Police have been quitting in droves in the last year • Hacker News Board

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#211

Post by JamisonM » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:32 PM UTC

As an observer from the other side of the northern border I have always been keen to see the US temper its general culture of "police worship" that seems very contrary to the interests of the general public. I have likewise been hoping to see the vast number of smaller forces consolidate into larger forces that might have better training & resources with less nepotism and petty corruption.

I feel a lot of sympathy for the officers referenced in the article and their personal stories seem very genuine and troubling.

I have no idea how to "solve" the more general problem that seems to be the thesis of the article. Anyone can see that the political valence of modern police forces in the US as expressed by their unions is now so hostile to a majority of the people being policed it seems entirely untenable. And in places like New York City that is despite the force getting better at reducing violent incidents with residents over the last decade or so. The very extreme bunker mentality expressed by police unions likewise make them bad-faith actors in any attempts to improve the relationships involved here.

The Newark success story seems like the solution: https://www.nj.com/news/2021/01/newark-cops-with-reform-didn...

Of course that sure makes it seem like my original position that "larger forces" would probably be better look quite incorrect, it would be hard to imagine implementing a reform like Newark's if a regional police force were in need of reform with multiple stakeholders across jurisdictions to convince and satisfy. I do think that I would really love some journalism that goes deep into what other forces think of the Newark reforms and the results at a union & officer level.

Back to the original article, some of the numbers here are bit misleading, I found this article:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/18/us/police-reform-year-of-reck...

"The retirement bubble is bursting

There's another, older, reason behind so many officers leaving the force: the 1994 Crime Control Act, a controversial law overseen by Joe Biden in the Senate and signed by Bill Clinton, which provided $7.6 billion in federal funding for tens of thousands of police officers.

"All these cops are coming up for retirement now," said Ivonne Roman, one of those so-called "Clinton Cops" who retired as police chief of Newark on April 1. "This past April alone 200 cops retired in Newark. This was always coming regardless of Covid or the protests.""

Nearly 10% of the officers in the US are apparently eligible for retirement in the US as of the end of 2020, and with the risks of COVID-19 I can see why you would see a large uptick in resignations regardless of any other circumstances. Not that this takes away from the very real experiences that other officers are finding pushing them out of the policing earlier than they would otherwise like.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#212

Post by II2II » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:32 PM UTC

dfxm12 wrote: post #48

Finally, officers said they were asked to handle too much; they were constantly thrown at tangled societal problems like mental health breakdowns or drug overdoses, they said, for which they were ill-equipped — then blamed when things went wrong. Yes. Untrained people should not be sent to deal with these issues. Hopefully, this leads to municipalities actually training people to deal with these issues instead of con…

I doubt that it is that simple.

By the time police are called in, it likely is a police issue: a crime has been committed or there is an imminent threat of violence. Having specially trained people to deal with those issues may marginally improve the situation, but they will end up being the police in all but name. The blame will be shifted away from the police and the burden will be put on the new organization.

What we need is a means of reducing the social ills that lead to mental health breakdowns and drug overdoses. That requires proactive involvement in the community rather than a response model.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#213

Post by bluedino » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:33 PM UTC

Pet_Ant wrote: post #120

ceejayoz wrote: post #5

> Finally, officers said they were asked to handle too much; they were constantly thrown at tangled societal problems like mental health breakdowns or drug overdoses, they said, for which they were ill-equipped — then blamed when things went wrong. Sounds like they've got some common ground with the "defund the police" folks, if they'd listen a bit.

In most places that is the issues that the communities face. But Police like firefighters need to exist irrespective of any current need, so what else would you have them do in the mean time? Maybe they need to up their training to include those items. They aren't just town guards.

There is a trend of cross-training fire and police, creating 'public safety officers'

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#214

Post by only_as_i_fall » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:34 PM UTC

pirate787 wrote: post #76

nradov wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Law enforcement can be dangerous but it's only #22 in occupational death rates. Lumberjacks and roofers are far more likely to get killed. https://www.ishn.com/articles/112748-top-25-most-dangerous-j...

I suspect this doesn't account for the subset of cops out on the beat versus law enforcement clerical workers.

In most years the leading cause of death among on-duty police officers is traffic accidents.

So in a sense you're right but not really for the reasons you might think.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#215

Post by bluedino » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:34 PM UTC

yardie wrote: post #52

_fat_santa wrote: post #3

Policing has to be one of the hardest jobs in our modern society, I honestly couldn't event imagine the stress. Imagine picking up a JIRA ticket at work and not knowing if that ticket is going to a run of the mill bug fix or something that can kill you. That's just out of the realm of possibility for an SWE but for a cop it can be any one of the calls they take on a daily basis. I've always had respect for cops becau…

We know different cops. The only cops I've met are mildly racist and intellectually lazy. Sure they were occassionally nice to have a beer with. But then they'd start talking and leave no doubt they aren't one of the good apples. Imagine getting a JIRA ticket thinking, "fucking Java bug, again. Only way to fix this is to yank the power cord out." Honestly, delivery people have to put up with way more shit and don't h…

>> Imagine getting a JIRA ticket thinking, "fucking Java bug, again. Only way to fix this is to yank the power cord out."

You must not have worked with a lot of support staff

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#216

Post by tzs » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:35 PM UTC

viraptor wrote: post #160

blacktriangle wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except "so many unarmed black people are shot" is a lie. A larger per-capita percentages of unarmed whites are shot than blacks.

Absolute death by police in 2020: white 457, black 241. https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-de... Population: white 197M, black 40M. https://statisticalatlas.com/United-States/Race-and-Ethnicit... Per-capita: close to 3 times as many black people shot. I couldn't find clear statistics for unarmed victims. Please post if they're much different.

You used to be able to get data on armed vs. unarmed at killedbypolice.net, although it took a bit of effort. The site was simply a chronological list of all the known police killings in the US, for each giving name, age, race, gender, location, and linking to news stories covering the killing.

Unfortunately that site shut down, someone else got the name, and it now redirects to RoBarGuns.com, a gun review and buying guides site.

You can still get the data from archive.org here [1]. That has all the 2020 shootings up through July 20th, and has links for prior years back to 2014, and the last month of 2013.

I remember a couple years ago going through the then previous year and picking something like 50 at random (via a random number generator) and looking into the details, but I don't remember if I specifically took note of armed vs. unarmed.

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20200723033637/https://killedbyp...

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#217

Post by 835Temporary » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

mtrower wrote: post #95

recursivedoubts wrote: post #12

Democracy is said to be the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. However, I note that, from a democratic perspective, it appears that the broader public does not actually want a reduced police force, and this appears to be true across racial lines[1]. So, let us perhaps say, instead: democracy is the theory that the extremely-online elites and activists know what the…

> So, let us perhaps say, instead: democracy is theory that the extremely-online elites and activists know what they want, and that the common people deserve to get it good and hard. Holding a (small time) elected leadership position, this definitely matches my own observations. I have to deal with the opinions of those I represent on the matters I’m elected to handle quite frequently; the opinions of the few and the…

Interesting. Are you aware of any blog/channel/whatever where I could read honest reports from elected officials on the nuts and bolts of their jobs?

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#218

Post by sgtnasty » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #5

> Finally, officers said they were asked to handle too much; they were constantly thrown at tangled societal problems like mental health breakdowns or drug overdoses, they said, for which they were ill-equipped — then blamed when things went wrong. Sounds like they've got some common ground with the "defund the police" folks, if they'd listen a bit.

The job is supposed to be hard, I don't understand the problem. Perhaps we need 1-4 years of crisis training instead of 6 months of how to shoot.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#219

Post by theossuary » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

treis wrote: post #125

I don't think enough people are talking about the huge change in the crime landscape. Here in Atlanta, violent crime is up 50, 60% while arrests are down 40%. We're down hundreds of cops and morale is terrible. Cops aren't doing their jobs because they fear politically motivated prosecution. And for good reason given that a handful of them faced politically motivated prosecution. We're still below the worst days of v…

I'm going to call BS on this. So many sensationalist stories were written about how there's "a spike in crime," but they're comparing this year to last year! Of course there was a spike in crime, last year there was a pandemic and national lockdown. Crime shifted to online and domestic, and now that the country is opening back up it's shifting back.

Take a look at the actual reported felony offenses and you'll see that yes there's a YTD spike this year, but it's still below where it was in 2019.

YTD crimes: 2019 - 10,963 2020 - 9,022 2021 - 9,928

Really the only scary increases in crime have been in domestic violence (which I bet also explains the increase in murders).

See https://www.atlantapd.org/home/showpublisheddocument/3037/63...

Also I'd really question wanting to retain police in a department that were so fickle they'd allow violent crimes to occur because they aren't worshiped enough. That is a type of self-centered police officer I'd like to leave anyways.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#220

Post by bluedino » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

viraptor wrote: post #160

blacktriangle wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except "so many unarmed black people are shot" is a lie. A larger per-capita percentages of unarmed whites are shot than blacks.

Absolute death by police in 2020: white 457, black 241. https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-de... Population: white 197M, black 40M. https://statisticalatlas.com/United-States/Race-and-Ethnicit... Per-capita: close to 3 times as many black people shot. I couldn't find clear statistics for unarmed victims. Please post if they're much different.

Those aren't unarmed, though (you pointed that out but I wanted to make it clear)

One of the most pernicious myths about police shootings is that officers shoot unarmed black men at an alarming rate, when in fact just 2% of the people who were killed by an officer were unarmed and black. Since the beginning of 2015, law enforcement officers across the country have actually killed 33 more unarmed white people than unarmed black people.