Harry Jaffe: Balancing the budget on the backs of cops

Mayor Adrian Fenty’s budget for next year employs the sleight of hand that would impress a master magician.

Take his proposed use of the funds collected in the plastic bag tax. Fenty and the city council sold us the 5-cent tax on every plastic shopping bag by promising to use the proceeds to clean up the Anacostia River. The bag tax was a snow job: Fenty wants to use the dough to clean streets, rather than the river, so he can help close a half billion-dollar budget shortfall.