KDPS FUNDING TO REMAIN VIRTUALLY UNCHANGED IN 2021
Earlier this week, the Kalamazoo City Commission held its 2021 City Budget Work Session. At this session the various city departments presented their projects for 2021 and the Commission was presented the proposed budget. Two major things stood out, firstly that there will be no service reductions across City departments due to the economic impact of COVID-19. And secondly, that despite of numerous humiliating incidents throughout 2020 and 1000’s of residents demanding to ‘defund the police’ among other demands, KDPS’ budget will remain the same.
For context, the Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety’s budget takes up a whopping 47% of the cities’ annual budget and is, by far, the most well funded department in the city. However, despite these rich resources the department seemed to fail to respond adequately to the major challenges it faced.
Early in the Summer, KDPS officers were dispatched in riot gear to forcibly move a crowd of peaceful protesters gathered on the mall, near Michigan Avenue. This move was met with harsh criticism from the community but the excuses from then Chief Karianne Thomas were ultimately accepted by the Commission. Over the next few days and weeks, KDPS violently escalated matters by tear gassing protesters who were lying on the ground, tear gassing peaceful protesters for breaking a curfew, welcoming in the National Guard to help lock down the City and fueling rumors of dangerous ‘outside agitators’ looking to start trouble. Of course when in August, these out of state agitators did come into the city looking to start trouble KDPS were nowhere to be found.
On Saturday Aug. 15 the Proud Boys, a violent white nationalist group, descended on Kalamazoo. The group of mostly out of state fascists was allowed to march freely, without KDPS intervention, towards a counter protest in Arcadia Park. Naturally, when the two groups met violence occurred yet KDPS were nowhere to be found. Once counter protesters has pushed the Proud Boys back into a parking garage, officers showed up in riot gear to disperse the crowd of counter protesters. The Proud Boys, after violently assaulting City residents, were allowed to leave the parking structure by KDPS while illegally concealing their license plates. At the same time, officers were busy arresting a local Black journalist and a legal observer. Not a single dangerous ‘out of towner’ was caught nor charged, they were allowed to leave after causing chaos.
In the aftermath, the organizer of the legal law abiding counter protest, Rev. Nathan Dannison said that “It looked like they [KDPS] were protecting the Proud Boys.” A month later City Manager Jim Ritsema did not reappoint Rev. Dannison to the Citizen Public Safety Review and Appeal Board, aka the police accountability board.
This is no surprise considering the cozy relationship Jim Ritsema has with KDPS.
In a City Commission meeting after the Proud Boys incident Jim said “In hindsight, sure, we shouldn’t have arrested people from Kalamazoo and should have arrested Proud Boys,” a statement that many residents in Kalamazoo would agree on. After all the counter protest was legal, peaceful and locally organized and the Proud Boys were out of town fascist invaders. However the day after this mild criticism, Jim apologized privately to KDPS saying “I should have said I am not in a position to make those determinations”.
Eventually, in September it was announced that KDPS Chief Karianne Thomas was to step down. It was reported that Mayor David Anderson said she decided to retire on her own and that the feeling was ‘mutual’. Earlier this week we learned that this was a straight up lie. Chief Thomas was in fact fired and without cause to ensure she’d receive a fat pay out of public money. The man in charge of hiring and eventually firing her, was Jim Ritsema. Chief Thomas’ firing seems to be the only consequence of the horrible summer for KDPS.
The lack of any serious budget changes comes as a disappointment to many who were protesting on the street his summer. The call for police reform and reallocation of funding was a major component of the Black Live Matter movement yet it has seem to have had almost no impact on cities budget.
If the protests against police brutality, and KDPS’ failures in the summer are not enough for their budget to be decreased then what is? Bigger, potentially violent protests? More disruption? Perhaps it is indication that the City are only willing to listen to those who follow the official channels.
At the end of the meeting, Vice Major Patrese Griffin encouraged residents to get in touch with the City Commission with their feedback and comments on the 2021 budget.
For those wanting to still have their say, the public can attend the virtual 2021 City Budget Public Session on Jan 4. The budget itself will be finalized before the end of January.
