Crediting a new model of police work that reduces high-risk, low-reward actions like detaining violent criminals, local officer Tom Sainsbury announced that he’s “no hero” and just did “what anyone in my position would have done” by issuing 36,093 frivolous citations to balance the city budget.
For almost a decade the city had been suffering financially after a string of bad investments: in 2016 they spent $80 million on a state-of-the-art XFL arena in hopes of luring an expansion team. In 2018 there was a $200 million purchase of Typhoid vaccines “Just to be safe.” So when the investments didn’t pan out the budget cuts began, that’s when Tom realized he had a particular set of traits that could make things right.
“I’m a coward, by nature,” Tom started. “I don’t really like confrontation or risking my life to protect people.“
He went on, “Take this scenario as an example: an armed robbery. We could spend thousands of taxpayer dollars by finding the men responsible and ripping them away from their families. Or we could issue tickets for pointing an unregistered weapon at the cashier’s face, loitering during the stakeout prior to the robbery, and then the numerous traffic violations they committed fleeing the scene. This example alone took us from a $20,000 liability to a $1,800 profit and not a single police officer is put in danger.” At first, officers were skeptical, but after earning a bonus for all the money he saved, word spread and his colleagues began to follow suit.
“This is just what heroes do,” the Spokane mayor remarked. “We were weeks away from being the indentured servants of the Chinese Communist Party because our deficit was so large, and now here we are turning a profit. Which—when you get down to it—is the goal of every government: making more money than it spends. Yes. The ultimate dream of every municipality… turning a profit on the services we provide.”
