Minneapolis is “dealing with a city council who have zero clue in what they’re doing,” Rev. Tim Christopher of the Berean Missionary Baptist Church told “360aproko news on Sunday.
“At the end of the day, to be totally honest with you, they’re inept in their job,” the reverend in Minneapolis went on to say.
Christopher made the comments reacting to the fact that the city plans to spend $4.8 million to temporarily rent a building to replace the police precinct headquarters torched by rioters in the wake of the police-involved death of George Floyd.
A city council committee on Thursday approved spending $3.6 million to sublease the building for three years and $1.2 million to renovate it. The new location is roughly a half-mile from MPD’s Third Precinct, which was burned down by rioters May 28, after officers were forced to abandon it.
Christopher said on Sunday, “We’ve got a city council who’s doing everything they can do to get rid of the police, so if they’re worried about where they’re putting it, are we even going to have a police department?”
He added, “Everybody is worried about if there is going to be a place for them, but they’re trying to dismantle and defund a police department when we have record numbers of homicide in the city.”
Last week a pair of shootings that resulted in two deaths in Minneapolis accounted for the city’s 48th and 49th homicides of the year, surpassing the number of murders reported in all of last year.
When the precinct was burned down in May, Minneapolis had been in the midst of three days of demonstrations protesting police brutality and systemic racism after 46-year-old Floyd’s death.
Floyd, a Black man, died after a White police officer held his knee on his neck for nearly nine minutes despite Floyd’s shouts that he could not breathe. He was handcuffed at the time.
Officers and staff have been working remotely and at the Minneapolis Convention Center since the original Third Precinct was torched.
MINNEAPOLIS SURPASSES 2019 HOMICIDE TOTAL AFTER 2 SEPARATE DEADLY SHOOTINGS
City Council member Cam Gordon said that renting temporary space will give leaders time to figure out what to do with the old headquarters, 360aproko News reported.
Christopher stressed that city council members “have zero clue in what they’re doing, and they’re hurting the people of this city.”
“That’s what the problem is,” he said. “The problem isn’t where they’re [the police precinct] moving.”
“We are in a city where the officials are telling us if a criminal comes up to you, hand over your hard-earned money, hand over your hard-earned property, and you want to defund the police department?” Christopher went on to ask.
He added, “There is a record number of killings that go on here, and you want to defund or hurt the police department?”
There have been growing calls in cities across the country, including Minneapolis, to defund or dismantle police departments following Floyd’s death.
