The city of St. Louis is moving toward axing nearly 100 police officer positions and cutting millions from the police department’s budget. The movement to defund the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department was lauded by Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.), who called the decision “historic,” despite the city being one of the most violent per capita in the world.
A proposal to eliminate 98 vacant officer positions and reallocate $4 million of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department’s $171 million budget passed a vote last week. The proposition was passed by the Board of Estimate and Apportionment by a 2-1 vote, with St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones (D) and Comptroller Darlene Green supporting the plan and Board of Aldermen President Lewis Reed opposing the proposal. Fox News reported that the plan “now goes to the Board of Alderman, the legislative body of the city, for hearings and possible amendments, before it’s set to take effect July 1.”
“The plan moves $4 million out of the police department’s $171 million budget to go toward affordable housing, homeless services, a victims’ support program and civil rights litigators,” the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. “The police budget accounts for about 15% of total city spending.”
“For many years the budget has not supported the needs of the people and that’s why we’re seeing record numbers of homicides and other acts of violence,” Jones said in a statement after the vote, according to the Riverfront Times. “What we’ve been doing doesn’t work. This revised budget will start St. Louis on a new path to tackling some of the root causes of crime.”
Bush said the vote to defund the police is “historic.”
“Today’s decision to defund the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department is historic,” Bush said in a statement. “We are building a St. Louis where elected officials lead in partnership with activists, organizers, and our communities.”
“For decades, our city funneled more and more money into our police department under the guise of public safety, while massively underinvesting in the resources that will truly keep our communities safe,” Bush added.
“Previous administrations spent more per capita on policing than all comparable cities, building a police force that is larger than that of any city comparable to St. Louis,” the congresswoman continued. “But even as more and more money has gone into policing, the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department continues to be the deadliest police force in the nation, year after year — all while violence in our communities continues to skyrocket.”
St. Louis police were responsible for more killings per capita than any of the 100 largest police departments, according to a report from Arch City Defenders, a self-described “holistic legal advocacy organization that combats the criminalization of poverty and state violence, especially in communities of color.”
Bush called for alternatives to police, such as “unarmed mental health professionals or social workers to respond to crisis calls.”
However, not all residents of the crime-ridden city were sold on having fewer cops, and in fact, some called for more police on the streets.
“I would like to see more police officers here,” longtime St. Louis resident Gale Davis told KSDK-TV.
“Just make sure that we have police officers and safety because this is a dangerous city,” LaTaisha Jones-Lewis, who lives on the south side of the city, stated.
Not only is St. Louis a “dangerous city,” but it was recently named as one of the most violent cities in the entire world. The Citizen Council for Public Safety and Criminal Justice, a Mexican think tank, released its annual 2020 rankings of the 50 most violent cities in the world on April 20.
The first six spots of the most violent cities list are all Mexican cities, including Celaya, Tijuana, and Juarez occupying the top three spots. St. Louis, which had 264 homicides in 2020, up from 194 in 2019, is the seventh most violent city in the world. Other U.S. cities on the list include Baltimore, New Orleans, and Memphis, which were 16th, 21st, and 24th, respectively.
I feel about St. Louis, Fergerson, Detroit, Seattle, Baltimore, Memphis, Cleveland, New York, LA, and other cities, the same way I feel about Minneapolis and Portland – good riddance; destroy yourselves; you will not be missed.
Well said! Wish I had said it.
Notice what the American ones all have in common
That is the dark truth of the matter! (tic)
Well played. Well played, indeed.
This is ridiculous!!!! Wait until they start seriously injuring, killing and taking hostage the “unarmed social workers” they send into crisis situations. Lets see how that works out for the idiots in charge (Democrats) Buckle up folks this shit is just getting started and fueled by the Democrats in D.C.
You misspelled “Demoncrats”.
Take a good look at her, and you will realize why she is delighted with the idea of getting the mean ol’ police out of the way, so black folks can make an ‘honest living’ for their families, robbing, looting, drug-dealing, and car-jacking, without interference!
‘Bush called for alternatives to police, such as “unarmed mental health professionals or social workers to respond to crisis calls.”’ Look how defunding the police worked out for Portland. Not good. Now they want to hire a bunch of unarmed ‘park rangers’ to respond to calls, some potentially violent ones, at that.
I suppose there might be some Democrat social workers out of the ID10T box that might take those kinds of jobs but I think they will have a very short career.
Sure, get rid of the police, that will certainly make things safer.
Ok, just one more reason to avoid St Louis at all costs! I can already hear the minority “Victims” of crime crying about how the POLEZE never go to their neighborhoods, just the rich, white folks!
Here’s alternate routes around St. Louis, I-255, goes around to the south, and I-270 goes around to the north. You’ll still hit bits of St. Louis, but not go through town like I-55, I-70, and I-64 (40). I know if this passes, I’ll miss St. Louis.
Face it. ‘Sane’ people do not act the way they are acting.
A perfect recipe for disaster. I lived in St. Louis for 5 years back in the late 1980’s. It had a lot of good things going for it but even then you had to practice situational awareness. My first night there I walked into the neighborhood convenience store and found a clerk cowering behind bulletproof glass — and 3 dead armed robbers on the floor. Just to prove that this event wasn’t unusual, I was held up by 2 armed black youngsters in my front yard, run off the sidewalk while jogging by a carload of black teenagers, and had my home broken into and burglarized. Goodbye St. Louis and “hello” Florida!
Is insanity an affliction to Democrat leadership?
Is there a vaccination to mitigate?
michael zitterman
mikiesmoky @ aol.com
Stupid is as stupid does. The great Forest Gump.
Have they called Minneapolis lately. You will get what you pay (&*^*((^%^&*((s.
Gonna Need a Heck of a lot More than 4 Million for Victim Services if You Defund the Police! Total Idiots!
Spot on! $4M is a mere .02% of the total police budget, and frankly, nothing but a gesture, historic or otherwise, applauded by God-Forsaken marxists who can campaign on “making good” on a promise of “change”
$4 million in a city with an annual budget of $1.1 billion is change, alright. Chump change for a chump administration.
NOW I know the demo’s have gone totally insane. Oh wait, you have to have a brain to go insane, sorry. Without LAW enforcement, there will be no enforcement, thus no law, and by DEFAULT there will be NO ORDER! Stock up on your ammo now, before that is illegal as well!