Voters in three Connecticut cities favor reallocating police funding to social services — that’s according to a new poll from the ACLU of Connecticut.
The ACLU polled voters in Bridgeport, Hartford and New Haven. Three quarters of those voters support redirecting some of their city’s police budget toward mental health experts and social workers — with higher support among Black voters.
All three cities saw protests in favor of defunding the police this summer after the killing of George Floyd in Minnesota. Melvin Medina is with the ACLU.
“The summer protests were not a moment or a flash in the pan. The thousands of people who poured into the streets of Connecticut represent a decades-long movement and call for cities and towns to spend less on policing and invest more in people,” Medina said.
About three quarters also support pulling police out of schools and redirecting money toward school counselors and other social programs.
The ACLU said more than half the people who responded to the poll said they or someone they knew had been harassed or hurt by police.
