following the resignation of former Public Safety Director Fritz Fragé, who served in the role for the past two years,” Baraka said in a statement on Tuesday. “Director Miranda, Newark’s former chief of police, brings 23 years of effectively safeguarding our city’s diverse community to skillfully guiding the Department of Public Safety.”

Baraka also announced that Deputy Director for Police Operations Sharonda Morris would replace Miranda as chief of police, the highest-ranking uniformed officer on the force. Police Captain Leonardo Carrillo moves into Morris’s deputy director job.

Fragé could not be reached for comment.

Asked when and why Frage was leaving, Newark Communications Director Crystal Rosa said in an email that the outgoing director announced his resignation internally on Nov. 4, effective this Friday.

“After much reflection, Fragé felt it was the right time for him to step aside and allow a new leader to continue the work of advancing public safety in Newark,” Rosa said. “We thank him for his service; he did a great job, and our numbers are proof of that. The fact that our homicide rate is at the lowest it’s been in 63 years is testament to his positive impact on the city.”

Fragé was named director following an unusual leadership change in mid-2022, after his predecessor, Brian O’Hara, was moved to the newly created post of deputy mayor for public safety. O’Hara then vacated the post, leaving Newark to take the police chief’s job in Minneapolis.

As director, Fragé presided over two consecutive years of declining murders and other violent crimes in Newark in 2022 and 2023.

Last spring, Fragé joined a federally appointed monitor, former New Jersey Attorney General Peter Harvey, to announce the police division’s continued progress in complying with court-ordered police reformsunder a consent decree intended to curb years of excessive force and civil rights abuses.

But Fragé was also viewed as remote from rank-and-file officers. He had been on the job for a year when a ship fire at Port Newark in July 2023 killed two firefighters and exposed the department as ill-equipped and unprepared for such a blaze.

Newark’s first public safety director was Anthony Ambrose, who served from 2016 to 2021 after decades as a Newark police officer and Essex County chief of detectives.

Ambrose said Fragé’s biggest challenge may have been his outsider status when he took the job, which has a steep learning curve and little time to master it.

“An outsider usually has a tough time here,” Ambrose told NJ Advance Media. “I think Fritz navigated it pretty good for the two and half years he was here, but an insider is always accepted by the rank and file.”

“Someone new coming from the outside, they have to learn the organization. They have to learn the people and their needs,” he said. “They have to learn the politics.”

The head of Newark’s police union agreed.

“Not coming up through the ranks of the Newark Police Department, it took him a little time to get his feet wet,” said the union leader, Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 12 President Jeffrey Webber. “I think during that time a lot of opportunities were missed.”

Looking ahead, Webber applauded the choice of Newark native Miranda to replace Fragé.

“He’s held every position in the Newark Police Department,” Webber said. “He’s known as a very hard worker. He’s got a good feel for the men and women of the department.”

“I know during his time as the chief, he always made himself available to me,” Webber added. “He always assisted when he could, and when there were things that we couldn’t agree on, he was professional enough to discuss the differences and not dance around them.”