Our Accomplishments

In 2000 CCOP Presented the Vision for Camden's Recovery; Rosa Ramirez, Rev. Phillip Hirsch, Fr. Bob McDermott and Larraine Johnson on the steps of Christus Lutheran

We are making a difference, in over 24 years of organizing we have:

• Won commitments from City Officials to build the first city park in the Bergen Square Neighborhood
• Opened a new Community Garden in Cramer Hill
• Demolished an abandoned police sub-station that had become a magnet for drugs and graffiti
• Stabilized a hazardous property that neighborhood a local elementary school and church
• Pressed and won new police leadership and new policing strategies to improve public safety in Camden
• Created a new $8 million Camden Home Improvement Program (CHIP) that is providing grants to approximately 300 Camden homeowners to upgrade their properities
• Proclaimed a Vision for the Recovery of Camden that eventually led to passage of the CAMDEN RECOVERY ACT in the New Jersey legislature.  The initiative has brought more than $200 million in new resources, along with new structures of leadership to put Camden on the road to recovery
• Sealed 2,000 vacant buildings and demolished over 750 hazardous units all across the city - and reduced crime connected with those buildings
• Secured a commitment of $2.7 million from Governor Whitman to support the development of over 500 new units of housing by our non-profit housing partners
• Won a $3.2 million annual discount (Community Host Benefit Agreement) on CCMUA bills for Camden residents, small businesses and non-profits in 1994 that has kept more than $40 million (and counting) in Camden over the past 14 years
• Brought police sub-stations into Cramer Hill and a mini-station in East Camden
• Worked with the County Prosecutor and Camden Police Department to establish a pilot community-oriented policing program
• Won the development of a community park in South Camden
• Secured $240,000 worth of improvements to Dudley Grange Park
• Addressed a serious air pollution problem in South Camden
• Eliminated an abestos threat in South Camden
• Secured the demolition of a dangerous vacant warehouse in East Camden
• Addressed a water contamination concern in Cramer Hill
• Brought a streetsweeper route to Whitman Park
• Replaced stolen sewer grates in Cramer Hill
• Organized neighborhood clean-ups across the city
• Organized a citywide baseball league for our youth