The next day, the city's biggest civic group, Camden Churches Organized for People, issued an urgent news release, but the takeover wasn't mentioned. Instead, the group announced a rally to celebrate the demolition of two abandoned houses.
Legally disenfranchised during the takeover, citizens and activist groups who once helped to shape this hard-luck city have abandoned any coordinated attack on Camden's power structure. They instead focus on small, winnable neighborhood projects, content to watch from the sidelines as Camden's government is reshuffled.
"People are just beaten down," said Tom Knoche, a Rutgers-Camden urban politics professor who was once one of the city's most renowned community organizers. He now lives in a nearby suburb.
"They're just not engaged. And they generally believe that their participation does not matter very much."
CCOP members lobbied for the $175 million that came to Camden with the takeover law, and then they lobbied for changes to the law. But with this fight to rescind the law, they stayed home, taking a conciliatory, wait-and-see approach to the new mayor, Dana Redd, and the governor-elect, Christopher J. Christie.
"We have to try to build a relationship with them, try to work with them and go from there," said Rosa Ramirez, a leader of CCOP.
Activists say they don't expect the pie, or even half the pie. They'll take a sliver - two knocked-down buildings, for example, in a city of blight.
"Why bang your head against the wall? You're only going to have a headache," said Marianna Emanuele, coordinator of the group Camden United. "We have energy, and we still believe in what we do, but we want to focus that energy . . . even if we don't shift anything major."
'The people's champ'
Emanuele said the 2007 imprisonment of Ali Sloan El, an opposition City Council member convicted of corruption, was a blow to the activist community. He had filed one of three lawsuits against the takeover.
