The problem is this is what the local government really, really should be. It should be an administration made up of local residents, with an equitable mix of (formerly) underrepresented folks. Honestly, it’s a violation of civil rights that it’s not. (And we really need to start pressing that.)
We are so bad at governments that we are constantly coming up with the idea of government to replace what passes for governments.
And if we have everyone in the community pitch in to pay for the services that we want our local community to offer… we’ve re-invented taxes again.
Can I just quote this here because I agree with it so much? 
And there, right there, that is the crux of the problem, the key to solving the rest of it: perhaps if we solved this there would be no rest of it because it would all fall into line.
The police work for us. They have forgotten that. They are our servants, not our masters. There should be no convincing required, just telling them the new parameters of their job. If they don’t like it, they can go pound sand. If they don’t do their job, they can go pound sand. This is what I mean when I say that the police are no longer under the control of the local government.
