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They didn’t get the money this go round but they made the seriousness of their demands know to bot the city government and the community at large. Now more people in Baltimore understand that they have a right to be heard when identifying priorities on how their tax dollars should be spent. https://www.marylandmatters.org/2021/06/29/opinion-baltimore-city-council-should-listen-to-city-residents-not-ignore-them/ 7/8

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Can you work with a municipality and stay true to the notion that police are not the answer for public? After all, the police budget IS the public safety budget! And if you do decide to work on reducing the police budget, can you trust governments to make the process something meaningful. But if you don’t work with a city, then where will the money come from to accomplish the change you want? It’s complicated! 2/8

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Yesterday I talked about police department budgets. So if you’re an abolitionist you want to start working on reducing police budgets right? Except its not that simple and I think the topic of how you get police budgets reduced is a good example of the complexity of thinking about abolitionist work. Andrea Ritchie and Mariame Kaba have a chapter on this called “Tricks and Tension.” 1/8

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In all three of the cities “crime” is supposedly spiraling. In fact, it’s that gun violence is increasing to pre-pandemic levels. Every year the police get more and more money, but they don’t seem to be effective in crime control. And that’s probably because the police don’t prevent crime, they respond to it. Tomorrow I’ll mention how an individual person can participate in the police budgeting decision making. 8/8

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The NYC police budget does not include the $121 MILLION dollars the city paid out in settlements for lawsuits charging police misconduct. Chicago’s budget does not include the $250 million spent between 2017 and 2020 to resolve lawsuits against the police for improper use of force. DC paid $1.6 MILLION for just two lawsuits. Across the country BILLIONS are being paid in settlements. 7/8

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The budget for the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington DC was $545 MILLION dollars for a city with 700,000 residents. The council has consistently attempted to reduce the budget over the objections of Mayor Bowser and her consistent attempts to increase it. DC as well as Chicago used COVID relief money for the police (who in DC resisted wearing masks throughout the whole pandemic!) 6/8

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The Chicago Police budget is 1.9 BILLION dollars and former Mayor Lori Lightfoot still managed to give them more. A recent report from Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability found the CPD was not spending the money effectively or equitably. And get this.… “lacks a long-term, data-driven strategy to reduce violence.” No plan at all on guns. 5/8

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How many of us know how much money our city, town or village pays to the police? The amount of money can be astounding. The NYC police budget is approx. $11BILLION dollars. That does not include grants they may receive from the Feds or the airport authorities. It is the 3rd largest agency in the city. If you deducted the mandatory costs of Medicaid it would be the 2nd 4/8

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Over the past few years police in numerous departments have been prosecuted for abusing overtime and leave policies. See departments in CA, Shreveport LA, Louisville, KY, Boston and in FL. During the recorded hours of conversation, numerous police officers talked about doing their work slowly to help them accrue overtime pay. The officer in question took an additional 5 hours to process the arrest than was required. 3/8

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The story linked above details how a protestor was arrested inside a building. Rather than give him a desk appearance ticket, the police chose to take him down to the precinct for booking. Unbeknown to them while they were detaining the man, his phone was on and recorded several hours of the police talking among themselves. They were talking about creating overtime. 2/8

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I was following a story out of New York recently that caused me to think about municipal budgets for the police. This is a complicated issue and can present tensions for abolitionists. More on tensions tomorrow, but first let’s take a look at the issue of police budgets. https://gothamist.com/news/nypd-officers-brag-about-milking-overtime-call-detainees-names-in-accidental-recording 1/8

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Thinking about how to create safety is a labor of both love and necessity. The highlighted projects show it IS possible for us to change the paradigm for what is considered safety and how we go about achieving it. I can’t repeat often enough, it is a long term project but it starts with each of us really thinking about what the world we want to live in should look like and then figuring out how to get there. Peace. 7/7

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The Black Market is a small independent grocery store opened to address a food desert in Louisville. Opened by #BLM supporter. Community-based efforts can be rocky. The store was opened and by all accounts doing well. A car slid into the building this winter and damaged it. The store was then vandalized. The owner is undeterred. She hopes to have the store up and running again soon. https://www.bizjournals.com/louisville/news/2023/01/23/black-market-ky-setbacks.html 6/7

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On a smaller scale you also have the mutual aid concept of Community Fridge. In NYC the pandemic and concerns about food insecurity led some community folks to start NYC Community Fridges where refrigerators are put outside of a bodega . Food is free for anyone who needs. During the pandemic they started with 13. Now there are 123! Community fridge projects are now across the country. https://www.greenmatters.com/p/community-fridge-near-me 5/7

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Black Urban Framers are everywhere trying to address the lack of healthy food choices in our communities. Here are two great articles covering what urban farmers are doing to help end food deserts: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-americas-food-farmers-race-insight-idUSKCN24V0R8. The Guardian piece also talks about mentioned yesterday. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/mar/05/black-led-urban-farms-are-thriving-until-they-have-to-fight-for-their-land 4/7

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#1MExperiments has some interesting experiments dealing with food. One is Rogers Park Yard Sharing where property owners share yard space for growing food and learning environmental issues. They have a tool kit for others interested in the concept https://millionexperiments.com/projects/rogers-park-yard-sharing. Another is Plant-Grow-Share: https://thecentralneighborhood.com/plant-grow-share/ 3/7

#Abolition #BlackMastodon #BlackFediveese #BlackTwitter #Police Violence In addition to the community groups working on eliminating food deserts, John Hopkins School of Public Health created an app to pair urban farmers with corner store owners willing to include healthier food in their stores. Corner stores in Baltimore and other urban communities are often the only food options. The stores become important sites for delivering healthy food. Read about the app. https://wordinblack.com/2022/12/this-app-brings-fresh-food-to-corner-store-shelves/
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Yesterday I posted a list of factors that create unsafe conditions in our communities. The flow chart for food looks like: governmental failure to build infrastructure + economic disinvestment = lack of access to healthy food + lack of access to medical care -> poor health outcomes = chronic illness and/or premature death See e.g. COVID You can see that multiple factors from the list come into play. 1/7