Three of Minneapolis City Council members released a Safety For All Budget Plan Nov. 27. Their idea is to remove $7.9 million away from the police department’s annual budget and put it in alternative places. This would put more focus on things that don’t have a lot of money or professionals in order to better help the community.  

The plan was written by Minneapolis City Council President Lisa Bender and council members Phillipe Cunningham and Steve Fletcher. The idea is to use the $7.9 million to create a certain team to deal with non-emergent situations, to finance a mental health crisis response and expand the violence protection program, which is a program in Minneapolis that helps maintain safe, healthy and thriving communities.  

If passed the proposal would help move some money away from the police department and to the Minneapolis community. People would then be able to get help based more on what fits their needs. Furthermore, police wouldn’t be sent to deal with cases that would be best handled by mental health professionals. In addition, a larger variety of professional expertise could only benefit the communities. 

The plan would also remove the $5 million in the police overtime funding. There would be less funding to pay police overtime but the goal is to make it so police don’t have to work overtime by relieving them of some of their duties like responding to mental health emergencies. This budget would allow the police department to handle more violent and serious cases — leaving other calls to other professionals. This will be ideal because the police will be focused on these cases only and not be distracted, tired or overstressed. It’s also important because cops are trained to deal with serious cases so they will deal with situations they know how to handle. 

The Safety for All Budget Plan would benefit the community greatly. It would allow police officers to decrease their workload so they wouldn’t have to focus on so many things at once. It also makes it so that callers have responders that are more fit for certain cases. This plan should pass to help most effectively protect the Minneapolis community