A Harvard professor is warning that defunding police departments “could cost thousands of black lives.”
Protesters across the country are calling for local police departments to be defunded, a movement that was sparked by George Floyd’s death in police custody last month. Several local governments have already made plans to restructure or reallocate funding for law enforcement.
“Defunding the police is not a solution and could cost thousands of black lives,” economics professor Roland Fryer told the College Fix on Monday.
Fryer is the youngest black American to receive tenure in Harvard history and focuses much of his research on race issues.
“I think the streets are talking, and we should listen. People are frustrated,” he added.
Fryer’s new working study, titled “Policing the Police: The Impact of ‘Pattern-or-Practice Investigations on Crime,” focuses on police officers and how they interact with local communities. The paper found that homicides often increase following national scrutiny of police.
“Our estimates suggest that investigating police departments after viral incidents of police violence is responsible for approximately 450 excess homicides per year. This is 2x the loss of life in the line of duty for the US Military in a year, 12.6x the annual loss of life due to school shootings, and 3x the loss of life due to lynchings between 1882 and 1901 – the most gruesome years,” the working paper reads.
A veto-free majority of the Minneapolis City Council signed a pledge earlier this month to dismantle the city police department and reallocate funding to other areas of the city’s public safety budget.
“We’re here because we hear you. We are here today because George Floyd was killed by the Minneapolis Police. We are here because here in Minneapolis and in cities across the United States it is clear that our existing system of policing and public safety is not keeping our communities safe,” Minneapolis City Council President Lisa Bender said. “Our efforts at incremental reform have failed. Period.”
In Los Angeles, the city council proposed legislation that would slash the police budget by up to $150 million.
“We need to rethink what it is that makes people safer and makes communities stronger. We cannot just look at the police in isolation,” the motion read. “There is no doubt that communities of color suffer disproportionately from negative interactions with the police.”
An ABC/Ipsos poll released last week showed that 64% of those polled oppose defunding the police, and 60% oppose reallocating some funds from the police to social and health programs.
