Vasquez Guzman, L. Investing in Police-Community Relations to Advance Public Safety. Mayors Innovation Project.
Ensuring public safety is the first task of government. But since our country’s founding, the behavior of police in carrying out this role has been a perennial point of debate, social contest, and often violence. In the wake of the widely publicized police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020—and in response to years of frustration with the effectiveness of police, jails, and prisons in enhancing public safety—we look at the many ways cities across the country are rethinking how they allocate police resources to respond to crime.