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I’m a committeeperson in West Philadelphia. On Sunday May 31st, around 5pm, I was walking to a protest on 52nd street, to film. I was still a few blocks away from the protest, and several feet down a side street, when an officer in tactical gear looked at me, shot me in the leg with a rubber bullet, and continued down 52nd without a word, before or after. I personally had never been assaulted by a police officer, until I tried to attend a protest against police brutality.

I’ve actually interviewed several members of the PPD and many of them agree that we can’t arrest our way out of complex issues of crime and violence that are driven by structural racism and poverty. Yet this budget proposes that we do just that. It cuts funding for the Office of Violence Prevention, for community organizations that serve our youth, for the office of workforce development, for the Police Advisory Commission, our only police oversight body, which lacks the independence to do an effective job anyway.

Moreover, it proposes that we give police a raise when they have inflicted inexcusable violence on our streets, from the kettling and teargassing of protestors on 676, to selfies with white vigilantes armed with baseball bats and hatchets in Fishtown, to firing teargas canisters into my residential neighborhood (not to mention my own experience). These people do not deserve a raise, especially when there’s an embarrassment of riches in terms of great programs that will actually reduce crime and violence, not exacerbate it. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, so reduce the budget of the PPD by 15% and redirect those funds toward the community based grants run through the Roadmap for Safer Communities. An ounce of prevention is worth pound of cure, especially when the so-called cure inflicts violence rather than healing.

As I said, I’m a committeeperson – I canvass my neighborhood twice a year, before every primary and election, and I work closely with my fellow committeepeople and block captains. I’m a member of Reclaim Philadelphia, and I just finished a masters while working full time. (Go class of 2020!) We are watching you. We are organized and we are angry. Do not pass this budget. Cut funding for the police and fund our communities and services instead, or I promise we will oust you from office. Thank you for your time.

put this money where it belongs—towards the people, not the PPD

My name is Erin Hurt, and I am a member of the Citizens for Alternatives to Police and Reclaim Philadelphia. I’m here today to ask you to decrease the PPD budget by 15%.

Right now, the city’s current budget draft calls for a $790 million operating budget for the PPD, including $23million in new funds through various channels. At the same time, most other areas of the budget have been slashed. This is unacceptable.

Chenjerai Kumanyika [HE1] says, “We need to find a way for our communities to be free from harm. We need institutions to protect people...The police do not reduce harm. The police are creating harm…on your TV screens and in your streets across the country.” We know this is true—we have seen the PPD repeatedly escalate situations and assault peaceful protesters over this last week.

Putting more money into policing is NOT the solution. Mayor Kenney’s office has said that funding the police IS an anti-violence initiative, but history shows us otherwise. As a Billy Penn article states[HE2] , “Under Kenney’s tenure, the PPD budget has grown by about 30% — up from about $640 million in 2015. Yet shootings and homicides have generally increased.”

Kumanyika says that “police budgets [like the PPD budget] starve the money that would go into [social programs].” Here in Philly, to continue to fund the police during this difficult financial time for the city means that we lose the following:

Cuts to the Office of Violence Prevention, decreased annual community grant fund, the elimination of a mentorship program for youth on probation[HE3]

PHL Eviction Prevention Project (PEPP) and rental assistance program

Decreased hours at the library and city pools

Deferred opioid initiatives and street sweeping

The complete elimination of the Office of Arts, Culture, and the Creative Economy [HE4]

Think about what this means. How do you justify a budget for an entire city that takes from everyone else in order to fund the police? The programs that matter to us, that change people’s lives, are slashed or eliminated. And for what? The police don’t provide spaces to study, places to swim, or mentoring. They don’t fix eviction issues, and they don’t support addicts. They certainly don’t make our schools safer. How can these budget priorities be good for the city, when it comes at our expense?

The way I see it, the only people that this budget helps are the police. that’s not right or fair.

We must make a choice, today, to stop funding the police as a form of harm reduction. The cost is too great. We need to fund “social programs that actually reduce harm” (Kumanyika).

Taylor Crumpton, a journalist[HE5] , says that a budget demonstrates what a city is willing to invest in, what it sees as a social good. The PPD are not a social good, and they do not help the people of this city. Many of them don’t even live in Philadelphia.

I call for a 15% decrease in the PPD budget, and I call for our to use this money to address problems faced by the people of this city.

Our schools have lead in the water fountains and asbestos in the buildings, and the district budget is facing a billion-dollar deficit—we can fix this.

We’re facing a wave of evictions and homelessness as a result of COVID-19—we can stop this.

Young people in this city need more support—we can provide this.

Mr. Mayor and City Council, put this money where it belongs—towards the people, not the PPD.

Defund Police. Provide Affordable Housing.

Good afternoon Councilmembers. My name is Mariya Khandros. I am a West Philadelphia resident from the 3rd District, and I am testifying as a part of a growing number of Philadelphians who believe that the police department budget is bloated to unsustainable levels, cannibalizing social services that our city cannot afford to lose. Mayor Kenney’s revised budget currently allocates $760 million of the total 4.895-billion-dollar budget toward the police. That means that more than 15% of the city’s entire budget is dedicated to police expenditures. The mayor states that “what we have is both a pandemic and an economic catastrophe.” So then let us look that reality in the face and dedicate city funds according to the evidence at hand while shoring up our economic health.

Philadelphia has long faced a gun epidemic, but we keep responding with the same failed techniques. Just a little more than a year ago, Mayor Kenney’s administration released the Philadelphia Roadmap to Safer Communities program, which officially adopted using public health tactics as a crucial element in addressing violence in Philadelphia. A 2015 study in New York City revealed that using public health tactics led to an 18% decrease in the number of homicides over a three-year period whereas comparable neighborhoods that did not use this approach had a 69% increase. So why then are we continuing to turn to back to failed methods and wasting valuable city funds? Why do we continue to use surplus military equipment on our citizenry as the same tried and failed solution? Why do we continue to use chemical weapons like teargas at peaceful protests when it is banned internationally in warfare? We consistently overspend on the police while defunding housing resources and protections. How can the city have any question as to why trust is broken?

Two Sundays ago, on May 31st, I watched Councilmember Jamie Gauthier mediate a confrontation between the police and protestors on 52nd street. It was an egregious failure on the part of the police to do their job. The need to have a third party negotiate for them was a glaring reminder that they are not skilled at restoring peace, but instead at using violence.

Instead of increasing the police budget at a time when money is tight, we should invest in programs that make our citizens safe in every meaning of that word. According to the 2018 Housing Action Plan, “from 2008 to 2016, Philadelphia lost 13,000 lower-cost [housing] units, while adding 6,000 units at the high end of the market.” At the same time 5,600 Philadelphians were experiencing homelessness; 42,900 were on the housing authority wait list; 26% were living in poverty; and 24,000 evictions were filed in 2017 even before the pandemic. Now 2.5 months into the pandemic, thousands of Philadelphians have lost their jobs, leaving them unable to make rent or mortgage payments. We are all waiting fearfully for the moment when 1,700 more Philadelphians stand to be evicted after the moratorium runs out, adding to the 5,700 who are already homeless. In a city where more than half of Philadelphians are housing insecure, this is a problem we cannot ignore. Secure housing is fundamental not only to an individual’s safety, but as we have learned in this pandemic, to health and safety of every Philadelphian.

The current budget eliminates the General Fund contribution to the Housing Trust Fund. Reducing funding for affordable housing is an irresponsible choice when we are going to be faced with one of the largest housing crises in Philadelphia history. The city will not be any safer when we increase homelessness by 30%. If we truly want to be a safer city, we should use proven, evidence-based approaches to combatting violence and redirect all of the additional money slated for our police department to affordable and secure housing for every Philadelphian, restoring community trust and building a more secure economic future for all.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Philadelphia was experiencing another public health crisis: gun violence. Last year Mayor Kenney released the Roadmap to Safer Communities, a plan to address gun violence that includes investments in community programs and services that prevent violence and reduce recidivism. While the plan is very comprehensive, recent developments from the Mayor’s office give us reason to believe healing and safety are no longer a priority. In the revised budget proposal and Revised Five Year Plan, there is an emphasis on surveillance technology and the hiring of more police officers, while the very programs Mayor Kenney and several councilmembers identify as real solutions to disrupt cycles of poverty and violence are being defunded. Our vision for public safety CANNOT center on policing and technologies with racially biased algorithms that decide who is and isn’t dangerous, programs like the PPD’s Operation Pinpoint.

When this city is struggling to meet the needs of most communities during a global pandemic, giving over $760 million to the police department is like a slap in the face to all the organizers who have been doing mutual aid work and organizations that have been serving our communities long before COVID-19. Too many people don’t have enough food. Too many people don’t even know about the eviction moratorium and their landlords are capitalizing on this lack of information by carrying out illegal evictions. Too many families are struggling to keep their children connected to schools and educational materials because they don’t have access to the internet at home. Too many people who are essential workers haven’t had any PPE provided to them so they can safely do their jobs.

Philadelphia residents deserve MORE. The city’s budget reflects choices about what our city officials value and who they feel accountable to. When there are deep cuts to affordable housing, jobs, and city services, with no cuts to the police department and no taxes on the wealthy, those priorities are clear. Low income and black and brown communities will suffer more loss and violence, UNLESS there is a major divestment from the police department and investments in programs and services that promote healthy and safe communities. We will no longer accept the excuse that there’s no money for the things our communities need, we SEE where the money is going.

Since 2016, Mayor Kenney has given the PPD an additional $120 million in funding. NOW is the time to begin repairing the violent legacy of policing and over-incarceration. NOW is the time to take back that $120 million and commit public safety by fully funding our rec centers, libraries, community based anti-violence programs, the Office of homeless services, the public health department, the office of workforce development and transitional jobs, and public defenders.

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