Foot Dragging by the Council Equates to Defunding the Police

There is a narrative in the upcoming election that the Democratic Socialist-led City Council has been providing more than adequate resources to the Minneapolis Police Department. I was told by my own DSA Council Member that the MPD has the highest budget they have ever had. Obviously the DSA Council has not defunded the police, given we are spending so much money on them. Everything with public safety is fine. The problem is not resources, which is under the control of the City Council, but with the police themselves.

But the DSA City Council Members have found lots of other ways to sabotage the police. One thing they fail to mention is they cut funding for the police recruitment program. We added about 50 new police officers over the last year, in large part because of this program. We used to have 950 officers in 2019 and were at a low of about 550. Presently we are up to about 600 due to the recruitment program. But now the City Council cut the program. If it had been allowed to continue, Minneapolis may have filled many more police officer positions. But now it won’t, leaving a long-term dearth of sworn officers.

I pointed out to my Council Member, that cutting recruiting funding doesn’t only keep fresh recruits from becoming police officers; it shows the City Council’s hostile attitude toward their own employees. No one wants to work for a boss that hates them and many on the City Council have made their dislike of the police abundantly clear. And it is this attitude that is a problem.

To add insult to injury, the DSA voting bloc (for example Elliott Payne votes with Robin Wonsley 94% of the time but did not seek DSA endorsement) learned the art of foot dragging. The abolition of the police is a plank in the DSA platform, and even though the ‘defund the police’ amendment failed in 2021, they achieve the same goal through other means. They delayed approval of the police contract and held up approval of the shot spotter (used since the 1990s). When they take up these issues, the Council also uses these their time on the dais to say hurtful things about the police, to make it clear where they stand with their own employees.

The DSA Council Members have been especially harsh toward the 3^rd Precinct, the one in which George Floyd was murdered. It encompasses the most diverse neighborhoods in the City. It has been hit the hardest by the drug traffic due to the high concentration of encampments and therefore holds within its boundaries several high crime areas. The hostile attitude of council members toward the 3^rd has been nothing but punitive.

Inspector Jose Gomez, who has headed the 3^rd Precinct for four years, in this writer’s opinion, is the best, and the only person of color to hold that position. He has cleaned out most of the “cowboys” (as Attorney General Merrick Garland called them) and recruited respectful officers to join him in the transformation of the 3^rd Precinct. He has cultivated great relationships with Black, White, Native, Somali, and Latino Communities. However, due to the shortage of officers, Inspector Gomez has had no more than four squads patrolling the streets on any given shift, despite the 3^rd Precinct being the largest precinct geographically. He has had no Night Lieutenant for months, leaving officers on the street without a supervisor. Since 2020, the 3^rd Precinct has had no Community Response Team (CRT) to do undercover work and builds cases, especially against gangs, traffickers and drugs coming into the precinct. Downtown and the Northside still have their CRT and have seen declines in crime over the last five years.  This lack of police is directly related to a DSA City Council that is anti-police and who refuses to do the things to increase the number of police.

The manager of a small charity told me of an open-air drug market right in front of his establishment one summer. The low-income, working class, immigrant families who rely on his organization were afraid to come in and receive the help they needed. As the summer progressed, he became familiar with the dealers. One morning he noticed new dealers, and this was concerning him. He sensed trouble and reported it to the police, but the police didn’t have staff to respond. Within a week, one of the dealers was shot and killed, as the two groups fought over turf. It may have been avoided if the 3^rd Precinct had a CRT to come in, do the necessary undercover work, made arrests and get those violent criminals off the street. This man died because we didn’t have enough police, which is directly because of the DSA City Council.

The worst slight is the absence of a 3rd Precinct. It burned down in the riots on Lake Street over five years ago and the opening of the new location is still not in sight. This is a real sore spot for those living in the 3^rd Precinct, who are paying the highest price for the police shortage. It must also be hard on the officers who serve there having to go back and forth to an old moldy downtown building rather than staying in the community. Those who live in the 3^rd Precinct see this foot dragging as punitive for having so much crime.

When it is finally ready to be occupied, due to another “punishment” by the City Council, it won’t even be called a “precinct” or “station” but a “community safety center.” There is room and a need for both police precincts and community safety centers, and Minneapolis has both. But, when a city makes space for the protectors who carry weapons, it should be called what it is, a “precinct”, even when there are plans to house other community non-profits and services there. No other precincts have been treated this way. For example, this past year the 1^st Precinct moved into a newly renovated building that continues to be called the “1^st Precinct.” But the 3^rd gets treated differently.

Because they want to punish the police, the citizens of the 3^rd Precinct have suffered greatly from this City Council’s foot dragging, neglect and their never-ending tolerance of violent crime.  We need the suffering of residents to end and that means electing a City Council that cares about keeping residents safe rather than the DSA goal of defunding the police. Hopefully that happens in the next election.