Last update: August 29, 2004 at 7:02 PM Dwight Hobbes: Inner-city blacks must protest cutback in cops Dwight Hobbes August 30, 2004 Nine officers are expected to retire from the Minneapolis Police Department next year and, if Mayor R.T. Rybak can get his projected 2005 budget past the City Council, those cops will not be replaced.
It would be most responsible of him to take another look at the books and figure out somewhere else to make this cut. Starting, for instance, with the $200,000 that will be spent on, of all things, a study on streetcars on the Midtown Greenway. Not that the study shouldn't someday happen, but, just now, public safety is a great deal more important. Accordingly, Rybak ought to reevaluate his priorities. Inner-city African-Americans, many of whom have had the most trouble with cops and condemn the Minneapolis Police Department as racist, in their own best interest ought to be first in line trying to help the MPD. Activists who've protested racial profiling and selective excessive force would do well to vehemently speak out and demonstrate against decreasing the police force. Regular, everyday citizens should be dispatching letters and telephone calls demanding that their City Council representatives oppose this planned cut. This is not at all to mitigate the Police Department's documented history of singling out black drivers and treating residents in black neighborhoods to storm trooper tactics. However, it is to state that anyone with common sense who dials 911 would rather have a profiling, arbitrarily head-knocking cop respond to the call than no one at all. And inner-city African-Americans increasingly find themselves needing to dial 911. Police officers, frankly, are the only protection they have. There is no place to turn when crack is peddled practically on their doorsteps. There's no one else to call when they're victimized by burglarizing junkies. The plague of drug traffic continually worsens in their neighborhoods and certainly won't lessen with fewer cops on patrol. There's long been a hue and cry for more cops of color -- but with nine fewer positions, well, do the math. Mayor Rybak's proposed budget sends a sign that he's not terribly concerned about inner-city Minneapolis -- which, after all, is where rampant lawlessness remains a fact of life. This is where gangland gunfire still tragically affects the quality of life as homicidal thugs murder not only one another but innocent bystanders, including children like slain 13-year-old Tyesha Edwards, who caught a stray bullet while sitting down to do homework in her Minneapolis home. Rybak, quoted in Pulse of the Twin Cities, calls the Edwards family his friends. On what basis? It's doubtful he generally has them over to dinner. Or that they can reach him at home. It's clear, however, that any loss of cops on the job heightens his "friends' " chances losing another family member and the chances that some other family similarly will suffer. The mayor would do a great deal better, instead of expediently talking feel-good talk, to responsibly walk the walk, making it a priority that inner-city life doesn't get any worse. The last thing crime-ridden communities need is a weakening of the only thing standing between decent folk and criminals. Dwight Hobbes is a writer based in Minneapolis. Posted by Shawn Lewis, Field Neighborhood -- ___________________________________________________________ Sign-up for Ads Free at Mail.com http://promo.mail.com/adsfreejump.htm REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
