$5.5M. 36,000 trained can now answer the quiz a little better. Impact on arrest demographics? Zero. Claiming the root cause of X is Y, then dogmatically applying solution Z in the absence of evidence? Fail. Just as COVID won't "disappear like a miracle." https://www.npr.org/2020/09/10/909380525/nypd-study-implicit-bias-training-changes-minds-not-necessarily-behavior

Before we clearly define the problem, force-feeding "solutions" is stupid. But we keep doing it. "Do something" is not a plan. "What could it hurt?" is a dumb question. That $5.5M could've been spent on mental health or drug treatment, or prevention, or domestic abuse resources.

Those things work. We know this to be true. In fact, the more we stop spending money on those things (mental health, drug treatment, DV prevention/response) the more safety nets we remove, the more desperate people become, and the more they become ensnared in the criminal system.

We simply need to recognize that untreated mental illness and addiction are very strong predictors of police confrontation and violence. It's isn't as sexy as other claims and dogma. It also isn't new: I wrote this in the @washingtonpost in 2016: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2016/06/20/guest-post-the-low-hanging-fruit-of-police-reform/

In that I also said we must prevent, not react to, crisis. This is a rather simple concept. It just takes money and commitment to change; burning cars and shops, and yelling in the streets, does nothing at all to further this obvious societal need.