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Defunding the Police

Social Welfare Policy Analysis and Letter to Legislator:

Defunding the Police

Jennifer McDermont

Department of Social Work: Sinclair Community College

1213 Intro. To Social Welfare

November 27, 2020

Defunding the Police

The defunding policy doesn’t necessarily mean completely get rid of the police. Defunding

police means relocating or redirecting funding away from the police departments into other

government-funded agencies that are funded by local municipal areas. Defunding police and

placing that funding into other government-assisted areas can have a potential benefit that will

reduce police violence and crime. The excessive money given to the police should be going to

social services, education, and anti-poverty programs. The US as a whole spends on average one-

hundred billion dollars a year on policing. This needs to be cut and put to better uses such as

education, health care, housing, and more important programs. For example, New York spends

more on policing than the department of health, homelessness services, housing preservation,

and the development of youth and community all combined (Zerkel, 2020).

Those that may oppose the views of defunding the police may view or fear the police have

resentment for the defunding that they withdraw from labor. This will be able to create the

opportunity to bring more social workers in the need to help with noncriminal calls and create

better positions for the communities. There is a fear of less effective policing due to the decrease

in funding will cause a spike in crime. Redistribution to funding in resources that especially

favor minority communities may seem to discriminate against others and their taxes. However,

putting this funding in other areas can help any person of any lifestyle. Having more social

services to help mental illnesses and noncriminal issues in the communities can help those that

may not directly benefit from this funding by decreasing many social issues in a community

(Truecoverage, 2020). Policing as a whole does not benefit in the ways that many believe. People

believe that police are needed, and all the funding is needed because it keeps us safe. However,
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Defunding the Police
“police have an overall bad record on solving crimes. 38% of murders, 66% of rapes, 70% of

robberies, and 47% of aggravated assaults go unsolved. 90% of people stopped by police were

not committing any crime” (Ray, 2020).

By decreasing the funding of police, we can end the decades of the racially driven social

control and oppression demonstrated by police and minorities and address the social problems.

Police departments are historically oppressive to people of color. The first U.S. city police

department was a slave patrol. (ProCon, 2020). Police violence is the leading cause of death for

black men in America. “1 in 1,000 black men in America can be expected to be killed by the

police” (Fernandez, 2020). Having police defunded can have more of a focal point for those with

mental illnesses, and drug use. This can help the movement to decriminalize and destigmatize

people that have a mental illness. Defunding the police and relocating this funding can serve as

an investment to under deserved communities and address systemic racism.

Tax dollars should be applied to programs that don’t increase the violence but instead for

programs that help people that don’t include violence. The American Public Health Association

declared police violence a public health issue in 2018, stating, “almost 10 percent of all

homicides in the US are committed by police.” Police are more militarized since the 1990s. The

federal government has put up to six billion dollars of excessive military equipment to local law

enforcement. This includes things such as grenades, which no local police department should be

responsible for or funded to obtain such violent equipment. Every year the police kill 1,000

people when they are on duty. The multimillion-dollar funding for body cameras that have been

applied to reduce police violence has not helped the cause of the decrease in police violence. The

use of body cameras is supposed to be used for police accountability. That has not happened, and

we wasted millions of dollars because of this. The body cameras are typically turned off,
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Defunding the Police
especially during times of intense situations (Zerkel, 2020). As a community, we need to take

back the power from policymakers and have our taxpayer money go to the community as a

whole, not a multimillion-dollar department that still has not solved any social issues that we the

people deal with.

We must demand the federal government to redirect the money that funds the police to

the right places. Not having this funding go to other areas that need it can hurt communities.

Other areas that are needed to maintain a healthy life are struggling to stay afloat due to lack of

funding while police have excessive funding and still want more. We need a more appropriate

budget of taxpayer’s money and federal funding to the police into equal funding to help the

community as a whole. We should be changing the responsibilities of the noncriminal issues to

social services and police focus on serious crimes. 95% of arrest is noncriminal and does not

affect the community as a whole. These arrests are traffic violations, marijuana, homelessness,

and any small issue in-between. Only 5% of police involvement is for serious issues such as

murder, rape, assault, etc. This shows that all the excess money that goes to police because of

potential wrongdoings is not needed due to the low number of needs for the excessive amount of

money (Fernandez, 2020). 9 out of 10 calls to 911 are nonviolent. Police are trained for use-of-

force and the worst case of scenarios to reduce protentional threats. Police are not equipped to

deal with or trained for derailing situations, causing more tensions to rise and a higher likelihood

of having a situation goes worse. For example, in Sweden, they have created mental health

ambulances to help police deal with and not have a need to be involved in psychological crises.

These crises can be suicide attempts, drug-use, homeless, and anything to deal with issues

associated with mental illness. Police tend to deal with issues of the homeless regularly. If
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Defunding the Police
funding goes to “Housing First” programs this would help police avoid these issues as a whole

(Ray, 2020).

Social workers play an important role in social issues and attempting to reform issues. At

a micro-level a social worker is involved with meeting with people directly, families, and small

groups. At a micro-level a social worker would impact this policy by working with police and

the education process of implicit bias, working alongside with police to directly go for

noncriminal calls and victims that have directly affected by the impact that police make on

people. Training of implicit bias has been proven to show no effect currently because most

courses taught to police are taught by other police officers. Also, those that are teaching about

implicit biases are officers that have also demonstrated or have abuse in their history as well.

This shows the importance on a micro level to start to implement social workers directly to

mental crises. Social workers on a macro level deal with a large social problem, developing and

implementing social interventions in communities, states, or all across the nation. Regarding not

passing defunding police this shows ethical issues of social justice. “Social workers are supposed

to challenge social injustice. Social workers pursue social change, especially on behave of

vulnerable and oppressed individuals” (NASW, 2020). If we ignore how much funding is going

to police and not to departments that help those that are in need then we are helping with social

justice. Communities of color have dealt with decades of oppression especially from the police,

this the importance to social workers in social justice. If defunding does pass ethical issues that

social workers may struggle with is competence. “Social workers practice within their areas of

competence and develop and enhance their expertise” (NASW, 2020). This can show a struggle

if defunding is passed because social workers will be much more needed, and they may find

themselves in more opportunities to challenge their competency.

The Honorable Senator Peggy Lehner

Dear Senator, Lehner,

My name is Stephanie Hulsman and the legislation addressing the opposition of the bill “Remedy
Police Use of Excessive Force/Opposed Defunding” S.C.R. No. 16. This is a paramount interest
to me because I am a current Social Worker student, an ally of people of color, and a future nurse
and this issue directly impacts me because I have friends of people that have directly been
affected by the discrimination and unbiased nature of the police.
I am concerned about this issue because the bill directly states “Law enforcement officers
are entrusted by the public to uphold the law” while they are the ones personally breaking the
law. How is the public supposed to trust those that enforce the law when they break the law with
no repercussions? The bill states, “89 federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement officers
were killed in a line of duty in 2019”. However, how can we state the number of officers that
died, without addressing how many people have died, have been harmed, have been victimized,
have had mental and emotional harm, and harassed by the hand of the police? Over 1,000 people
are killed at the hands of people that are supposed to enforce the law. The police have a difficult
job and a dangerous job. However, this is a job that they signed up to protect the public, not
abuse the power they have to enforce the law. The community needs accountability for this harm
done by the people that are supposed to protect us. We need repercussions for the actions that
have been taking place. If the funding we have excessively given to police departments has not
protected us now then we need to take this excessive funding away and put it in places that will
benefit the public more such as social workers and social services. The police are here to protect
the public not to cause harm, this affects the community at large giving more funding to
departments that cause harm rather than good.
Thank you for your consideration of my viewpoint on this matter. I believe it is an
important issue and would like to see the legislation change its views on where funding goes
when it comes to protecting a community.
Sincerely,
Stephanie Hulsman
2181 Crosley Ct.
Miamisburg, OH 45342
(937)304-2583
[email protected]
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Defunding the Police
References

Beller, S. (November 15, 2018). The American Public Health Association Declares Police

Violence a Public Health Issue.

http://www.filtermag.org

Chatterjee, J. (September 11, 2020). Defund the Police: PRO

https://record.horacemann.org/5681/opinion/defund-the-police-pro/

Fernandez, P. (June 11, 2020). Defunding the Police Will Actually Make Us Safer.

https://www.aclu.org/news/criminal-law-reform/defunding-the-police-will-actually-

make-us-safer/

NASW. (2020). National Association of Social Work Code of Ethics.

https://www.socialworkers.org/About/Ethics

ProCon. (June 30, 2020). Defund the Police – Top 3 Pros and Cons

https://www.procon.org/headlines/defund-the-police-top-3-pros-and-cons/

Ray, R. (June 19, 2020). What Does ‘Defund the Police’ mean and does it have merit?

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2020/06/19/what-does-defund-the-police-mean-

and-does-it-have-merit/

Truecoverage. (2020). Defund the Police. What does it mean? Where will it lead?

https://truecoverage.com/blog/what-does-defund-the-police-mean-benefits-risks-of-

defunding/

Zaru, D. Simpson, T. (November 25, 2020). Defund the police movement 6 months after killing

of George Floyd.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/defund-police-movement-months-killing-george-floyd/story?

id=74296015
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Defunding the Police
Zerkel, M. (Oct. 15, 2020). 6 Reasons why it’s time to defund the police.

https://www.afsc.org/blogs/news-and-commentary/6-reasons-why-its-time-to-defund-

police