WHERE THE MONEY DOESN'T GO – AT 8:31 A.M. ET:  With the profligacy of the federal government, and with the huge payouts by state governments (see the post just below), you'd think services to the citizenry would be at an all-time high.  Think again, suckers.  This is government we're dealing with.  From The Wall Street Journal:

TULSA, Okla.—It has become a recession mantra: Do more with less.

Now, this heartland city is testing whether that's possible when it comes to public safety.

Since January, Tulsa has laid off 89 police officers, 11% of its force. That has pushed the city to the forefront of a national movement, spurred by hard times, to revamp long-held policing strategies.

In the crosshairs: community-policing initiatives created over the past two decades, such as having officers work in troubled schools, attend neighborhood-watch meetings and help small-business owners address nuisance crimes like graffiti. Such efforts are popular, and some experts credit them with contributing to the steady drop in the national crime rate since 1991.

And...

n New York, Mayor Michael Bloomberg recently vowed not to lay off cops, but tight budgets have slowed hiring so much that the force is down about 12% from 2000, with more attrition expected. Some violent crimes, including homicides, are on the rise. Paul Browne, a deputy police commissioner, says the department has kept a lid on problems by flooding high-crime areas with cops on foot patrol who practice community policing, such as checking in with merchants and pastors. Mr. Browne said the department is committed to such programs but acknowledges that "it's getting harder" to devote enough resources.

And...

The strain in New York and communities nationwide reminds William Bratton, former police chief in New York and Los Angeles, of the 1970s and 1980s. Then, departments lacked resources to focus on crime prevention and community partnerships, or deal with crimes such as drug dealing and prostitution.

"You'd think we would have learned our lessons from the past," says Mr. Bratton, who now runs Altegrity Security Consulting. "Policing still requires boots on the ground."

COMMENT:  We haven't learned our lessons.  Many cities are run by the kind of people who are skeptical of the police in the first place.  And crime reduction, strange as it seems, is not a priority in parts of the political spectrum.  If crime is reduced through police action, it violates one of the main foundations of modern liberal thinking – that crime is caused by "socio-economic problems of inner-city peoples," not given to law-enforcement solutions. 

So California and other states pay out huge pensions and salaries to public employees, while cutting the most vital service of all. 

It's a financial problem, we're told.  And yet The New York Times, just yesterday, informed us that the economy is really booming, if only those people out there without Ivy League degrees would simply understand it.

Get me the seasickness pills.

April 27, 2010