General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: It is going to be a FUCKING REVOLUTION! [View all]truedelphi
(32,324 posts)More billions so police can be properly trained!!
More billions for police departments? In an era where there are so many friggin' monetary programs for police departments that one envies the police. The money comes from the Federal Government, including beaucoup Homeland Security monies, and from the individual state, and then there are things like asset forfeiture where the homes, cars, bank accounts etc of various individuals whose property has been seized now goes to the police. (John Oliver recently had a story about how a family home in Pittsburgh was seized, due to the arrest of the teenager kid living in the home. The kid had a baggie of heroin, police suspected he was selling, and although the teen got probation (IIRC), the house was seized, and the family will probably lose it.)
As an example of huge monies going to PD across the nation, we can look to one city:
For the 2013/2014 fiscal year, the Santa Rosa Calif.'s Police Department's budget is $45.5 million. Santa Rosa is a city thirty miles north of San Francisco and it has a population of 172,000.
This is so much money that back in September, the police were assigned the task of going door to door to tell people about social programs available. (Never mind that those programs are being drained of monies, as social services are cut, while police budgets are increased.)
Meanwhile the fire department in Santa Rosa had only 33 million dollars available to them, at a time when the drought was a huge feature of everyday life.
So you have police getting so much money they don't know what to do with it, nor does this city even know what to do with the additional police officers the department has hired.
While fire departments, more needed than ever, shut down fire houses!