Norm Coleman on Crime Republican Sr Senator (MN)

Too many suspects are released without trial or jail

Strengthen the State Gang Task Force

When we get tougher on enforcement, we see a change

Voted YES on reinstating $1.15 billion funding for the COPS Program.

Proponents recommend voting YES because:

This amendment reinstates the COPS Program. I remind everyone, when the COPS Program was functioning, violent crime in America reduced 8.5% a year for 7 years in a row. Throughout the 1990s, we funded the COPS Program at roughly $1.2 billion, and it drove down crime. Now crime is rising again. The COPS Program in the crime bill worked, and the Government Accounting Office found a statistical link between the COPS grants and a reduction in crime. The Brookings Institution reported the COPS Program is one of the most cost-effective programs we have ever had in this country. Local officials urgently need this support.

Opponents recommend voting NO because:

The COPS Program has some history. It was started by President Clinton. He asked for 100,000 police officers. He said that when we got to 100,000, the program would stop. We got to 110,000 police officers and the program continues on and on and on.

This program should have ended 5 years ago or 6 years ago, but it continues. It is similar to so many Federal programs that get constituencies that go on well past what their original purpose was. It may be well intentioned, but we cannot afford it and we shouldn't continue it. It was never thought it would be continued this long.

Increase funding for "COPS ON THE BEAT" program.

COPS Improvements Act of 2007 - Amends the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 to make grants for public safety and community policing programs (COPS ON THE BEAT or COPS program). Revises grant purposes to provide for:

1. the hiring or training of law enforcement officers for intelligence, antiterror, and homeland security duties;
2. the hiring of school resource officers;
3. school-based partnerships between local law enforcement agencies and local school systems to combat crime, gangs, drug activities, and other problems facing elementary and secondary schools;
4. innovative programs to reduce and prevent illegal drug (including methamphetamine) manufacturing, distribution, and use; and
5. enhanced community policing and crime prevention grants that meet emerging law enforcement needs.

Authorizes the Attorney General to make grants to:
1. assign community prosecutors to handle cases from specific geographic areas and address counterterrorism problems, specific violent crime problems, and localized violent and other crime problems; and
2. develop new technologies to assist state and local law enforcement agencies in crime prevention.

Reduce recidivism by giving offenders a Second Chance.

Recidivism Reduction and Second Chance Act of 2007
• Amends the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 to expand provisions for adult and juvenile offender state and local reentry demonstration projects to provide expanded services to offenders and their families for reentry into society.
• Directs the Attorney General to award grants for:
  1. state and local reentry courts;
  2. Comprehensive and Continuous Offender Reentry Task Forces;
  3. pharmacological drug treatment services to incarcerated offenders;
  4. technology career training for offenders;
  5. mentoring services for reintegrating offenders into the community;
  6. pharmacological drug treatment services to incarcerated offenders;
  7. prison-based family treatment programs for incarcerated parents of minor children; and
  8. a study of parole or post-incarceration supervision violations and revocations.