I agree that, in general, you're going to have biased training data (with a bias that's difficult to measure) and so inherently policing recommendations will be biased. This is particularly problematic when it comes to arrests for crimes that are inherently 'selective' in their enforcement. Eg; drug-related crimes, public intoxication, loitering, trespassing.
But the fact is... violent (fatal and nonfatal) crimes do happen at a much higher rate in poor neighborhoods. And black americans are calling the police at higher rates knowing full-well what that might imply [1](https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hpnvv0812.pdf). Anecdotally, when I lived in south side Chicago, when speaking to residents (that did not live in a predominantly affluent area like Hyde Park) one of the key complaints was that there simply wasn't enough police to respond to violent incidents.
There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police.
But the fact is... violent (fatal and nonfatal) crimes do happen at a much higher rate in poor neighborhoods. And black americans are calling the police at higher rates knowing full-well what that might imply [1](https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hpnvv0812.pdf). Anecdotally, when I lived in south side Chicago, when speaking to residents (that did not live in a predominantly affluent area like Hyde Park) one of the key complaints was that there simply wasn't enough police to respond to violent incidents.
There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police.