My Turn: Steven Williamson: Rethinking public safety

Current discussions of structural racism and the ongoing use of excessive force across the United States have spurred justified calls for reforming or restructuring policing in our communities. These discussions have also highlighted the lack of other services provided in poor, ethnically diverse neighborhoods.

Cuts to government services since the 1980s and increased police budgets have armed police responding to situations for which they are ill-suited. For those in the poorest neighborhoods the police have effectively become the face of local government. The police have force and guns on their side, and as the adage goes, “to a man with a hammer the whole world looks like a nail.” Add to this picture the systemic racism pervasive in the country as a whole and the recipe for disaster is complete.

Despite protests, the conditions that created the current morass have not changed. We still live in a nation where smart bombs take priority over education. Seeing that the whole system is dysfunctional, it is natural that we should demand a complete rethinking of public safety.

These calls have lately taken the form of demands to “defund the police.” This provocative phrase often means something more mundane in practice: to shrink the budget and the responsibilities of the police, creating new programs to deal with situations where a police presence itself might escalate the situation, such as mental health crises, school discipline, drug use, etc.

Many of these issues are increasingly viewed as health matters rather than criminal matters. I suspect that many police officers would welcome being relieved of these duties, though not the funding. The truth is that the kind of police officers we should want to keep around are those who want to focus on solving and (if possible) preventing major crimes.

In practical terms what does this mean for Providence?

The reforms on the table range from relatively modest to radical. Whatever path we end up following, some responsibilities need to be shifted from the police.

In a small way this has already begun with the Safe Stations program, which has allowed people with substance use disorders to go to any fire station to get into treatment. We need to expand on this success. The Fire Department has existing relationships in neighborhoods all across Providence and enjoys a position of trust in the community. Additionally, as an integral part of our public safety apparatus, the department has long ago moved beyond focusing only on fire prevention and response.

According to the National Fire Administration, the majority of responses from fire departments in Rhode Island are for emergency medical services, not fire calls. The Providence Fire Department’s budget is about $73 million, and some have suggested that the shift away from fighting fires should signal a shrinking of the fire department and the closing of some of its 12 stations.

This would foolishly waste an opportunity to reinvest in a beloved public service already based in the communities most in need. Many non-criminal public safety matters that police currently respond to would be better handled by the city’s other major public safety service.

A shift in emphasis and responsibilities would meet resistance from some within the institutions and the unions, but forward-thinking public servants, whatever the color of their response vehicles, should recognize that the time has come for us to take a long, hard look at how public safety workers can best serve the public.

Steven Williamson, of Providence, teaches political science.