Letter to the editor - Defund The Police Makes No Sense, Anywhere…

DEFUND The Police = Dumb, Reactive Leadership

By Blane Stoddart,

Dear Editor,

Recent events over the past 9 days have shown that our democracy is imperfect, but has the elasticity to bend but not break.  The short victories experienced by the Black Lives Matter Movement and civil rights sympathizers will quickly evaporate if not checked by moderate pragmatic leaders.  The country seems to be dead set on jumping off a cliff into a Trump-led conservative racist abyss; or jumping off a corresponding cliff of radical leftist thinking run by anarchists.  Both are bad.  90% of Blacks do not want the police defunded.   Instead, what we need is practical, solutions-based leadership that will address the imperfections in our union, towards a more equitable and just society. 

Police departments need internal and external reform including retraining, utilizing non-lethal methods for the unarmed, recruiting, and promoting a more diverse force, retraining for all policing methods, diversity and inclusion training, training on black/police history, de-escalation training, and revamping police arbitration.  The racial divide that has recently been exposed is fueled by a separate and unequal public education system that is funded through property taxes whereby wealthy areas are flush with dollars for education, but poor areas do without; an educational system which in some areas has become a pipeline for prison.  In addition, the racial divide exposes a socio-economic system where black wealth is 10 times less than white wealth on a per capita basis;  the black unemployment rate is 2x that of whites, and the barriers to access to capital are much greater for blacks, and black business owners, as evidenced by the Payroll Protection Program.  Blacks are five (5) times more likely to be arrested versus whites, and thus serve as fuel for the burgeoning criminal justice industrial complex.  The recent events in Minneapolis, Georgia, and Louisville, Kentucky illuminate the need for reform. 

In 2016, the CATO institute conducted a National Survey on Criminal Justice.  It examined what Americans wanted from their police departments.  Here are the results:

• Have outside agencies investigate police misconduct – 79%
• Retrain to prevent and ban racial profiling - 63%
• De-escalation training as part of all basic training – 68%
• Wear body cameras – 89%
• Notify citizens when car stop is voluntary and when they can decline a search – 73%
• Ban military weapons used by police – 53%
• Treat drug offenses like traffic violations – 54%
• End civil asset forfeiture where police take suspects money and assets– 84% 
• Ban neck restraints – 67%
• Implement an early warning system to identify abusive officers – 80%
• Eliminate mandatory minimum sentences – 66%
• Cut prison sentences for non-violent offenders – 72%
• Allow non-violent offenders to vote 73%

         *Americans Don’t Want To #Defund Police, Instead, They Agree To Reform. Emily Ekins 6/4/2020

A recent survey showed that the majority of Americans support peaceful protests, but 71% of Americans support sending in the national guard if protests turn violent.   It is clear that if the movement is taken over by a few radical/leftists whose call is to defund the police, then the recent civil rights victories that have been worn, particularly in stirring the conscience of all Americans, will evaporate.

Blane F. Stoddart

Small Business Advocate

President and CEO, BFW Construction Project Management

Commissioner, PA Governor’s Commission on African American Affairs.

Philadelphia, PA

267-266-1612