Editorial: 'Defunding' the police is the wrong reform

There are obvious problems with the idea of defunding the police.

The police are not a piece of questionable art in front of a courthouse that we can debate. They are not a pork barrel project to slice away. They aren’t a program that is there to benefit some people but not all people.

Police protect and serve. They are who people turn to when scared or hurt or threatened or in need of help.

The problem is that there are other people who are scared of or hurt by or threatened by the very people who are supposed to provide the help. That’s something that cannot be ignored, and it is the rallying cry of the thousands who are protesting around the country and the world — and here in our streets — after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

Both things can be true. We can need the help of good people in uniform — but at the same time, that job might need to be overhauled.

Pittsburgh knows what it is like to need its police officers. They ran toward the horror of the Tree of Life synagogue shooting on Oct. 27, 2018. They saved lives and risked their own. They were our heroes, and that cannot be forgotten amid protests, no matter how much truth there may be in the raised voices.

They aren’t the only ones. Police throughout the area have answered the call in big and small ways. New Kensington Officer Brian Shaw of New Kensington made the ultimate sacrifice in 2017.

But we can’t ignore where there have been problems. Pittsburgh police operated under a Department of Justice consent decree for five years because of allegations of patterns of behavior and civil rights violations. Other communities have had incidents that raised questions, not the least of which was the 2018 shooting of Antwon Rose II by an officer of the now-defunct East Pittsburgh Police Department. Rose’s name has been prominently raised in many of the nationwide protests.

The word “defunding” does not fix anything because it makes an already tense situation very much into an either-or. Either you want there to be police who respond when you answer the phone — or you want to burn down the whole system and have anarchy, and that’s a situation that sets up one side to be vilified. That’s unhelpful.

The answers are predictably a middle ground where police are not expected to solve every problem, but instead are free to focus on actual law enforcement and crime prevention. We need to look at the job police do and decide what would be best handled by other services that already exist and reapportion those duties accordingly.

That is not a condemnation of police. Reforming the system is as much about helping them as acknowledging the real concerns of the protesters.

Police are not ordained to be social workers, drug rehabilitation counselors, mental health providers or any of the other duties that become folded into their work. Relieving that pressure could allow officers to focus on their real task in ways that aren’t splintered and create more partnerships with other agencies that facilitate de-escalating tense situations.

There are police who believe in reform. The Pennsylvania Chiefs of Police and the Pennsylvania State Troopers Association have both joined Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s push for hiring reform. But there are others who have reservations.

Robert Swartzwelder, president of Fraternal Order of Police Fort Pitt Lodge 1, said Tuesday that reforms juggling responsibilities could have unintended consequences. He is not wrong. But that is exactly why such reforms have to be collaborative and not combative. Reform has to be something police participate in, not something thrust upon them.