In our most recent episode, Dr. Justin and I talked about the intersection of mental health and the criminal justice system. One of the main focuses of the episode was about policing and how we got to this point in our country's history where police end up having a large number of encounters with those that have a Severe and Persistent Mental Illness (SPMI). Essentially, the police and then in turn the prison system have become the front line of working with SPMI out in the community in our country. Dr. Justin does a great break down of how this happened in our episode - check it out if you have a chance.
One thing that I have thought about a lot since we recorded is this idea of whether or not defunding the police would be helpful. Right off the bat, I think it would. But really what it has made me think about is how much our country is so against reallocating funds previously given to police for other programs or services but the same stance isn't kept when things like social services need more funds.
First hand example - I work in a public high school and during the 2022-2023 school year we found ourselves in a financial crisis. Because of this, cuts to staff and spending needed to be made immediately along with a plan for the end of the school year to make even more cuts if a solution was not found. Eventually the plan to vote on a local option levy was brought up as a way to help the school district get out of the hole we were in. Essentially, the community was asked to vote on a possible property tax increase to potentially help the school district.
Politics and taxes aside, some of the comments being thrown around during this time before the May 2023 election to decide on the possible tax increase were disheartening. A lot of them were pretty similar - "the schools should deal with this on their own" "do more with less" "kids will be fine with a few extra students in their classes" and a bunch of similar things.
I bring all this up to tie it back to my earlier thought - why are things like public education and public services told to figure it out by themselves but no one ever says that to law enforcement? Obviously not no one but you get what I mean. It feels like the idea of reallocating funds from the police gets shut down so quickly when you call it defunding the police that even if you have a good idea, people don't want to listen. And when people don't want to listen, we miss out on good opportunities.
Case in point, Portland Street Response. The program, which started in 2021, started by sending mental health workers and paramedics to respond to mental health crises instead of the police. The program has seen success over the last few years including a decrease Portland police officers’ annual call load by almost 4%. More specifically, the numbers show a 19% drop in police needing to respond to 911 calls characterized as “welfare checks” or “unwanted persons” – situations where callers are concerned about someone’s well being or want them removed from an area. Because of the program's success, their budget was boosted with money that was cut from the Portland Police budget.
And did the cut mean that police department was shut down or removed? No. The department is still there AND a social service that has been shown to be helpful got more funding. See? It's possible. I know that's just one example and I know there is so much more that goes in to and I know that this is probably way too simplified it but I want to finish this post with one final thought - if we respected social services the same way we respected law enforcement, we probably wouldn't need to pick and choose who gets money, we most likely would find a way to make it work.
~ Eddie
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