A lot of the mini-tanks, assault weapons and SWAT gear is based on how the police are funded, not necessarily the amount of funding they have. The amount of fu

A lot of the mini-tanks, assault weapons and SWAT gear is based on how the police are funded, not necessarily the amount of funding they have. The amount of funding a police department has is determined at the beginning of the fiscal year and by how much was spent by the previous year, including any shortfalls or excesses in budgetary spending. City councils and Mayors/DA's are always looking to trim the police budget (believe it or not), so a lot of the time, the department will take any excess budget they have at the end of the year and spend it on military auction items (a whole other mess), in order to keep their budget and show that they've been able to stretch their budget as far as they can and get the most value for their dollar (I read a very good article about it like 2 years ago, or so and can't find it). But departments do this so they don't lose their future budgets, "just in case" they need to hire future officers, need more "real" equipment, etc. etc. This has lead to the increase in militarization of the police and the militarization of the tactics of the police as military personnel are already familiar with the equipment. There has been no same said impetus to increase nonviolent intervention tactics on an ever increasingly divisive nation, who's "news" cycle and social networks actively work to stoke division and tension as it feeds interaction, which provides more eyes on advertisement (sorry, I went down a rabbithole in the end, there). It would be better, well it would be a start, to have quarterly budget reviews and performance reviews tied to the needs of the community and training. But, we all know that isn't how politics works =(