top of page
This site was designed with the
.com
website builder. Create your website today.Start Now
Search
  • Writer's pictureCold Spring Community Action
    • Jun 12, 2020
    • 6 min read

What Would It Mean to Defund the Police?

What does “defund the police” mean?

To defund the police is to reduce funding for police departments and reallocate the funds to under-funded programs, especially in communities of color, such as healthcare, education, community programs, and more. To defund the police is not to do away with the notion of law enforcement altogether, but to provide communities with the support needed to sustain and maintain themselves individually without the use of violence or deadly force to uphold the law.


Why not police reform? Why not fund the police and fund more community-led programs?

Police reform has been proven to not work. Procedural reforms such as implicit bias training, mindfulness, civilian review boards, etc. add millions of taxpayer dollars to police budgets with little to no result or progress. The Minneapolis city council implemented such reforms to their police department in 2017, and has since retracted that decision, saying that these attempts at reform were unsuccessful. The Minneapolis city council has come forward with their decision to begin defunding their police department. In regards to funding the police in addition to community-led programs, check out this excerpt from MPD150, a “participatory, horizontally-organized effort by local organizers, researchers, artists and activists”[1] in Minneapolis:


"It’s not just that police are ineffective: in many communities, they’re actively harmful. The history of policing is a history of violence against the marginalized– American police departments were originally created to dominate and criminalize communities of color and poor white workers, a job they continue doing to this day. The list has grown even longer: LGBTQ folks, disabled people, activists– so many of us are attacked by cops on a daily basis.
And it’s bigger than just police brutality; it’s about how the prison industrial complex, the drug war, immigration law, and the web of policy, law, and culture that forms our criminal justice system has destroyed millions of lives, and torn apart families. Cops don’t prevent crime; they cause it, through the ongoing, violent disruption of our communities.
It’s also worth noting that most social service agencies and organizations that could serve as alternatives to the police are underfunded, scrambling for grant money to stay alive while being forced to interact with officers who often make their jobs even harder. In 2016, the Minneapolis Police Department received $165 million in city funding alone. Imagine what that kind of money could do to keep our communities safe if it was reinvested." [2]


Does defunding the police leave us with no law enforcement?

How would a community protect itself from crime?

The intention of defunding the police is not to get rid of law enforcement and leave citizens to fend for themselves. The intention of defunding the police is to reallocate funds that have been given to local law enforcement in excess to fund more community programs that in turn would support the community. Another purpose of defunding the police is to reallocate funds to different community departments to provide more support to residents who live there. For example, a presence of social workers, healthcare workers, educational opportunities, and more.

Police officers are spread very thin, nowadays. As a society, we expect police officers to be equipped to handle every situation in which a typical citizen is in need of assistance. While this is unfair to expect of any given person, it’s unjust to community members who do not receive proper help or care due to the fact that law enforcement is often left in charge of situations that they are not trained to be able to navigate. Imagine a community where each person is supported by thoroughly trained and/or educated individuals who are prepared and available to help when needed in their area of profession. This includes individuals who are equipped to handle violent crime and crime in emergency situations. Here is another quote from MPD150 regarding crime and defunding the police:


"Crime isn't random. Most of the time, it happens when someone has been unable to meet their basic needs through other means. By shifting money away from the police and toward services that actually meet those needs, we’ll be able to get to a place where people won’t need to rob banks.
Sure, in this long transition process, we may need a small specialized class of public servants whose job it is to respond to violent crimes. But part of what we’re talking about here is what role police play in our society. Right now, cops don’t just respond to violent crimes; they make needless traffic stops, arrest petty drug users, and engage in a wide range of “broken windows policing” behaviors that only serve to keep more people under the thumb of the criminal justice system.
Even people who support the police agree: we ask cops to solve too many of our problems. As former Dallas Police Chief David Brown said: “We’re asking cops to do too much in this country… Every societal failure, we put it off on the cops to solve. Not enough mental health funding, let the cops handle it… Here in Dallas we got a loose dog problem; let’s have the cops chase loose dogs. Schools fail, let’s give it to the cops… That’s too much to ask. Policing was never meant to solve all those problems.
To really “fight crime,” we don’t need more cops; we need more jobs, more educational opportunities, more arts programs, more community centers, more mental health resources, and more of a say in how our own communities function."[3]

What does this mean on a larger scale? How can this be implemented?

When looking to defund the police, we must strive for a divest/invest model. To quote Freedom to Thrive,

"These invest/divest campaigns, which advocate for investments in supportive services and divestment from punitive institutions, challenge the very roots of mass criminalization and inequity,” reads the report. “They demand elected officials and decision makers acknowledge that the lack of investment in communities of color and the over-investment in their criminalization is emblematic of governmental disregard for Black and brown life [...]
This report is groundbreaking because we often talk about black and brown communities, and particularly low-income communities as having no investments, no resources, and being starved [...] What our report shows is that, in fact, there is an incredible amount of investment going into black and brown communities. But it’s going into criminalizing them."[4]

The Slacktivist, (an activist website which “serves as a useful tool for increasing people’s knowledge of current issues and for inspiring further engagement”[5]) states that “Abolishing the police means a call for community bonds within our own neighborhoods such as: Phone trees and rapid response teams; Community networks, training, and resources; De-escalation training; Conflict mediation; First aid training and supplies; Natural disaster emergency preparedness; Self defense classes; Knowing your rights to protect undocumented friends and neighbors [...] Police abolition is kind of like making your neighborhood or community into a little self-sufficient city!”[6]


How can I help? What can I do?

To begin: educate yourself! We have compiled a starting list of organizations to make yourself aware of and articles to read that will give you more information regarding defunding the police. Look at the sources these websites use and explore! Get in touch with friends and/or loved ones who are involved in Black Lives Matter protests or have been sharing educational content online. Talk to those who aren’t and engage them in an open and encouraging conversation. Read a book (or a few) from the list below. Get involved in the community and become aware of how you can best communicate with your local government officials, both on a community level and a state-wide level. VOTE. Support (if not monetarily, outwardly and publicly) organizations you have researched that are fighting to make a police-free future possible for everyone.


 

Sources and further reading:

Organizations:


Articles/Podcasts:


Books


Works Cited

“About.” MPD150, June 1, 2020. https://www.mpd150.com/about/.

“Frequently Asked Questions.” MPD150, June 10, 2020. https://www.mpd150.com/faq/.

The Center for Popular Democracy, Law for Black Lives, and Black Youth Project 100. “Freedom to Thrive: Reimagining Safety & Security in Our Communities.” Box. The Center for Popular Democracy. Accessed June 12, 2020. https://populardemocracy.app.box.com/v/FreedomtoThrive.

Mock, Brentin, and CityLab. “What Happens If Cities Stop Spending On Police?” CityLab, July 14, 2017. https://www.citylab.com/equity/2017/07/the-price-of-defunding-the-police/533232/.

“About.” The Slacktivist. Accessed June 12, 2020. https://www.theslacktivist.co/about.

Y, S. “WHAT IT DOES IT MEAN TO ABOLISH THE POLICE?” The Slacktivist. The Slacktivist, June 8, 2020. https://www.theslacktivist.co/blog/what-it-does-it-mean-to-abolish-the-police.



 

Here are some helpful inforgraphics!


By @melegirma and @conflicttransformation




84 views0 comments
bottom of page