Sleep/Swim

A couple months ago when the City of Detroit was revising their budget to account for a massive deficit, it was announced that there would be cutbacks to the fire and police departments. It wasn't until today that I found out how massive these cutbacks really are. I saw something posted on Detroit Yes, and I got curious.

So, I looked up some articles online to find out how the city's police department was restructured. I think "restructured" may be an inappropriate term here. 'Making bad things much, much worse' may be a better term for the situation. This is the initial result of the cutbacks:

First, at least 150 officers were laid off in addition to most student officers which means that when cops retire, there will be no one to take their place. Real smart.

Second, several precincts were closed or consolidated. Here is the breakdown by precinct number:

• 1-closed
• 2-being used only to house prisoners
• 3-covers 3,4&2,moving to new location on Fort/Clark this month (new loc. does not have cell block)
• 4-closed
• 5-closed
• 6-open covering 6&8
• 7-closed
• 8-closed
• 9-covers 9&5
• 10-closed
• 11-covers 11&7
• 12-covers 12&10
• 13-covers 13&1, but cellblock has been closed

If you read that closely, you'll see that there are now only five cellblocks where there were thirteen. With the first precinct being closed, this means that Greektown no longer looks and feels like a police state. There aren't quite as many officers wandering around down there.

The second precinct has always been the officers who deal with traffic and crowd control. For years they have provided free security and crowd/traffic control for events at Comerica Park, Ford Field, the Fox Theater, and the State Theater. Finally, the city is considering charging these private interests for these services rendered.

But wait, it gets better!

The seventh precinct was over on Mack just east of Gratiot in one of the city's worst neighborhoods (east side). Now that's closed. Sounds real smart, doesn't it?

The thirteenth precinct may be one of the most visible for suburbanites and local college students. It's on Woodward in the popular Midtown area. If you were hanging out at the Magic Stick and your car got stolen, this is the precinct you had to deal with when filing a report. If you were at the Bronx, and someone mugged you, the thirteenth is where the responding officers came from (if not from Wayne State - we laugh at them, but they have all the same authority as a DPD officer and they're often quicker to respond). Knowing all this makes me scared to know that their cellblock is now closed. It makes me feel like maybe some officers might overlook some things just to avoid having to deal with taking a suspect or perpetrator across town to an open (and most likely overcrowded) cellblock.

My point is that I don't think Detroiters really understand what's going on here. I was horrified when I heard on NPR this morning that Kwame's rating has gone up by ten points since primary. He's still losing to Hendrix, but he's on the move, and that means that people have already forgotten the mysterious Manoogian Mansion party/murder that supposedly didn't happen, and that they've forgotten about his spending issues with the city's credit card, and that they don't even know about the police layoffs and restructuring. And what's even worse is that this is just what's going on with the police department. I'm sure the fire department is even worse. I can't imagine.

(Maybe this is why when my tires/rims were stolen off my car two months ago I couldn't get an officer to file a report to save my life. I still haven't filed that report and I don't think I ever will. What's the point?)