Oakland will reverse police payback after massive crime increase

On Monday, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf announced plans to add funds to the city’s police department after a sharp rise in violent crimes in recent months as well as violent robberies.

“This analysis will make the case that there is a need for additional police manning in the wake of this violent spree,” Schaaf told reporters in a Zoom call on Monday, according to Daily mail.

“When these messages and services are not effective … the consequences must be swift and secure,” she continued. “There is nothing progressive about unbridled gun violence.”

Schaaf’s announcement comes after a fatal Thanksgiving weekend in which three people were killed, including a one-year-old boy hit by a stay bullet while sitting in his mother’s car, and retired police officer Kevin Nishita, who was killed while working as an employee security guard. protect a news team that reported the rise in crime.

The city of Oakland has seen 127 homicides in the city so far this year.

Schaaf stated that she would ask the city council to reverse funding cuts planned to take effect in 2022 and would present a plan instead of retaining a minimum of 678 officers in the city’s force, as well as restart the city’s ceasefire crime program.

She noted that efforts to place police incidents at lower levels with other wards as well as efforts aimed at redirecting the convicts to other services in Oakland have not been enough. Schaaf also stated that the city’s police personnel have fallen under the 2014 voter-approved measure that requires the police department to have at least 678 sworn officers.

The union, which represents the Oakland police, called the declining number of officers “another broken promise to Oakland residents from the” defund-the-police “majority in the city council.”

At a news conference last week, Oakland Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong said “I urge council members to step forward and start having a conversation about the loss of human life in this city.”

“In addition to the policy of whether or not you support the police, there is a clear problem in this city and that this city had to deal with overwhelming violence over the weekend, and that is unacceptable,” he continued.

In June, Oakland City Council passed a budget proposal that removed $ 18.4 million from the city’s police budget and shifted that cash instead to “violence and social services prevention measures.”