Bishop Willie Billips, right, and his assistant Brother Jose Vella stand outside Faith, Hope and Charity Church of God in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, Monday, Dec. 30, 2013, in New York, after hanging donated clothing on the fence. Billips, 51, a Brownsville native who specializes in working with gang members, credits New York Police Chief Ray Kelly and police commanders and police commanders with teaming up with the clergy and community activists in the neighborhood to try to curb crime. But year-end boasts by Mayor Michael Bloomberg that New York is the safest big city in America ring hollow in Brownsville, a neighborhood of entrenched gang violence that has proven stubbornly immune to strategies that have pushed crime to historic lows across the rest of the city. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)