 The promises were big and sweeping in the days just after George Floyd's murder. In Minneapolis, the epicenter of it all, the police department would be disbanded and reimagined. In New York City, $1 billion would be cut from the police budget. In Los Angeles $150 million would be taken from police and reallocated to social programs. A year later, instead of building on those promises, officials in major cities across the U.S. are moving closer to the old ways, amid rising crime, arguing that traditional policing is still central to public safety in America. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, facing reelection this fall, has expressed a desire to increase spending on police, hire more officers to replace those who retired, and he has demonized local officials who "fought to abolish or defund the police." In New York City, public safety has emerged as the major issue in the democratic primary for mayor, with frontrunners like Eric Adams and Andrew Yang declaring they're opposed to pullbacks of the police force. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti's budget proposal, meanwhile, essentially returns part of the money cut from the police department last year.  George Floyd Square in Minneapolis this week. Photographer: Tim Evans/Bloomberg "No politician wants to come across as being soft on crime," said Delores Jones-Brown, a visiting professor at Howard University and a retired professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. There are fixes, she added. Police officers don't solve crime, but stronger gun laws, jobs, education and organized youth programs do. These things can take a long time to put in place and aren't as immediately visible as a heavy police presence, so they often aren't useful in a political campaign. Yet, there are real risks in continuing policing as we know it. Nearly 1,000 people have died at the hands of police since last year, roughly the same pace as it has been since 2015, according to a Washington Post database of police killings. Federal police reform has stalled in the Senate. "If we don't come up with effective means to control police violence, it will in fact contribute to violence," Jones-Brown said. New York City and Minneapolis residents will soon get a chance to vote directly on the sort of public safety future they want to see. Frey, the entire Minneapolis city council and a measure to disband the police force and create a department of public safety are on the ballot in the fall. In New York, the mayoral primary will give voters a choice between candidates who want more officers and candidates who seek a pullback in traditional policing. - Fola Akinnibi | 
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