"Originally we asked INS to train a select number of local police to access their database via computer at the jail to check the legal status of ALL ARRESTEES."Good idea, and nothing in the APD's policy prevents that. This is about checking the residency status of witnesses and victims.
Personally, I think that all the small-government conservatives here eager to turn the APD into a branch office of the federal government are really onto something. But let's not stop with the INS; there's lots of overworked and underpaid federal agencies that need our help!
Anytime someone is mugged and reports the crime to the police, the APD should audit him for the IRS. Anytime a woman is raped, the cops should give her a drug test for the DEA. Anytime a car is sideswiped by a hit-and-run driver, the highway patrol should check its emissions level for the EPA. Anytime a home is burgled, the police should ransack it looking for pirated videotapes and bootleg MP3s. Anytime a business is vandalized, Austin's finest should conduct a thorough review of its hiring practices and workplace safety.
And so forth. I'm sure the folks in Washington can provide us a list, since we Texans are too left-wing, ignorant and provincial to be trusted with setting our own law-enforcement priorities. This plan would have three important benefits:
- First, of course, we'd finally start to put a dent in crimes like these that the federal government just doesn't have time to pursue.
- Second, we'd ease the pressure on the pared-to-the-bone federal budget, moving the costs of enforcement from the cash-strapped feds down to the local level, where police departments have more money than they know what to do with.
- Third, and best of all, crime statistics would drop through the floor. Why, I'll bet you'd see at least a 25% drop in reported crimes the day this policy went into effect! And fewer reported crimes to solve leaves the APD even more time to pursue other federal crimes—endangered-species habitat destruction, CFR spending-limit violations, you name it.
Sure, some Austin police officials might whine that the job they were hired to do is to protect the lives and property of Austinites. But I know I speak for all Austinites when I say that anyone who expresses such feeble excuses should be first on the list for investigation, because he obviously has something to hide. Any true public servant should know that his first duty is to Washington, D.C. Only after the workload of federal employees is properly lightened can those lazy, bureaucratic, good-for-nothing beat officers be permitted to squander my tax money chasing after burglars, murderers, rapists and other petty criminals who merely violate state and local laws.