An Increase in Police Officers
https://finance.yahoo.com/economy/policy/articles/meta-10-billion-louisiana-data-173631860.html
There is a quickly rising voice for increased recruitment numbers of police officers coming from Shreveport City Leaders. The reasons that have been vocalized in public forums by City Leaders for a need in the increase in police officers focus on Shreveport's high crime rate, but do not attempt to describe any alternative reason as to why a significant number of more police officers will be needed in the following years.
This push for a higher amount of local police officers comes right after 50 Cent's 99 year lease for a considerable chunk of Downtown Shreveport was approved. A 99 year lease for a performer that had 1, singular, festival in Shreveport and continues to cancel the Humor & Harmony Festival every year since.
While it seems targeted to focus on 50 Cent's downtown plans as the cause for more police, 50 Cent himself is who requires it. He hired multiple private security companies for the 1 Humor & Harmony festival that did occur, and even then, the State Police had to be brought in to the City of Shreveport in order to ensure the festival continued smoothly.
It makes sense for Shrevport to want to secure their 99 year long investment, but will this come at a cost to local residents? Dramatic increases in policing in city centers, typically, have an opposing effect to crime rates. Making them rise dramatically. Ultimately, coming in the form of over-policing: like the recent laws allowing the Shreveport Police to exercise their legal liberties to ticket cars that are parked on private properties if they aren't parked correctly, for example.
And realistically, why should we believe that City Leaders are becoming altruistic about crime rates all of a sudden? They pushed both the AI Data Centers and 50 Cent's 99 year lease through multiple rounds of disapproval by the city's citizens, until they were able to finally achieve internal approval amongst themselves. Multi-generational deals are being made at the City level that are removing huge swaths of possible tax revenue for the city, that further reduce the amount of tax budget that can be used for improvements like increasing the number of police officers.
Community health is at an all-time low. Shaming the City of Shreveport's citizens about the high crime rate instead of funding community support programs that will actively lower the high crime rate, is a major misstep by our City Leaders.
Do better.