SULLIVAN'S SALVOS
June 3, 2025
Sullivan’s Salvos 6/5/25
In this edition:
*IC Pride
*Visiting Octavious
*Police
*Did You Know?
*IC Pride
Pride is this month in Iowa City, and there are numerous events throughout June. For a list, please see: https://www.iowacitypride.org/year-round-events.
The Pride Parade and Festival are two of my favorite events each year. I hope you can get out and show your support, particularly in light of all the bullshit Kim Reynolds and crew are pulling.
Please allow me to call particular attention to the annual Pride Parade at noon on Saturday, June 21, followed by the annual Pride Festival on the Ped Mall. Happy Pride, all!
*Visiting Octavious
Melissa and I made a quick trip to visit our son Octavious (BJ) at his new home in Morristown, New Jersey. He works for Hyatt, and recently got a promotion to Morristown from Orlando, where he had lived for 5 years.
Morristown is an interesting place. Alexander Hamilton lived there at one time, and George Washington wintered there in 1777. So the nearby area is home to a lot of history.
Morris County is home to half a million people, but all the cities are relatively small. Morristown is like many of the cities there - about 25,000 people, so roughly the size of Coralville. Because the city is very old (1730s) the downtown and square makes it appear smaller than Coralville. But Morristown and all the other cities are very close together, maybe 2-3 miles. The area between the cities, while heavily wooded, is full of expensive suburban homes.
It is only a 35-minute train ride to Penn Station in Manhattan. Many Fortune 500 companies are headquartered in Morris County, including AT&T, Novartis, BASF, Honeywell, Colgate-Palmolive, Pfizer, and Johnson and Johnson. Because of this, Morris County has the third highest median household income in the US. We have definitely seen what the wealth of the place does to housing costs! Unlike most of New Jersey, Morris County leans slightly Republican.
We took the train to New York – God I love the public transit available in the eastern US! We squeezed a lot into a single day in NYC - visiting Greenwich Village, the Stonewall National Monument, the World Trade Center 9/11 Monument, and Times Square. We rode around on the subway, ate at a classic deli, and walked around the Knicks watch party at Madison Square Garden.
Needless to say, the best part of the trip was seeing our son. I am so proud of him, and love him more than words can say!
*Police
(This ran in a previous edition of Salvos.)
It seems that one of the big debates in and around Iowa City is whether we should reduce spending on law enforcement in favor of more funding for health and human services initiatives. It reminds me of a trip I took.
Melissa and I spent some eye-opening time in Haiti. At the time, it was the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, and 5th poorest country on planet Earth. If I had to guess, I’d wager they are worse off now than when we visited.
We spent a tiny bit of time in Port-Au-Prince, whose approximately 2.6 million people is comparable to Pittsburgh, Las Vegas, or Sacramento. We spent most of our time in a city of about 80,000, which is pretty similar to Iowa City. We also visited villages close in size to Solon and Lone Tree. In all these places, I only saw police twice – entering and leaving the country at the airport.
Has an almost complete lack of police led to a better society? No, in fact, it is much the opposite. In the absence of police, the bigger, stronger, or armed person always wins. Women and children are the big losers. Physical prowess, weapons, and/or money, rather than laws, settle most disputes.
I know, I know… Haiti fails to invest in everything, not just police. Better public health, education, etc. would also improve lives. So let’s compare the countries across the world with the highest and lowest rates of police.
Of 146 reporting counties, the US ranks number 44 at 243 officers per 100,000 people. Among the countries with the lowest policing rates are Mali, Haiti, and Somalia. Not great company. Finland comes in at #16, but is followed immediately by bad actors like China and Myanmar. Right after that? Canada, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, and Sweden.
The point is, even the most progressive social democracies have police. Yes, the rate is lower. But we are talking 185-195 police per 100,000 people in the social democracies, compared to 243 in the US. The number is lower, but not substantially lower.
What does this tell us? Even with birth to death free healthcare, great schools, free childcare, guaranteed pensions, less income inequality, strict gun laws, and the like, societies need police. We will NEVER – and I mean NEVER – approach the level of social investments made by these European countries. We’ll never get close. Regardless of how much we invest upstream, downstream, you are still going to need some police.
As human beings became farmers rather than hunter/gatherers, they began living in larger and larger groups. Every single society since then has maintained some system of settling disputes. In some societies, this is done with armies. In more democratic societies, this is done with police. It has never worked any other way. There must be some way to maintain social order. Using police seems to be the best method anyone has ever come up with.
So what are we to do here? Again, we are asked whether we should reduce spending on law enforcement in favor of more funding for health and human services initiatives. I think it is obvious that this is a false choice.
Again, we will NEVER – and I mean NEVER – approach the level of social investments made by these European countries. We’ll never get close. Especially when we are only talking local dollars. Those social democracies have billions to spend; by comparison, we have a pittance. Regardless of how much we invest upstream, downstream, you are still going to need some police.
So why pit funding for police versus funding for social services? We should acknowledge that both are important. Both deserve to be heartily funded. And both should be subject to the same budgetary scrutiny as every other program or service governments provide.
I think some of the anti-police attitude comes from high profile cases. We all saw what happened to George Floyd. We know what police did to Brionna Taylor. I could name another hundred examples of bad police doing bad things to African Americans.
In addition, many of us locally saw bad behavior by past cops in Iowa City. Everyone had a story of two. Add in greater distrust of institutions in general, and it is easy to see why some folks might think more police is a bad deal. I just don’t happen to agree.
I have had a close look at local law enforcement for over 30 years now. And I can tell you that local police did a better job in 2003 than 1993, did better in 2013 than 2003, and do better in 2023 than in 2013. The improvement is significant. There is better training. They have adopted most national best practices. Crisis Intervention Training (CIT) is not optional. Cops who did not buy in have retired; new cops are hired into a very different culture. We (voters) deserve credit, because we have demanded higher standards, and our police have stepped up.
This does not mean things are perfect. We can always improve. We need to remain diligent as citizens. We need to demand the very best policing available.
And yes, we are not immune from a disastrous event. Police are people; it could happen. We need to do everything we can to make certain it doesn’t happen, but there are no guarantees.
I think there are several things to consider here:
1. I do not want to “defund” the police, but I expect police to be accountable.
2. I do not want to “defund” the police, but I expect police to always strive to be better.
3. I do not want to “defund” the police, but I expect police to always use best practices.
4. No one is more upset by a bad cop than all the good cops.
5. Contrary to what is often stated, minorities strongly oppose “defunding” the police.
A 2021 report from the Vera Institute of Justice noted that for the first time, arrest rates in the suburbs were higher than in major cities. And while arrest rates for African Americans in urban areas have been going down, they are increasing in suburbs. Over the past 20 years, the United States has seen a 20% decrease in the overall arrest rate, lower rates of racial disparities in arrests, and lower youth arrest rates. Despite very high-profile examples to the contrary, police just may be doing better nationwide.
There are racist incidents on busses. We don’t call for the abolition of bus drivers. There are racist incidents in schools. We don’t call for the abolition of teachers. There are racist incidents in hospitals. We don’t call for the abolition of doctors. I don’t see this as much different.
I am all for police accountability. As a matter of fact, I demand it. But “defunding”? No thank you! If I need a cop, I want to call 911 and get a cop!
*DID YOU KNOW? The Pride Festival in Iowa City is over 50 years old, making it one of the oldest in the country!
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---Rod
posted by Rod Sullivan @ 3:11 PM
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