Voice of San Diego
Sara Libby
October 28, 2020
More San Diego County residents support reallocating police funding toward social services than those who oppose it, a Voice of San Diego poll found.
Forty-nine percent of respondents said they supported taking a significant amount of funds currently going toward local police departments and the county Sheriff’s Department and instead using them for mental health services, substance abuse treatment and job-training programs, while 41 percent said they opposed redistributing funding and 10 percent weren’t sure or didn’t respond.
Though the poll suggests the public is open to efforts to reallocate funding away from policing, officials at all level of government have expressed a wariness – or outright hostility – to doing so.
Julia Yoo, a San Diego civil rights attorney and president of the National Police Accountability Project, said she believes it will take time for politicians to begin to act on residents’ desire for change.
“There is such a movement in the community, but it is frustrating the lawmakers don’t seem to be listening to the loud voices. It takes time. It takes political will. It takes leadership,” she said. “This is the most prolonged movement I have seen in my career, so I’m extremely hopeful that there will be an appropriate response by lawmakers to the demand of defunding.”
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