Abolishing the police completely or even lowering their numbers could easily increase crime. And in the process harming the very same poor and minority communities reformers most want to help. Many minority communities have complained that the police don’t do enough to protect them against crime. Defunding the police would make that worse. Most African Americans and other minorities want the police to do a better job of protecting them against criminals.

We have the American public which has given a huge NO to the idea of defunding the police. A recent ABC news poll has found that two-thirds of the American people are against defunding the police departments.

No matter what reforms are pursued, the simple truth is failing to provide resources to local police departments will put Michigan families at risk. Criminals would have free reign knowing that no one is going to respond.

Defunding police departments would also hurt communities that are already facing a tough economic situation during this pandemic.This is nothing more than an outburst of political emotion to take advantage of civil unrest.

How do we keep a city safe without law enforcement? Who do we call when our houses are broken into, or if you’re robbed on the street? How are businesses and mom and pop stores supposed to feel secure operating in such an environment. Businesses will start leaving areas where the police are defunded and those areas will lose tax revenue.This isn’t about privilege, it’s about the first responsibility of any Government protecting its citizens.

We can’t forget that law enforcement sometimes involves actual force! It’s not a please and thank you type of job all of the time!

If we want to restore trust in police-community relations, prevent crime and reduce police abuse or misconduct, we should invest even more in police training and societie’s education.

The Lansing city council members mission statement: It is their mission to ensure quality of life by: And the number one thing on the list is.

Promoting a vibrant, safe, healthy and inclusive community that provides opportunity for personal and economic growth for residents, businesses and visitors.

Now I want to read a direct quote from a city council members facebook page. And the main person behind trying to defund the Lansing city police department is Brandon Betz: and I quote: I am happy to see the PRO-RIOT and ANTI-POLICE sentiment among the people in Lansing.

Now isn’t that kind of going against the very first mission statement of the city council?

Here is an idea, let black lives matter pay for programs that the city council members want to see created. I’m sure that they have the resources and the Capital to fund programs.

Hell the Lansing residents raised $3,885.00 for the Lansing art gallery to fix the mural of George Floyd and he was a habitual criminal. So why can’t people come up with money for programs if they want to see a change in their community instead of defunding programs.

Now the subject of replacing police with social workers! While cities across the nation want to defund the police and use social workers in their place to respond to non-violent calls such as, disorderly intoxication, drug overdose, mental health crisis, disorderly juvenile and neighborhood dispute. While this might have an advantage to some degree, one fact that is being overlooked is that many of these calls are potentially explosive.

A truth that appears to be missing from the conversation is, while a large percentage of these calls can be handled peacefully, situations can be very unpredictable and can escalate quickly. And to what degree is an agency assuming liability by placing a social worker in harm’s way. Also to what degree is a social worker willing to put him or herself in that kind of position.

And another point is, how many of these calls will the social worker have to call for police assistance? So now we will have a social worker in an escalated and dangerous situation that should have been handled by an officer in the first place.

One of the cases that Brandon Betz said could have been handled by a social worker was on May 27th the Lansing police responded to a domestic violence call and the man came out of the house firing a gun with bullets going in every direction and one of the bullets struck an officer in the ankle and the police returned fire killing the 37 year old man. Now how could a social worker prevent that? They couldn’t have!

The only people that can fix this is the AMERICAN people! We need to be heard and stand together behind our police department’s and let our local city council’s know that we need our police and we will not stand for what they are trying to do to our police department’s! Contact your city council now and rally behind the brave men and women that go out and risk their lives every single day to protect you and your family!

Tim Brewbaker is a guest columnist.