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Actual instances of police funding being reduced are so rare that the author reaches for incidents of low police-citizen interaction following controversial pol

Actual instances of police funding being reduced are so rare that the author reaches for incidents of low police-citizen interaction following controversial police-on-citizen violence as evidence of what a straw-man version of "defund the police" advocates for. "Defund the police" has to be the most poorly conceived political slogan of all time. It sounds more like a pejorative its opponents came up with.

throwawaymanbot 5y ago
I feel you are spot on With this.
mitigating 5y ago
wouldn't that mean the cause of the increased crime is either criminals who are angry at the police so they commit more crimes or the police not working as hard (or a combination)
- ben_w 5y ago
  Could be, but those aren’t exhaustive possibilities. There might also just be more crime e.g. because of the pandemic rather than anger at the police, or there might be the same actual level of crime but more is getting reported.
- chongli 5y ago
  Wait what? Why would criminals be angry at the police for not interacting with them as much? I think a more likely explanation for increased crime is increased opportunity due to reduced police presence.
tshaddox 5y ago
I can understand some criticisms of the slogan, but why are you criticizing the slogan in this case when the police were literally not defunded?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- harry8 5y ago
  Not op. When the call for reform is "defund" and that seems like the wrong thing to do, then people don't support sensible reform. One would imagine that many if not most police officers support some kinds of sensible reform but probably hesitate to support "defunding" their wages and have their and their colleagues jobs cut, which is what "defund" really sounds like. It's a total us and them mentality which is not the way policing is supposed to be. In fact it's one of the things many people want reformed. Policing should be for us and us in our community with our consent as a population.
  - tshaddox 5y ago
    My point is that it doesn’t make sense to say “you called for defunding the police, we didn’t defund the police, things got worse, therefore your slogan is bad.”
    - harry8 5y ago
      Because no meaningful reform happened and whatever did happen doesn't, at face value, appear to be positive?
      - tshaddox 5y ago
        I would want to evaluate the merits of a particular slogan by means other than whether the intended reform happened. It’s easy to say “no thanks” to reform regardless of how good of a slogan it is.
        AnimalMuppet 5y ago
        But a misleadingly bad slogan makes it much more likely that people will say "no thanks". If what you said isn't what you meant, and what you said makes people reject what you meant, why did you say it? I suspect that proponents thought anger at the police was much more widely spread than it was, so they grabbed what they thought would sell.
ybessyehs654 5y ago
The article he cites is from a June 24 bill that redirected $17 million from that police budget to violence prevention programs [1] [1] https://abc7news.com/oakland-police-funding-city-council-cuts-opd/10828829/ https://abc7news.com/oakland-police-funding-city-council-cut...
- scrollbar 5y ago
  Reposting my reply to this comment that you reposted (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29504134 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29504134) If I read this article correctly then the author's point is that simply the passage of a bill to be enacted in the future is the cause of increased crime in the present, which seems like a shaky argument to me. Also I'm noticing that the ABC7News article says >More than $17 million will be diverted from the police to violence prevention and other services not involving police. Another $3.6 million will be put into the new MACRO program which will basically be a civilian crisis response program within the Oakland Fire Department addressing those in mental health crises. This means that even assuming this is a net decrease of $20.6 million to budget, this is still giving back only ~half the net increase from this year's budget. So we should still be up $16 million or so vs. 2020
  - ybessyehs654 5y ago
    Again, this does not account for inflation (6.2%)
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - scrollbar 5y ago
      Also again, I don't see how inflation should apply to police budgets but not other budgets.
      - ybessyehs654 5y ago
        Sorry I don't seem to understand your argument. You're comparing the budgets in nominal terms without accounting for inflation. For example the $630 million this year won't be able to fund as many officers and services like the year prior due to inflation. Budgets are typically increased across the board to account for inflation.
bigmattystyles 5y ago
It must have been a calculated decision to name it 'Defund the police' - if it had been called what it really is, which is 're-allocate percentages of funds from the enforcement arm of the police to more pre-emptive interventions and other services while still increasing budgets all around' or even just 'reform the police' it would not have had legs. 'Defund the police' has legs but it's easily used by political opponents. Perhaps a student of political science can chime in on the merits of blunt messaging and if it has a longer term impact.
vegetablepotpie 5y ago
They should have gone with "right-size the police".
rufus_foreman 5y ago
It wasn't just "defund the police", it was "abolish the police". If your argument is that the police haven't been defunded or abolished, maybe your issue is with the mainstream media that were publishing arguments in favor of abolishing the police? Have you considered holding them to account for that?
wdr1 5y ago
> Actual instances of police funding being reduced are so rare I'm not sure what you mean by rare, but many major cities did proceed with reducing police funds: "New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Seattle, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Baltimore and a dozen other cities have all also reduced police spending. " https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-defund-police-transferring-money-community https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-de...
- SpelingBeeChamp 5y ago
  Aside from the author saying so, I don't see any data in the linked article supporting that LAPD funding has been reduced. Moreover, a quick search seems to indicate that LAPD received a funding increase in 2021.
  - wdr1 5y ago
    "The City Council cut the LAPD by $150 million in July, after massive protests following Floyd’s death, pledging to put the proceeds into disenfranchised communities. Council members quickly set aside $60 million, using much of those funds to balance the budget, leaving about $89 million for various programs." L.A. cut millions from the LAPD after George Floyd. Here’s where that money is going https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-05-26/lapd-funds-reallocation-george-floyd#:~:text=The%20City%20Council%20cut%20the,%2489%20million%20for%20various%20programs https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-05-26/lapd-fun....
    - SpelingBeeChamp 5y ago
      From the same article: "Although activists expressed satisfaction in seeing law enforcement funding go into social programs, some remained frustrated that Mayor Eric Garcetti and the City Council recently increased the LAPD’s budget for the fiscal year that starts on July 1." And just one month ago, LAPD's budget was increased by 12% for the upcoming fiscal year, up $213 million.
johndubchak 5y ago
People are conflating "Defund the Police" with a reduction of Policing enforcement and staffing. Whereas, I believe the original intent of DTP was the stop the militarization of the Police by not allowing them to acquire APC and other war-surplus items. The movement feared, rightly so IMO, that having such things would allow Police Departments to train and begin to act in a manner more consistent with field battle and a less like Community-based Policing enforcement.

throwawaymanbot 5y ago

I feel you are spot on With this.

mitigating 5y ago

wouldn't that mean the cause of the increased crime is either criminals who are angry at the police so they commit more crimes or the police not working as hard (or a combination)

ben_w 5y ago
Could be, but those aren’t exhaustive possibilities. There might also just be more crime e.g. because of the pandemic rather than anger at the police, or there might be the same actual level of crime but more is getting reported.
chongli 5y ago
Wait what? Why would criminals be angry at the police for not interacting with them as much? I think a more likely explanation for increased crime is increased opportunity due to reduced police presence.

tshaddox 5y ago

I can understand some criticisms of the slogan, but why are you criticizing the slogan in this case when the police were literally not defunded?

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
harry8 5y ago
Not op. When the call for reform is "defund" and that seems like the wrong thing to do, then people don't support sensible reform. One would imagine that many if not most police officers support some kinds of sensible reform but probably hesitate to support "defunding" their wages and have their and their colleagues jobs cut, which is what "defund" really sounds like. It's a total us and them mentality which is not the way policing is supposed to be. In fact it's one of the things many people want reformed. Policing should be for us and us in our community with our consent as a population.
- tshaddox 5y ago
  My point is that it doesn’t make sense to say “you called for defunding the police, we didn’t defund the police, things got worse, therefore your slogan is bad.”
  - harry8 5y ago
    Because no meaningful reform happened and whatever did happen doesn't, at face value, appear to be positive?
    - tshaddox 5y ago
      I would want to evaluate the merits of a particular slogan by means other than whether the intended reform happened. It’s easy to say “no thanks” to reform regardless of how good of a slogan it is.
      - AnimalMuppet 5y ago
        But a misleadingly bad slogan makes it much more likely that people will say "no thanks". If what you said isn't what you meant, and what you said makes people reject what you meant, why did you say it? I suspect that proponents thought anger at the police was much more widely spread than it was, so they grabbed what they thought would sell.

ybessyehs654 5y ago

The article he cites is from a June 24 bill that redirected $17 million from that police budget to violence prevention programs [1] [1] https://abc7news.com/oakland-police-funding-city-council-cuts-opd/10828829/ https://abc7news.com/oakland-police-funding-city-council-cut...

scrollbar 5y ago
Reposting my reply to this comment that you reposted (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29504134 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29504134) If I read this article correctly then the author's point is that simply the passage of a bill to be enacted in the future is the cause of increased crime in the present, which seems like a shaky argument to me. Also I'm noticing that the ABC7News article says >More than $17 million will be diverted from the police to violence prevention and other services not involving police. Another $3.6 million will be put into the new MACRO program which will basically be a civilian crisis response program within the Oakland Fire Department addressing those in mental health crises. This means that even assuming this is a net decrease of $20.6 million to budget, this is still giving back only ~half the net increase from this year's budget. So we should still be up $16 million or so vs. 2020
- ybessyehs654 5y ago
  Again, this does not account for inflation (6.2%)
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - scrollbar 5y ago
    Also again, I don't see how inflation should apply to police budgets but not other budgets.
    - ybessyehs654 5y ago
      Sorry I don't seem to understand your argument. You're comparing the budgets in nominal terms without accounting for inflation. For example the $630 million this year won't be able to fund as many officers and services like the year prior due to inflation. Budgets are typically increased across the board to account for inflation.

bigmattystyles 5y ago

It must have been a calculated decision to name it 'Defund the police' - if it had been called what it really is, which is 're-allocate percentages of funds from the enforcement arm of the police to more pre-emptive interventions and other services while still increasing budgets all around' or even just 'reform the police' it would not have had legs. 'Defund the police' has legs but it's easily used by political opponents. Perhaps a student of political science can chime in on the merits of blunt messaging and if it has a longer term impact.

vegetablepotpie 5y ago

They should have gone with "right-size the police".

rufus_foreman 5y ago

It wasn't just "defund the police", it was "abolish the police". If your argument is that the police haven't been defunded or abolished, maybe your issue is with the mainstream media that were publishing arguments in favor of abolishing the police? Have you considered holding them to account for that?

wdr1 5y ago

> Actual instances of police funding being reduced are so rare I'm not sure what you mean by rare, but many major cities did proceed with reducing police funds: "New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Seattle, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Baltimore and a dozen other cities have all also reduced police spending. " https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-defund-police-transferring-money-community https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/07/us-cities-de...

SpelingBeeChamp 5y ago
Aside from the author saying so, I don't see any data in the linked article supporting that LAPD funding has been reduced. Moreover, a quick search seems to indicate that LAPD received a funding increase in 2021.
- wdr1 5y ago
  "The City Council cut the LAPD by $150 million in July, after massive protests following Floyd’s death, pledging to put the proceeds into disenfranchised communities. Council members quickly set aside $60 million, using much of those funds to balance the budget, leaving about $89 million for various programs." L.A. cut millions from the LAPD after George Floyd. Here’s where that money is going https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-05-26/lapd-funds-reallocation-george-floyd#:~:text=The%20City%20Council%20cut%20the,%2489%20million%20for%20various%20programs https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-05-26/lapd-fun....
  - SpelingBeeChamp 5y ago
    From the same article: "Although activists expressed satisfaction in seeing law enforcement funding go into social programs, some remained frustrated that Mayor Eric Garcetti and the City Council recently increased the LAPD’s budget for the fiscal year that starts on July 1." And just one month ago, LAPD's budget was increased by 12% for the upcoming fiscal year, up $213 million.

johndubchak 5y ago

People are conflating "Defund the Police" with a reduction of Policing enforcement and staffing. Whereas, I believe the original intent of DTP was the stop the militarization of the Police by not allowing them to acquire APC and other war-surplus items. The movement feared, rightly so IMO, that having such things would allow Police Departments to train and begin to act in a manner more consistent with field battle and a less like Community-based Policing enforcement.