Deliberate Dumbing Down of America Public Education

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and organizations, to make it easier for citizens to contact the correct source for so lutions to their problems, thus releasing police time to take care of legitimate police business.

A recent article in The Washington Times (National Weekly Edition) of May 17–23, 1999 entitled “Ahem, about those 100,000 new cops…” sheds some light on what is a little-known but controversial program. Excerpts follow: Whatever happened to those 100,000 new cops President Clinton promised to put on the streets back in 1994? More to the point, what became of the $9 billion appropriation to fund the much-hyped Community Oriented Policing Services Program (COPS) that was supposed to deliver them? According to an embarrassing new report released by the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General (IG), the money is being spent on anything and everything but new police officers. …[T]he IG discovered, during the course of 150 audits of grant recipients, that 78 percent of grantees charged unallowable costs to the federal government for such things as overtime, police uniforms and fringe benefits not approved in advance; that 41 percent of grant recipients showed indicators of simply having used federal funds to supplant local funds, sometimes paying the salaries of officers already on board, and other times not meet ing the program’s matching funds requirements; that 58% of grantees either did not develop a good faith plan to retain officer positions or said they would not retain the positions at the conclusion of the grants. All told, the IG report identified $52 million in questionable costs; $71 million that could have been put to better use. As to how many new police officers are actually on the street as a result of all this manna from Washington, well, that’s something not yet pinned down. The IG’s audit shows the COPS program has issued some $5 billion in grants, enough to fund 92,000 officers, of which only 50,000 appear to be on the street. Three years ago, IBD noted that federal grants have been going to fund state parks, nature sanctuaries and other places not usually associated with violent crime. In Florida, for instance, the state Department of Environmental Protection received a $3.5 million COPS grant to hire 30 marine patrol officers to monitor a national marine sanctuary. (Manatees can be a real threat to public order, you know.) More than 20 criminal investigations of COPS grantees have been opened thus far, yet the lucre continues to flow. But the real problem with the COPS program is the further po liticization of American law enforcement at all levels. By dangling billions before state and local departments, the federal government is teasing law enforcement into a bidding war and lobbying campaign, shifting the emphasis from dealing with crime to worrying about how to score a hit on the cash-laden Beltway pinata. Not only is there reason for legitimate concern over the “politicization” of American law enforcement. The use of the money for COPS to pay organizations like Community Research Associates to train police departments in towns across this country to employ tactics similar to those used by educational change agents to accomplish questionable re-orienting of law enforcement activities cries out for an investigation. A sample of such suggestions, taken from U.S. Department of Justice materials, follows:

MEETING #3... We ask that between now and the time we arrive, you contact these iden tified individuals and arrange for a day-long session.... This group will be exposed to the