Yeah. I considered adding a few sentences to the tune of "the politicians won't stick their necks out covering this waste unless they think there's political gain for them so this is really a reflection of the priorities of the people in the town" but felt that would drag things toward the direction of nit picking over what the people actually want.

That said, at the small town level having less crime than the next town over is generally how you please everyone so there's a pretty good overlap between what the powers that be want the cops to deliver and "less crime".

Police performance is kind of a malleable and hard to pin down thing.