I believe the city of Phoenix made a big mistake in trying to secure the public’s safety by adding more police. As reported recently, the council voted to increase its police budget to add more officers. According to Councilmember Jim Waring, the need was clear: “I think it’s of paramount importance that we increase the number of police officers we’re putting on the street every day. We’re at 1990-something levels of staffing with a much bigger city.”
Of course, this sounds like the most logical step in the context of our developing population, which, according to the article, What Is the Population of Phoenix in 2025?, remains one of the country’s fastest-growing urban areas.
However, in the context of what is right, adding more police is abhorrent in my opinion because local police have so often mistreated people. Last year, ABC News reported that a U.S. Department of Justice investigation found “the Phoenix police deprives people of their rights under the Constitution and federal law.” Additionally, the DOJ “found systemic problems … of civil rights violations, including unjustified deadly force, discrimination in traffic and other enforcement and unlawful detention citations and arrests of the homeless.”…