To defund the police, activists rewrote city budgets

Re:To defund the police, activists rewrote city budgets by mwigdahl on Thursday June 04, 2020 @03:20PM (#23420656)

Curtailment of QI should come first, but defunding the police in a vacuum will be very dangerous as long as the power of civil asset forfeiture exists. You may remove tax money from the police budget, but that just sets up a perverse incentive to confiscate more cash and property to make up the difference.

Curtail QI _and_ civil asset forfeiture, and we will have set the stage for real policing reform.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:To defund the police, activists rewrote city budgets by Ericson2314 on Thursday June 04, 2020 @03:53PM (#23420988)

Civil forfeiture works "best" in small jurisdictions harassing driver-bys who aren't constituents, right?

I think we can go for defunding in the major metros (which also have the more powerful police departments in absolute terms), and then go after the smaller jurisdiction police (with more relative power) with/after fixed laws.

Also, if the police are curtailed in the urban areas, and Covid fear lowers the rent, poor persons of color can "vote with their feet" and move from Fergusons to Saint Louises. Not the best solution, but I can't imagine a friendly supreme court too soon so this is better than nothing.

[ Parent | on HN ]