Council must try again on police incentives

Opinion editor's note: Editorials represent the opinions of the Star Tribune Editorial Board, which operates independently from the newsroom.

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Minneapolis is facing a crime crisis with a police force that's down about 40% since 2020. Overall, Minneapolis is about 200 officers short of the 731 the city's charter requires.

The city is not alone in any of this. Across the country, urban centers face crime and police-staffing challenges. In response, many have implemented recruitment and retention bonuses to address the issue — something that Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, Police Chief Brian O'Hara and others advocated for in a relatively modest plan: a $15,000 recruitment incentive over three years and an $18,000 retention incentive over two and a half years, budgeted at up to $15.3 million, with that total coming from a fund of $19 million authorized by the Minnesota Legislature last session. In exchange the police union agreed to relinquish some control over staffing decisions, a move that could expedite the process of filling officer vacancies.

But in a deeply disappointing response, the Minneapolis City Council, on an 8-5 vote, rejected the plan last week, sending yet another signal to officers, residents, visitors and investors that it won't do what is necessary to keep the public safe.

The issue is basic, Frey told an editorial writer: "We don't have enough police."

We "have an obligation to the people of this city," the mayor said. "To be providing basic city services with excellence, and there is no more important basic city service than that of safety."

This isn't a question of whether policing reforms are needed; the necessity of abiding by an impending consent decree with the Department of Justice is clear, Frey said. But implementing these changes requires police officers. And that requires that the city acknowledge today's extraordinarily competitive environment for hiring and keeping cops. "This exodus of officers from police departments is happening in many cities throughout the country, but it's happening quite acutely here," the mayor said.

O'Hara, in comments to reporters last week, put it even more starkly when he said: "We have to look at reality here. We are stuck in a vicious cycle, spiraling downward. We are caught [with] hundreds of fewer officers over the last few years, and the cops that are here have been living through that — their co-workers for decades walking away and out the door. At the same time that requires us to spend massive amounts of money in overtime, mandatory overtime, which now leads to burnout, and it also doesn't attract the new generation of officers."

Ultimately, O'Hara said, "this is about the residents, this is about being able to provide the most basic services to those who are most deeply affected, which is our most vulnerable residents."

Such residents include several elderly people living in the subsidized Bii Di Gain Dash Anwebi apartments in south Minneapolis, where chronic break-ins make people particularly vulnerable, according to a story in Monday's Star Tribune. Providing inadequate policing to them isn't "progressive," a label proudly claimed by several council members who voted "no." Rather it's regressive, which should lead the left-leaning cohort on the council to reconsider its antipathy to Frey and the force.

Soon, as a result of the recent election, this group will lead a council majority as like-minded members take office. So it's particularly important that the current council find a route to compromise. Forging one will require members like the 11th Ward's Emily Koski, who has previously been a supporter of initiatives to stabilize the police force, to lead other persuadable colleagues to work with her and the five members who already understand the alacrity of the crisis.

In an email to her constituents, Koski stated that among the reasons for her "no" vote was that "Data has not been provided that shows sign-on and retention bonuses are effective as a sole solution" — an argument she reiterated to an editorial writer. But the mayor himself acknowledged to the council that this was not the only approach, and data does indicate that of the 648 officers who received a retention incentive in 2022 and this year, 87% remain — an indication that incentives can have a positive effect. This fact is not lost on several suburbs offering similar, if not more generous, bonuses to their forces.

All this comes in the context of ongoing negotiations between the city and the union; resolution on this issue can help advance those discussions that are so crucial for Minneapolis.

"We have fewer officers per capita than any major city in the country that I'm aware of," said Frey.

Minneapolitans — often the most vulnerable ones — are bearing the brunt of this, and City Council members must live up to the oaths they took and help solve the problem.