SITTING ON THE FENCE

I find myself in an unusual position. I am unable to come to a logical opinion about an important matter.

Although I did not attend the City Council meeting on July 6, I have read several other peoples' opinions about the EDIT funds being used to increase the number of police officers.

On one side, we all know the city has a crime problem. The officers say their numbers are too low to adequately enforce the laws and capture the criminals. The Mayor, the Police Chief and some members of the council agree that using EDIT funds is the answer.

On the other side, many citizens and some council members believe that the city cannot afford to use the EDIT funds at this time to hire more officers.

I can see the value of both sides of the argument, hence my inability to make a decision.

When I heard the officers speaking at the last council meeting last month I was upset and disappointed that they talked of moving out of New Albany because our city was not a safe place to raise their families. Isn't that their job? Aren't they supposed to "protect and serve"? Are those just words? They said that if we had more officers on the job New Albany would be safer and our crime level would go way down. Would they move back here if the crime level was reduced? Would using EDIT funds solve the problems?

Then I read on another blog about how we have 1.8 police officers per 1,000. That is considered adequate for a city of this size. Is the problem not the number of officers but that our officers are not as well trained as those of another city? Is the problem "quality" not "quantity"? Personally I don't think this is the case. I have a lot of respect for Chief Crabtree and I think he is doing the best he can with the number of officers he has to work with.

I guess we just need to figure out how to come up with the money to hire new officers, pave our streets, fix our sewers, etc., etc, etc. Maybe we citizens should each pitch in a dollar and buy 37,000 lottery tickets in the name of New Albany.