WESTERLO — Dennis C. Smith, a husband and father who loved to travel and also a long-time New York University faculty member and criminal justice scholar credited with reducing crime in New York City, died on Monday, July 27, in Manhattan. He was 69.

Dr. Smith was born to Charles Smith and Ruth (née Speed) Smith, in Chicago in 1945.

He earned his Ph.D. in political science from Indiana University. He began teaching at NYU in 1974, and taught public policy and management of government and not-for-profit agencies, receiving tenure in 1980. He directed the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service program in public administration for nine years and served as associate dean for two years. 

Dr. Smith was also the Professor in Residence in the New York State Assembly Internship Program for 10 years, and he taught in Albany.

He lived in Arkansas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico before settling in New York, said his daughter, Marissa Smith.

Dr. Smith and his wife, Diane Baillargeon, married in 1985. They lived in Manhattan and also in their home in Westerlo, which they purchased the same year, his daughter said.

“They lived in Manhattan while in NYU,” she said. “He was teaching right up until he passed away.”

Dr. Smith died after being treated for esophageal cancer that was diagnosed two years ago.

Professional life  

In 2013, Dr. Smith, as an associate professor of public policy at the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at NYU, took the stand as New York City’s expert witness in a class-action lawsuit that challenged the constitutionality of “stop-and-frisk” police tactics, according to Dr. Smith’s obituary provided by NYU.  Smith contended that the practice had a strong crime-deterrent effect, the school stated.

In the opinion section of the June 4, 2015 edition of The New York Times, Dr. Smith wrote, “The voices of the critics will have overwhelmed those of public housing residents and other city neighborhoods who have been the prime beneficiaries of the record crime decline, who are calling for more, not less, police protection. There are real problems with these approaches that must be fixed, but abandoning them is not the answer.”  

Dr. Smith’s opinion was guided by his research, the school stated; Dr. Smith focused his research on policing.  For the last 25 years, he focused on public safety policies, and the use of data in driving crime down — in his research, Dr. Smith found that police had reduced crime in New York City by moving from reacting to incidents to preventing crimes from occurring through “performance-based management,” the school stated.

Personal life

Although he grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, “My dad was a New Yorker, through and through,” said Dr. Smith’s daughter, Sabrina Smith-Sweeney.

“He absolutely loved Tony Hillerman books,” she said, because Hillerman used language that depicted Albuquerque sunsets and settings the way Dr. Smith remembered them.

Dr. Smith liked to reminisce about his “rough and tumble roots,” such as when he worked at the Duke City Drive-In with his brother; they were held up at gunpoint and made to lie on the ground, Smith-Sweeney said.

“My dad wasn’t going to let this go,” she said. Dr. Smith reported the crime, she said.

“One of them was wearing argyle socks. They actually did a line-up of socks. My dad identified the socks of two robbers,” Ms. Smith-Sweeney said. “Whenever he wanted to tell stories of his brave youth, he would tell that one.”

Dr. Smith also enjoyed biographies and American history; he read about every American president, Ms. Smith-Sweeney said. Dr. Smith also liked old movies, including Westerns, she said.

“He was going to be a Major League baseball player,” Ms. Smith-Sweeney said of her father’s early dreams. He made sure that each of his grandchildren had baseball gloves “as soon as they could say the word ‘ball,’ ” she said.

“He loved travel,” said his daughter, Marissa Smith. “He took small teaching jobs so we could travel with him in summers. His passport is pretty extraordinary. He definitely inspired me in that way.”

Dr. Smith led the NYU’s United States State Department-funded partnerships with the Ukrainian Academy of Public Administration, and the Eduardo Mondlane University in Mozambique.

He also taught and traveled in Morocco, and “all over Europe,” including in France and Spain, Marissa Smith said.

“He loved being outside. He was perpetually taking endless scenic drives to take visitors to the ‘the view,’ ” she said.

Dr. Smith liked to drive on Route 157 out of Rensselaerville to see “the panoramic view of the Catskills he loved,” she said.

“He loved to cook. He was constantly cooking to feed an army,” Smith said. “He would run into people and invite them back to dinner.”

At holidays, Smith said of her father, “He always had an entourage of international students who didn’t have a place to go.”

The family held a memorial service for Dr. Smith at the Presbyterian Church in Rensselaerville on Aug. 1.

“It was beautiful — exactly as he would have wanted,” Ms. Smith said. Friends from all parts of his life told stories of him, she said, and the family played music that Dr. Smith had liked; the service ended with a song by Elvis Presley.

“The outpouring from all over the world” for her father at the memorial impressed Smith. Two of Dr. Smith’s friends from graduate school maintained a friendship with him until his death, she said.

“He was a pretty outgoing guy,” she said.

“All roads lead back to his love of students and teaching,” Ms. Smith-Sweeney said of her father. “His work was so important to him.”

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Dr. Dennis C. Smith is survived by his wife, Diane Baillargeon, of Westerlo and Manhattan; their daughter, Marissa Smith, of Brooklyn; his daughter, Sabrina Smith-Sweeney, and her husband, Brian, of Manhattan; his grandchildren, Zoe, Connor, and Owen Smith-Sweeney; and his brother, James Smith, and his wife, Elizabeth, of New Mexico.

Dr. Smith’s parents, Charles and Ruth Smith, died before him.

A second memorial service for those at NYU is planned for later this summer, the school stated.

— Jo E. Prout