Odd Math in U.S. Police Funding

Federal officials should read more of their own important publications. Take the FBI Crime Reports, for example. That, a calculator and a copy of the World Almanac would have shown the Justice Department that it was ludicrous to bypass Los Angeles on new federal funding for police officers. Clearly Los Angeles, proportionally, has far fewer sworn officers than other big cities.

Moreover, some of the cities that did benefit under the $100-million, 700-officer program announced late last month already have more officers per 1,000 residents than Los Angeles. So, the City of Angels will now slip further behind its national counterparts. That’s unless the Justice Department and presumptive presidential hopeful Al Gore come to their collective senses and put Los Angeles on the list for another round of funding later this month. It’s all obvious and by the numbers. Los Angeles, the city that is supposedly so vital to the nation’s economic interests, is still playing catch-up.

As you can see from the chart, Los Angeles falls woefully short of New York City. Chicago, with a much smaller population, has a much larger police force than ours. Even Houston, with one of the nation’s fastest-growing populations, is slightly better off. And these figures don’t even tell the whole story. New York City, for example, also has about 2,500 housing police. Washington has the U.S. Park Police, the Capitol Hill police and the U.S. Secret Service. There are military juntas with fewer armed people in uniform than the District of Columbia. Los Angeles, by contrast, barely has more sworn officers per capita than the average rural county.

The Justice Depart- ment’s thinking on this, if that’s what it can be called, was that cities with many poor residents and a smaller drop in crime were most deserving of the money. Oh, please.

The number of poor people in Los Angeles no doubt dwarfs the entire populations of many of the cities that received money for more police. Chicago, Baltimore, Cleveland and Buffalo already have more police, proportionally, than Los Angeles, and each received additional funding. And just how does it make sense to penalize Los Angeles because crime declined here more than in some other cities?

Los Angeles officials did not drop the ball. Many, including Mayor Richard Riordan and members of Congress, lobbied long and hard for a piece of the funding pie. When the next slices are handed out, there had better be a place at the table with Los Angeles’ name on it.

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On the Beat

Number of residents per sworn police officer in major cities:

Washington, D.C.: 156

New York City: 198

Chicago: 210

Philadelphia: 234

Detroit: 253

Houston: 324

Los Angeles: 349

Sources: FBI crime reports 1997 and U.S. Census data