Black Lives Matter and Defunding the Police Part Two

If you happened to have read my blog post from the other day, then you read part one on this two part blog piece. Part One dealt with Black Lives Matter, a few facts and my thoughts and opinions on the topic. Today, I am going to talk about Defunding the Police and again my thoughts, opinions and a few facts thrown in. It is a huge topic right now and one that affects not just black lives, but the lives of all of us in every state, city, town and community across the country.

Again, these are my thoughts and opinions and you are under no obligation to agree. 

So....Defunding the Police (DTP). It is the cry of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. Now in my previous post, Black Lives Matter and Defunding the Police Part One, I was clear on how I felt about the movement and it's hypocrisy and the reasons why. I feel no less strongly about the Defunding of the Police.

To begin with, I said something about defunding the police the other day on facebook, and a friend posted to me, this snipit from an article she found (I do not know the source) with the reasoning behind (DTP). Here it is:

Defunding the police is shorthand for a divest and invest model: divesting money from local and state police budgets and reinvesting it into communities, mental health services, and social service programs.
The idea is that American communities have come to rely on their more than 18,000 police agencies to do much more than police. They’re fighting terrorism abroad, performing homeless services, working with children in schools, responding to calls for mental health crises, performing social work and welfare checks, mediating domestic disputes, and responding to drug overdoses. Often, they’re not trained to perform these tasks. 
Those who call for police defunding say they would rather have some duties handled by nonviolent specialists trained in social work, education, or drug counseling.
As the police take on more work, their budgets have also grown substantially. The U.S. spends an estimated $100 billion on their police forces annually, with another $80 billion spent on incarceration. Policing typically accounts for one-third to 60% of American cities’ annual budgets. 
The New York Police Department, for example, has a $6 billion budget—that’s more than spending on homeless services, housing development and upkeep, youth and community services, health and hospitals, and parks and recreation combined.


Alright....it sounds reasonable to a point....on paper. Of course when you figure into that the NYPD also has 36,000 officers and 19,000 civilian employees in one of the highest crime rated cities in the country, not too mention a very high cost of living rate, and that those dollars cover much more than just salaries....they also cover equipment, pensions and classes just to name a few, it all makes a little more sense.

It doesn't matter where in the country you are at though, you have to also realize that you are talking about a group of men and women who every day put their lives on the line to protect and serve our communities with no guarantee that they will make it through a shift alive. The average salary for a cop across the country according to Indeed is $54,174. Broken down that is $4,514 per month, $1,128 per week and $28 per hour. Most cops make much less than that and a lot of less hazardous jobs pay a lot more. So yeah....$28/hr hardly seems like much considering what is ask of them in a day, and yet BLM (if we go by the above definition of defunding) wants to cut their salaries even further. Hmmmmm.

So, just what is a police officers job description? Each department, throughout the country has their own official description but all are pretty much the same, so I just pulled the description from Wikipedia. It seems to cover what we would expect, but let's delve a little deeper.

Police are first responders. In any situation, they are usually first on the scene to secure what could be a volatile situation. Over the years they have been the first ones on scenes like Jonesboro, Columbine, the Oklahoma City Bombing, 9/ll and the list of scenes go on and on. In many cases, even if it is a fire or emergency situation, fire fighters and EMS cannot and will not go into a situation unless police have first come in and secured it. It is for the safety of the firefighters and the EMS crews as well as all civilians involved.

Police also have training in but not limited to: emergency medical treatment, psychology, tactical combat training, search and rescue, domestic violence and abuse, community relations, crime scene investigations, hostage negotiations, crisis management and forensics. Their jobs can entail everything from stopping someone from killing themselves, to handling terrorists threats. They see the best in their communities and they see the very worst and in return, they are screamed at, spit on, called names and treated as though they are the enemy. And probably the most significant part of the job is not only that they have to be prepared to die each and every day, but they also have to be prepared to kill to protect others. Can you even imagine such a job? Yeah, that $28/hour sure doesn't look like that much when the realities of their jobs are focused on.

I have always supported law enforcement. Truthfully, I haven't always liked all the cops I have dealt with, but I have always respected the job they do and how hard I know it is. If I had their jobs and had to deal with what they do, I might not be real likable at times either. Never though, have I needed a cop that they didn't do their job to the fullest and give those involved the help they needed. I guess that is why the other night was concerning to me. We had a group of BLM protesters protesting in Wichita. It was a 3 or 4 night event. The first night they were all but rained out. The second night though, they were a bit more prepared for the weather. It was at this time that I realized that even in Wichita, the greatest number of protesters were not black, but white. Again....kids who have no idea about anyone's struggle, let alone a black persons, and they were not yelling "defund the police," they were yelling the new mantra, "abolish the police!" There is quite a difference in the two. They were also yelling...."Whose streets? Our streets!" Hmmmm. Of the 60-100 protesters, I would bet that maybe 20% paid taxes. Honey...those streets are MY streets. Not yours.

The moment that they yelled "abolish the police," they need to realize that this became something much more serious than they even know. This is no longer a BLM issue. This is now an issue that affects everyone of all colors, as those police protect and serve us all. I refuse to give that up to any group because quite frankly.....my life is just as important as yours. My life matters too!

So.....let's just play devils advocate for a moment. Let's just say we decided right here in Wichita to abolish the police. What might that look like? Well, first of all, we have seen that Millenials and Gen Zers have very little impulse control, nor do they have any understanding of true struggle, not to mention most seem pretty entitled, so no police means they will come in and take what they want, destroy what they want and demand more, with no one telling them what to do. Sounds like utopia...right?

Forget that you have worked hard all your life for something. Without police, there is no one to uphold the law and therefore no law means either you buy a gun and protect yourself and your property or you allow your property to be taken from you. You add into the fact that these particular age groups have absolutely no idea what a "peaceful protest" is, and they tend to involve themselves in a lot of drug activity (heroin, meth, pills, etc) and you are not just dealing with entitlement but also with the mental issues that go along with drug abuse, so there's that to contend with too. It's just getting better...right?

By abolishing the police, then you also lose your front line first responders. You know the ones who keep your boyfriend from beating you to death, or the ones that pull your child from the pool and resuscitate them back to life or the ones that make sure it is safe for EMS and fire fighters to do their jobs to help you. And when people inevitably start shooting each other in the streets because they are sick of no one doing anything....and trust me they will.....whose going to come when your family member or friend is lying in that street bleeding? Whose going to catch your rapist? Whose going to help you find your missing child? Oh right. No one! Because the police were abolished. So....how's that working out for everybody?

Now let's go back to defunding. The fact is that most police departments are underfunded as it is. They are expected to do everything from psycho-analyzing someone to make sure they are not a danger to themselves or someone else, to rushing in to stop a shoot out. Sometimes the training is lacking because the dollars aren't there and yet, you want to defund the pay and resources they do have....so mental health professionals can rush in and do what? Do you think a mental health professional is going to run in and save a family when they have been broken into and someone is holding a gun on them? Is a mental health professional going to go into a crime scene and find a killer? Is a mental health professional going to secure a situation so that EMS can do their jobs? Of course not. It makes no sense and yet this is part of the defunding plan? 

So what does make sense? Perhaps those who have climbed their way up the ladder to six figure or more paychecks within the police departments, do their jobs. Perhaps they take pay cuts themselves so that those serving on the streets can get all the proper training and pay they need and deserve. Perhaps it makes more sense to have universal police training that covers race relations and mental health services for the police to use both on the job and personally. It also makes sense for police to work in communities with mental health professionals to help each other in crisis situations. It makes sense for awareness to be brought about that there are bad cops and to weed out and prosecute those who abuse their jobs and their badges, sending a message to other officers and the communities they serve that abuses of power will not be allowed.

I am in no way saying that there are not issues within police departments. But for all the issues, the good they do on a whole is far greater than the bad. It makes far more sense to fix what is broken than to scrap it all and leave our cities unprotected and open to all forms of criminal activity.

To abolish the police or even defund a little bit will end up being a travesty to everyone. More lives will be lost and I have no doubt, those yelling the loudest for this to happen, will also be the ones who end up crying the loudest if it does. Reallocating dollars into more training and community relations is a far better idea, as well as finding solutions to unite communities with their police forces.

Let's get down to brass tacks though. Much of this goes back to taking responsibility for our actions. How many times have we been pulled over by an officer doing his job, when we were speeding and as we drive away, blaming him? Forget that we were the ones going 45 mph in a clearly marked 30 mph zone, but somehow it is the cops fault for seeing us,  stopping us and giving us a ticket. And of course, our bad attitude has nothing to do with any attitude he might show us....right?  Let's face it, we've all watched enough COPS to know that when someone black or white commits a crime, they are seldom anxious to admit the wrong doing or deal with the consequences of the actions. They will lie, fight and wrongfully accuse....even if it is all caught on camera. It's not all about bad cops. A good deal of it is about people wanting to get away with bad things and the police are in their way. With police upholding the law, there is consequences and we live in a world where no one wants those consequences.

So....let's deal in facts. George Floyd was a criminal. He should have been arrested and he should have had his day in court. He however, should not have died the way he did and the officers involved should be held accountable for their own criminal actions and be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. It's that simple. That does not however mean that because Floyd died at the hands of bad cops, that all cops are bad. The reality is that good cops far outweigh bad cops in every precinct around the country. An even greater reality is that at some point in our lives, the chances are pretty great that we will need a cop and I just pray that when that time comes....they are able to be there when we call.

These are MY streets and I support law enforcement. How about you?

Wichita....My Past

I have been feeling rather nostalgic of late. If you are a friend of mine on facebook, I am sure yesterdays numerous nostalgic posts made this quite evident. With all the changes I am trying to implement, perhaps I am looking for that one last hurrah with the past, so that I can move forward. Sometimes visiting the past is like a warm and fuzzy feeling on a cold night. You don't really want to be warm and fuzzy forever (at least I don't), but that walk down memory lane sure can be a nice vacation away from reality and the present.

So last night I saw a post about the 16 most missed landmarks of Denver....or something along those lines. At any rate, it got me to thinking about Wichita. Wichita is the city that I grew up closest to. Early on, I lived there and later on, it was the place where we shopped, I worked and for a few months, where I lived again. I played a lot in Wichita, from my late teens on and I have some truly fond memories of one of the smaller cities in America.

Wichita sits in the south central part of the state of Kansas and while it is not the capitol, it is the largest city in the state and the 49th largest city in the country. Wichita has an interesting past of wagon trains, cattle drives and shoot outs, all before it began taking the shape of what it has become today. One of my favorite places to visit in Wichita is the Old Cow Town Museum. It is an outdoor museum made up of some of the original buildings from Wichita's early days. During the summer they have actors take up daily residence there and act out a day in the life of early Wichitans, complete with long dresses, long sleeves and sometimes 100+ degree weather. It is actually an amazing place and if you like history like I do, then TOCTM is a must see if you are ever in these parts.

Growing up in Wichita pre-Michael Soles and pre-Otero murder/BTK, it was an amazing place. In the 1960's and early 70's, people still left their doors unlocked and their keys in their cars, even downtown. My mother would go once a week to the K-Mart on east Kellogg which was also a grocery store and buy a station wagon full of groceries for $50. We had family bbq's, kids played all over the neighborhood and we couldn't wait until school was out every year to take our final grade cards to Joyland Amusment Park and get free ride tickets for our A's and B's.

Joyland was a wonderful amusement park that left a mark on the memories of anyone growing up in the Wichita area between 1949 and 2006, with Louie, the organ playing clown, the Old Woman's Shoe and the pig trash can. There was also the Wacky Shack, where many a teen had their first kiss and the famous wooden roller coaster that was as dangerous as it was fun. Joyland opened Easter Sunday of every year and stayed open until Halloween. It was an exciting place for our little piece of the world and when it closed for good in 2006, due to a lack of funds and an increase in crime and gang activity in the area, it was as if a piece of our childhood had died. Now the park sits deserted, falling apart and according to some......haunted. In fact for years after it closed, many said they could hear Louie playing the old Wurlitzer late late at night. Hmmmm

The amusement park was not the only place we had fun though. As a kid, a huge treat was going to the drive-in. We would get dressed in our pajama's, Mom would make sandwiches and we would head out. We would back our station wagon into the stall, throw down pillows and blankets and we were set for the evening. The first drive-in movie I ever saw was The Jungle Book at the Meadowlark on east Harry St. I loved it! Wichita had it's fair share of drive-ins back in the day: The 54, Sunset, Meadowlark and the Landmark just to name a few, but sadly, only the Starlite currently remains. I am glad to say though, that during drive-in season, that place is still hoppin'!

Downtown Wichita used to be quite a place too. Long before the suburbs brought us Towne East and Towne West malls, we had downtown Wichita. It was an exciting bustling place where everyone did their shopping and you could see housewives in hats, gloves and heels, with a tight grip on their equally dressed up children frequenting places like the Innes Tea Room, The Model and Lewins. We had Macy's, Henry's and Brooks Brothers and of course my favorite place was Woolworth's. Not only did it seem like Woolworth's had absolutely everything, but the best part of all was the lunch counter with the soda fountain. A soda or a sandwich at Woolworth's was really quite the treat.

My all time favorite spot downtown though, was Macy's. Macy's was a multilevel building just like something out of an old black and white movie. You took an elevator to get to whatever department you wanted. As it has been many years since Macy's left Wichita, I don't remember what level was what, but I do remember absolutely loving that store. It still makes me sad to know that it is gone.

As Wichita began to spread out both east and west, keeping up with the times, one of  the first local malls came to be. On east Harry they knocked out another small amusement park called Kiddieland which was basically a Joyland for the 6 and under set and my beloved Meadowlark Drive-in was also sacrificed so that the Harry Street Mall could be built. Being the child of divorced parents, I spent a great many Saturday's and Sunday's at the HSM because my dad didn't know what else to do with us. I spent hours walking the oblong mall past McDonald's Department Store, Hickory Farms, Montgomery Wards, the pet store with puppies on display, Cricket Alley(the most amazing dress store ever) and of course....Orange Julius. HSM also boasted a movie theater where I was privileged to see at least the first two Star Wars movies and maybe even the third. I loved the HSM and it will forever hold a special place in my heart. Sadly, in the mid 1970's HSM began to see the beginning of the end as Towne East Square and soon after Towne West Square were built to anchor Kellogg and draw traffic to the suburbs.

While Towne East meant the slow and steady demise of my beloved HSM, I grew very enamored with TE very quickly. Perhaps it was it's multi-levels, it's shiny new surfaces or maybe it was the fact that I was now of the Mall Rat age and I just loved hanging out in the food court. Whatever the case though, TE won me over and I have been a dedicated fan ever since.

Wichita holds other dear memories for me such as skating on Saturday nights. All us Mulvane kids would load into someones parents car (often my mothers) and we would head out to Joyland Skate, Skate South or Skate East and make the rounds of the rink to the likes of the Bee Gee's and Donna Summer. We ALL ate Italian at Angelo's and the Colonial had the best ice cream soda's around.

When I was old enough to drive (and maybe even a little before), there was Douglas street dragging. Douglas was two or so miles of midtown street where every Friday and Saturday night, kids and car aficionado's from all over the area met and made the round over and over again. On a busy night, it might take two hours to go the two miles. The cars were amazing, the kids were from all over and the music was blaring from car speakers up and down the strip. It was the cheapest and some of the best spent moments of my teen's and early 20's. But like everything else, it only takes a few bad apples to spoil it for everyone. Gangs became a bigger presence in the area and since the decline of the downtown shopping area with the mall boom, the city decided they wanted to renovate the area and thus ended dragging on Douglas in the early 1990's.

Wichita was an amazing place back in the recesses of my mind. There were pony rides at Watson park and the "original" zoo at Riverside Park. We ate at places like Angelo's, Portobella Road, the Lazy R, Howard Johnson's, The Old Weigh Station and Shakey's Pizza. We partied at Pogo's, Backstage, Bubba Rocks, Johnny Rockets, The Rattlesnake Club, the Fireside and the Cowboy. We shopped at Macy's, Lewin's, Henry's, the Model and my all time favorite....Cricket Alley. We watched football at Cessna Stadium and went to the Coliseum for everything. We had the Twin Lakes Mall and the Harry Street Mall, drive-in's galore and bowling alley's all over town. We were the Air Capitol of the world with Cessna, Beech, Boeing and Learjet. We had Wichita State University for higher education and with Century II and the Wichita Art Association we kept up with the culture and refinement of the times. To those from the St. Louis's, Oklahoma City's and other big cities, Wichita might not have seemed like much in it's growing years, but to the locals, it was bursting with activities, shops and it's own little midwestern culture and I hold it fondly in my heart.

So there you have it....my nostalgic stroll down memory lane into a time, mostly forgotten and yet it still holds a special place inside me. Now I will carefully take these wonderful places and times and fold them neatly and tuck them away until another day when a wave of nostalgia hits. Until then though, I move forward knowing that each and everyone of these memories, made me who I am today.