- The Washington Times - Tuesday, June 29, 2021

Oakland Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong ripped the city council’s decision last week to redirect $18 million from the department, saying it will undoubtedly increase police response times as the city experiences an “out-of-control” uptick in crime.

During a press conference Monday, Chief Armstrong blasted the city council’s vote Thursday to redirect nearly $18 million in proposed police spending over two years to alternative forms of violence prevention, KGO reported. He said the council’s vote to “defund” the department will have an immediate impact on the community.

“Today, we find ourselves in a crisis,” Chief Armstrong said. “We find ourselves reeling from a weekend of violence where we’ve seen four homicides over a three-day period. It now has us currently at 65 homicides for the year — that’s a 90% increase compared to last year. Our shootings are up over 70% this year. Our robberies are up 11% this year — there’s been 1,300 robberies in this city already this year. Our carjackings are up nearly 88%. So we see clearly that crime is out of control in the city of Oakland and our response was for less police resources.”

“The impact will be immediate with a slower response time to emergency calls for service,” he continued. “It’s going to delay response. We already have a tough time responding to the high number of calls that we get. This will make it tougher, having less officers in the field, particularly for marginalized communities like deep East Oakland, where we see two-thirds of our calls coming from. They will be impacted the most. That concerns me.”

“I hope that we can put politics aside and put public safety first,” he added. “Put people’s lives first before political agendas.”

Chief Armstrong said the department is severely underfunded and understaffed, with only 714 of a possible 788 officer positions staffed.

Mayor Libby Schaaf, who opposed the council’s decision, warned the defunding could cost an additional 50 police officer positions, KGO reported.

• Jessica Chasmar can be reached at jchasmar@washingtontimes.com.

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