Written by Michael Palomba
Black Lives Matter protesters and rioters who have been demanding that we “defund the police” are certainly going about it the wrong way. In fact, their actions have directly increased the funding being provided to law enforcement officers.
Last week, I wrote an article revealing that nearly $2 million was spent on overtime pay for San Diego County police officers during the recent civil unrest. Well, we have now gotten word that over $5 million has been spent on overtime pay for Southern California Highway Patrol officers.
Southern California's division of the California Highway Patrol spent $5.1 million on overtime for officers during local demonstrations against police brutality following the killing of George Floyd on May 25. https://t.co/jWfrDMpAJs
— NBC Los Angeles (@NBCLA) June 20, 2020
CHP’s border division reported paying $5.1 million for over 58,300 overtime hours between San Diego, Imperial, Orange, and Riverside counties. Statewide, over $38 million was spent by CHP in response to protests. The lion’s share of that money was to pay more than 431,000 hours of overtime.
In San Diego, CHP officers had to intervene to prevent protesters from blocking freeways like SR-94, I-5, and SR-78. Fortunately, most of the activity in San Diego was peaceful, with some clear exceptions. The same cannot be said for Los Angeles, however.
Los Angeles County had to declare a state of emergency so that disaster assistance money could be used to cover the unexpected costs. So far, they have spent more than $6 million to cover 70,300 overtime hours, which is more than the entire border division combined.
If the goal of anti-police activists is to “defund the police,” it appears that their recent actions have achieved the opposite—at least in Southern California. Officers were called to duty to keep our communities safe from massive protests, and are being properly compensated as a result.
