Seattle Police Chief: 50% Defunding Would ‘Decimate Public Safety’

On Friday’s broadcast of KTTH’s “Jason Rantz Show,” Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best stated that the proposed 50% defunding of the city’s police department would “decimate public safety for the city of Seattle” and would result in the loss of 1,100 employees or 50% of the police workforce, and would result in “hundreds” of fewer officers who can respond to calls for service in the city.

Best said, “I think you — the word ‘plan’ is rather loose here. They haven’t got a plan. All they’ve shown us is that they want to reduce the budget by 50%. I haven’t seen any real planning in that. And the real tragedy of doing that is that we will lose 1,100 employees. That’s 50% of our total workforce. Because most of our budget is made up of our personnel costs, and it would be a tragedy. I think that it’s the height of recklessness for them to decimate public safety for the city of Seattle without being thoughtful and encouraging public engagement on this issue.”

She added that “certainly, there would be hundreds of less officers responding to calls for service in the city of Seattle under this current plan — or idea.”

(h/t Fox News)

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