The Defund CPD Research & Policy Toolkit
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DEFUND DEFUND CPDCPD RESEARCH RESEARCH && POLICYPOLICY TOOLKIT How to #TakeBackTheBudget to #DefundCPD CONTENTS SECTION 1: INTRODUCTION 4 INTRODUCTION & WHAT’S IN THIS TOOLKIT? SECTION 2: HOW WE DEFUND THE POLICE 8 BUDGET SURVEY RESULTS 10 DEFUNDING CPD BY 75% 12 WHERE WILL THE 75% GO? SECTION 3: UPLIFTING COMMUNITY SOLUTIONS 16 FOOD SECURITY AND ACCESSIBILITY 16 COVID-19 RESPONSE & HEALTHCARE 17 HARM REDUCTION & COMMUNITY SAFETY 18 HOUSING 19 SCHOOL AND EDUCATION 20 EMPLOYMENT 21 ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE & BUILDING GREEN SPACES SECTION 4: TALKING TO YOUR ALDERPERSON 24 WHY TALK TO YOUR ALDERPERSON 25 FIND YOUR ALDERPERSON 25 ALDERPERSON ONE PAGERS 26 IMPORTANT POSITIONS AND VOTING RECORDS 29 HOW TO PREP FOR YOUR MEETING (TALKING POINTS) 31 HOW TO SET UP A MEETING SECTION 5: THE FOP & CONSENT DECREE 34 COSTS OF OVERTIME 34 THE FOP 35 THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE INVESTIGATION & CONSENT DECREE A APPENDIX: INFO SHEETS SECTION 1 - INTRODUCTION SECTION 1 - INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION Each year, the City of Chicago is tasked with The proposed 2021 budget includes expanding creating a balanced budget in order to decide how initiatives that fail to address the root causes of it will utilize its revenue to best benefit the city. The violence which has been named as a top issue for city budget funds programs and projects related residents and elected officials. Rather, they further to finance, legislation, planning and development, our investment in policing, despite the fact that as community services, public safety, regulations, police funding has increased in Chicago, so has and infrastructure. Though each of these areas crime and violence. We recognize that more policing represent essential services and resources does not and cannot keep our communities safe, required for our city to thrive, there exists an and often has the exact opposite effect, as increased extreme disparity between the amount of funding interactions between police and residents leads allocated to the Chicago Police Department (CPD) to greater criminalization of and violence against and other city departments. residents, particularly for Black, Brown, and The budget consists of several funding Indigenous people. sources; however, most of the sources have a predetermined use and rules on how the revenue 2021 PROPOSED CITY CORPORATE FUND What’s in the Toolkit? may be spent. The corporate fund is considered BREAKDOWN2 $1200M $1600M the City’s “general” fund, as it spends this money on $400M $800M City services such as public safety, public health, and infrastructure. This fund is sourced primarily 0 through taxes and services paid to the city and $1556.7M POLICE SERVICES is often the focus of the budget because it can be spent at the discretion of Mayor Lori Lightfoot and $743.4M OTHER PUBLIC SAFETY the City’s 50 alderpeople. $913.1M GENERAL FINANCING REQUIREMENTS In the proposed 2021 budget1, the corporate fund is $4,022,469,000. Of that amount, $1,556,686,263 $362.0M FINANCE AND ADMINISTRATION — 38.7% of the corporate fund — is allocated to the Chicago Police Department with the idea that it will $217.4M INFRASTRUCTURE SERVICES keep the public safe. This amount does not include $156.9M COMMUNITY SERVICES spending on police settlements or pensions. Despite calls for divestment from police and investment $56.3M REGULATORY in community services, the City of Chicago is currently preparing to spend $4,264,893 on the $40.2M LEGISLATIVE AND ELECTIONS Chicago Police Department per day next year. To $24.1M CITY DEVELOPMENT compare, community services have been allocated the following budgets for the whole year: » Family & Support Services: $95,388,336 We believe that creating safer communities starts » City Development: $21,902,754 with funding things our community needs like job » Violence Prevention: $16,500,000 training, affordable housing, and mental health 1 Lightfoot, Lori E, 2021 Budget Overview § (n.d.). https:// www.chicago.gov/content/dam/city/depts/obm/supp_ info/2021Budget/2021OVERVIEWFINAL.pdf. Sign on to #DefundCPD! 4 SECTION 1 - INTRODUCTION services. In Mayor Lightfoot’s citywide survey of DefundCPD is a grassroots campaign demanding over 38,000 residents, 87% responded that they that the Chicago City Council defund the Chicago want to defund the police to fund social services. Police Department by 75%. We want the council to Lightfoot is choosing to ignore Chicagoans by take resources and power away from the Chicago refusing to defund the police in her 2021 budget Police Department, which we recognize as a racist, proposal while cutting valuable and necessary violent institution that has too much power over our social services. Our alderpeople have the communities. Instead, we want our city to reinvest opportunity to VOTE NO on Lightfoot’s budget and in community resources like quality, well-funded make amendments that would defund the police to public schools, mental health centers, housing, and fund services we need. other social services and community institutions. What’s in the Toolkit? Our campaign believes another world is possible. We know that the Chicago Police Department fails We hope you will use this toolkit to speak to keep our communities safe and that—despite to City Council members, your friends, and the harm they cause—multiple factors protect neighbors about building towards a future CPD’s existence. We are choosing to reimagine the without police. City’s budget outside the constraints of the current system because we know the current system does not prioritize care for our communities and was built without the true democratic input of the people. THIS TOOLKIT WILL EQUIP YOU WITH KNOWLEDGE AND RESOURCES ON HOW TO: » #TakeBackTheBudget to #DefundCPD. » Know what’s in the City’s and Chicago Police Department’s budgets and how to pay for your community’s needs » Talk about the reasoning behind defunding CPD, know the obstacles and opportunities to defunding the police deparmtent, and what you can do. Sign on to #DefundCPD! 5 SECTION 2: HOW WE DEFUND THE POLICE INTRODUCTION WHAT ARE THE GOALS WHO IS THIS FOR? OF THIS SECTION » Anyone interested in learning about the Section 2 starts with a breakdown of the City’s City’s Proposed Budget for 2021 compared 2021 Budget Proposal and the 2021 Budget to the results of the Public Budget Survey. Survey results. The next sections detail where » Anyone who wants to learn more we propose the 75% cuts in the CPD budget specifically where the 75% cuts would come would be made and where that funding could from in the CPD Budget. be redistributed to community services and » Those looking for talking points on the kinds investing in people, not violence. of community services where the 75% could be redistributed. SECTION 2 - HOW WE DEFUND THE POLICE SECTION 2 - HOW WE DEFUND THE POLICE Budget Survey Results Budget Survey Results The Budget Survey Results are Clear: Defund CPD This fall, the City launched a public survey in WHERE RESPONDENTS WANT TO 3 order for residents to provide feedback to the 100 REALLOCATE20 RESOURCES40 60 FROM 80 Mayor’s office for the 2021 budget. Over 38,000 0 people across every Chicago residential ZIP code 87% POLICE SERVICES 13% CITY DEVELOPMENT responded to the survey. Respondents made it 13% REGULATORY SERVICES very clear that the priority of the budget should 9% CULTURAL AFFAIRS & SPECIAL EVENTS be Community Services (support for youth, 6% LIBRARIES homelessness, violence prevention) and Public 5% COMMUNITY SERVICES Health (mental health, food protection) with 86% of 4% OTHER PUBLIC SAFETY 4% PUBLIC HEALTH respondents believing that they required additional 3% INFRASTRUCTURE SERVICES resources. Police Services ranked the lowest 3% STREETS & SANITATION priority to residents, with only 9% of respondents THE ANSWER IS CLEAR asking for additional resources to the police. Chicagoans want our underserved communities The survey respondents wanted to allocate funded and want the police defunded. Rather than 22% and 21% of the budget to Public Health and increasing revenue through taxes paid directly Community Services, respectively, while the by the city’s working class, the people believe that 2020 Budget allocated for only 4% and 14%. The funds should be reallocated from an ineffective 2020 Budget allocation for Police Services was policing system. We deserve a budget that our approximately 34% while the respondents asked to residents have demanded, a budget that serves our allocate only 6% to Police Services. communities by reallocating our police funding into More than 90% of responses said that the funds should housing, mental health, youth, food protection, and be reallocated from current services rather than community services, and we will not stop until we increase revenue sources. When asked which services get it. to reallocate funding from, 87% of those responses 2021 PROPOSED TOTAL BUDGET BREAKDOWN4 said to reallocate funding from the police budget. When $1000 $2000 $3000 $4000 $5000 $6000 respondents commented on ideas and concerns to the 0 2021 budget, 95% of the comments received mentioned defunding CPD and reallocating police funding to $5,653.6M GENERAL FINANCING communities to reduce crime. $1,698.6M POLICE SERVICES $1,021.8M OTHER PUBLIC SAFETY “I am tired of wasting my taxpayer money $2,520.3M INFRASTRUCTURE SERVICES for having incompetent police officers settling lawsuits with families who have to $1,421.2M COMMUNITY SERVICES deal with harm from police.” 2 $741.9M FINANCE & ADMINISTRATION $312.9M CITY DEVELOPMENT 2 City of Chicago Office of Budget and Management,