Police and taxes

Did not know where to post this. I was listening to the radio several days ago in the middle of the night and this story just hit me. A very large county in Oregon has very limited police protection. People are told, when they call a 911 type center, to call back when someone is available and people cannot go to jail since there is no money to fund it. Crime is exploding.

Here is one article I found: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nati...icle-1.1353085 and another http://www.kivitv.com/longform/in-th...aw-enforcement

Regardless of the historic reason for the current situation, it appears that the population (enough who vote) could not care less about their friends and neighbors and believe that they can protect themselves. Crime is exploding. I think the reporter said theft had gone from $12,000 per year to over $300,000.

One poor man had everything he owned stolen and was told to call back the next day. He called and called and then was told to go to the next town to their police and when he got there he was arrested for something like harassment.

One resident who wanted more business to move in to the county to provide jobs, was asked what about when the business is robbed. He laughed and said robbed by government taxes or a robber?

I think everyone who can should leave and leave now. They have voted down 4 levies to pay for more police or at least a full time force.

The fourteenth amendment would seem to disagree. There is an expectation of "due process". If you are talkin federally protected civil liberties here.

And of course if the State creates an environment of "danger" by the inaction of law enforcement.......then civil penalties can ensue.

Either way, chaos is just around the corner in that community, if all is the way it is reported.

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Originally Posted by Williamsmith

The fourteenth amendment would seem to disagree. There is an expectation of "due process". If you are talkin federally protected civil liberties here.

And of course if the State creates an environment of "danger" by the inaction of law enforcement.......then civil penalties can ensue.

Either way, chaos is just around the corner in that community, if all is the way it is reported.

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People can just police their own community now, save a few bucks by depriving the tax man.

Sounds like they are dumping the socialist model - I'm sure anyone who wants to hire protection there is free to do so.

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Originally Posted by creaker

Sounds like they are dumping the socialist model - I'm sure anyone who wants to hire protection there is free to do so.

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Read about the Coal and Iron Police. There is a very important reason why the private hire model doesn't work when there is no counter balance from public law enforcement. You know, things like lynchings and the violation of human rights in exchange for money.

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Originally Posted by creaker

Sounds like they are dumping the socialist model - I'm sure anyone who wants to hire protection there is free to do so.

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And they can probably hire more qualified applicants too. :+1:

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Originally Posted by Williamsmith

Read about the Coal and Iron Police. There is a very important reason why the private hire model doesn't work when there is no counter balance from public law enforcement. You know, things like lynchings and the violation of human rights in exchange for money.

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You're just nay-saying because public law "enforcement" buttered your bread.

Let these folks have the freedom to either be their own security or hire their own.

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Originally Posted by UltraliteAngler

You're just nay-saying because public law "enforcement" buttered your bread.

Let these folks have the freedom to either be their own security or hire their own.

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I got butter on my bread the old fashioned way, I "churned it."

Once people see how crime dramatically drops in this community there will be massive lay-offs of police forces all over the nation.

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Originally Posted by Williamsmith

I got butter on my bread the old fashioned way, I "churned it."

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMPu99_Xvjw

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Originally Posted by UltraliteAngler

And they can probably hire more qualified applicants too. :+1:

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Actually folks will step up and fill those positions - in places like Afghanistan I think they call them warlords, in Central America I think they just call them gangs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Voluntary_City

Sometimes a useful resource for this sort of thing.

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Originally Posted by creaker

Actually folks will step up and fill those positions - in places like Afghanistan I think they call them warlords, in Central America I think they just call them gangs.

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Well, if that is all they can afford to hire then I guess they will have to make do!

Part of what is wrong with this country is all the whining about things: "I don't have affordable healthcare! Getting cancer bankrupt me!" or "I lost my job because it was outsourced to Mexico!" or "Crime is bad and we don't have a police force in my city!"

Wah-wah-wah!

These whiners need a can-do attitude!

Poor rural communities that expect wealthy-urban-level response time and staffing are going to be disappointed.

There are big chunks of the day when my area will have only one deputy on-call. This means he is asleep at home, and the dispatcher will call and wake him if there is an issue. Anything not immediately pressing will wait until the next business day. We had a home invasion a few months ago, the dispatcher asked "well, are they gone?", and upon hearing they had left decided not to send someone until the next morning. Recent wealthy incomers to the community were horrified to learn that there wasn't a SWAT team waiting to roll out the door on 60 seconds' notice...

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Originally Posted by UltraliteAngler

Well, if that is all they can afford to hire then I guess they will have to make do!

Part of what is wrong with this country is all the whining about things: "I don't have affordable healthcare! Getting cancer bankrupt me!" or "I lost my job because it was outsourced to Mexico!" or "Crime is bad and we don't have a police force in my city!"

Wah-wah-wah!

These whiners need a can-do attitude!

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As long as your can-do is bigger than the can-do of the person who is trying take your can-do away from you, that'll work.

Anarchy is a viable model - but like most other systems it usually doesn't end well once oligarchy sets in.

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Originally Posted by bae

Poor rural communities that expect wealthy-urban-level response time and staffing are going to be disappointed.

There are big chunks of the day when my area will have only one deputy on-call. This means he is asleep at home, and the dispatcher will call and wake him if there is an issue. Anything not immediately pressing will wait until the next business day. We had a home invasion a few months ago, the dispatcher asked "well, are they gone?", and upon hearing they had left decided not to send someone until the next morning. Recent wealthy incomers to the community were horrified to learn that there wasn't a SWAT team waiting to roll out the door on 60 seconds' notice...

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Have the wealthy incomers hire private security. Problem-solved.

Or better yet! Have the wealthy incomers run for all the local offices, dupe the poor/uneducated electorate there so they vote for the wealth incomers, then have all the wealthy incomers raise the taxes on the poor/uneducated electorate. This way the taxes fund a police force that protects the wealthy incomers in a proper way and the poor/uneducated schlubs pay for it.

No need to reinvent the wheel.

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Originally Posted by creaker

viable model

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Originally Posted by creaker

oligarchy

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Big words.

Most of the wealthy incomers are progressive Democrats, and expect services to magically appear and someone else to pay for them. So your "drive the working people off the island" scheme might hold great appeal. I'll see about working that into my next campaign pitch.

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Originally Posted by bae

Most of the wealthy incomers are progressive Democrats, and expect services to magically appear and someone else to pay for them. So your "drive the working people off the island" scheme might hold great appeal. I'll see about working that into my next campaign pitch.

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:+1:

What can I say? I am a problem-solver.

For the record, I have been quite sarcastic in this thread.

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Originally Posted by UltraliteAngler

For the record, I have been quite sarcastic in this thread.

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Except foe the problem solver comment, that is TRUTH!

For those of us who feel really bad for the victims, I can only hope you never have to experience what they have gone thru. This was for me a serious troubling issue since I have a heart for the victims.

I am now not going to read any of your responses. I am pretty sure you will have some kind of sarcastic comment.

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Originally Posted by UltraliteAngler

Have the wealthy incomers hire private security. Problem-solved.

Or better yet! Have the wealthy incomers run for all the local offices, dupe the poor/uneducated electorate there so they vote for the wealth incomers, then have all the wealthy incomers raise the taxes on the poor/uneducated electorate. This way the taxes fund a police force that protects the wealthy incomers in a proper way and the poor/uneducated schlubs pay for it.

No need to reinvent the wheel.

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I'm not sure, but I doubt wealthy people are clamoring to get into Grants Pass. It had a reputation as kind of a backwater when I lived in Oregon. It's only claim to fame is being the birthplace o Dutch Brothers' Coffee.

Is this the same area that a few years ago voted down public library service? I wonder.

perhaps rheir sherriff' s dept isnt providing good service for the money and they didnt want ro give that department more.

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Originally Posted by iris lilies

Is this the same area that a few years ago voted down public library service? I wonder.

perhaps rheir sherriff' s dept isnt providing good service for the money and they didnt want ro give that department more.

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I agree that if I lived there I'd be looking at the numbers before just passing a tax increase to make sure there wasn't a lot of waste. However, I found another newer article about the situation and apparently they elected a new sherriff in 2015 who is having the same issues where often he'll be the only person working and trying to protect a sizable county landmasswise (1,642 sq. miles according to wikipedia) with 82,000ish residents and constantly running from one end of the county to the other to deal with what would sounded like actual emergencies.

Perhaps they need to take a page from the Fergusson MO playbook and figure out how to monetize the residents with fines for traffic violations and littering and jaywalking or whatever. Then they could hire a boatload of new deputies who would earn their own salaries.

I have noticed my county and similar ones nearby have a habit of:

- increasing spending on non-mission-critical stuff
- being forced to spend on unfunded state and federal mandates
- increasing staffing

- running into a budget problem when the economy responds to the normal business cycle downturns

- going to the voters for special levies to make the budget work, and threatening to cut essential "charismatic" services first, like law enforcement, fire/ems, health and human services, parks, ...

My county has gone through this cycle a few times since I've been here. The independently-elected Sheriff and Prosecutor tend to have to issue press releases similar to the Sheriff in the news articles in the original post, pointing out that the county Council is refusing to fund basic expected governmental services.

Still, we seem to always have money to spend on consultants to facilitate meetings developing word clouds for community planning...

[QUOTE=bae;244038

Still, we seem to always have money to spend on consultants to facilitate meetings developing word clouds for community planning...[/QUOTE]

Facilitation can run the range from the worst to the best. I have been in plenty of the bad, and a couple of the great. Done the best you get things done!! I am finally on a committee that is getting things done, like effective steps to fix serious communication issues in our department. It is very rare. However you can get stuck in lovely word clouds, sticky note boards, and too much sharing. I don't think people know how to evaluate this, they just see that a facilitator is supposed to help.