In the last post, we revealed that the huge taxes and fees the City is taking from you are going to fatten the budgets of your City Council Member. So, we should start examining what it is you'll be getting for the $5.6 million they are voting to pay themselves. The first responsibility of government is to protect the people - Public Safety is paramount.
But a review of the City's proposed budget shows that improvements to public safety are hardly a concern for the Council.
The proposed budget notes a desire to increase police staffing levels to two officers per 1,000 residents, but that such an increase would "require substantial new ongoing resources" which are not provided for in this budget. The Council is proposing to move away from a community policing model to a "geographic policing model". To hell with communities - they cost too much to provide adequate police resources anyway!
Oh, but the lack of officers is okay. The City will just purchase another ten cameras to install around Sacramento to record all of our movements and keep them in police files. It won't matter much the crimes that are happening in our neighborhoods, because police will be able to watch their televisions and find criminals after-the-fact. Your house may be trashed, your car smashed, or your neighbor murdered - but at least they can (maybe) figure out who did it!
The City Council is giving themselves each a 6% raise, so we should assume that the Police Department will also have at least as much , right? No, of course not. The proposed budget shows only one-half of one percent (0.5%) increase for the Police.
And the best is yet to come - other than body cameras and other recording devices, the City Council is putting police funding into hiring new staff at the Police Department. This should come as good news for those of us watching invasive property and non-violent crimes devour our communities. But none of these proposed staff will actually be helping to deter or combat crime.
Out of newly created positions, about 2.5 will go to running background checks on city employees. And the other 22.5 positions will be part-time jobs for police recruiters to go out and talk to kids about becoming police officers. Never mind the fact that even if they want to become officers there's no new money in the budget to hire them.
That's right. The Council's answer to crime in Sacramento is to hire part-time recruiters and buy cameras. But they really deserve that 6% raise, right?
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