APD Decruitment Initiative

APD Decruitment [Initiative] (2022) by Andie Flores

The APD Decruitment Initiative is a multi-part public service campaign that aims to prevent potential recruits from joining the Austin Police Department, and to convince existing police officers to quit their jobs. The project is a collaboration between artists Andie Flores and Sam Lavigne.

Process

Conceptualization

Cutting across busy I-35 like a knife, a banner hangs across the top of the Austin Police Department’s downtown headquarters calling upon commuters to put our faith in a city whose potential they believe rests upon a diverse group of armed APD officers who, much (we’re to assume) like the ones pictured, want to “achieve more” “together.” The five smiling officers here stand in the way of the city, obstructing our view. Directly across the highway, text along a construction site-cum temporary parking lot boasts, “Everything you can imagine is real.” The idea feels like a mirror and foil to its opposing structure.

The pairing of this architecture is fitting first because, like the imagination quote’s womanizing originator Pablo Picasso, US police officers perpetrate acts of domestic violence at roughly 15 times the rate of the general population. Taken at its boldest interpretation, the message itself also poses a solution to our city’s police problem. Police on one side, a new reality through our own imaginations on the other. If everything we can imagine is already real, an Austin that thrives without police is a tangible reality. This project began by imagining all the ways we could/can achieve this together. The specific idea of decruitment struck while sitting at a red light behind an APD vehicle. I noticed how each cop car had bumper stickers that said ‘APDRECRUITING.ORG’ in white text on them, and the more I stared the more I noticed how one letter change might produce an entire shift in conversation. I searched to see if APDDECRUITING.ORG was an available url, and it was. I wondered what encouraging police to quit might actually feel like, especially at a time of heavy nation-wide police opposition and bought the url for $12 almost immediately. I circled around the playful optics of the bumper sticker. What would a decruitment bumper sticker look like on my car? On many cars? Would it guarantee being pulled over? Then what? What would a decruitment campaign entail? It’s one thing to yell “Quit your jobs!” at police during protests, but what if one “answer” to our police problem was supplying current and would-be cops with incentives and resources they need to find a different job? I began to bounce the idea off of close friends, namely Sam Lavigne and Zac Treager, and soon we began to dream up what may be involved: the bumper stickers, but also mailers, tokens for officers who quit, billboards, discount programs with local businesses, targeted ads, performances, a text help hotline, etc. etc. First I tried to direct a lower stakes effort to jam APD’s cadet class hiring call with large numbers of fake applications, but when I discussed with Sam we decided it would be really difficult to do this and account for entering fake social security information. As Sam and I fleshed out more of the project, it was fun to play with the extent of where we could direct the proposal’s simplicity and ease. Decruitment supposes true and then acts upon the idea that you can structure abolition in the same way initiation to institutional positions of violence are structured. You can incentivize folks to leave, you can reward them when they do, and you can provide alternatives to their current work that satisfy our need for less/no police all without having to do the heavy work on the front end of needing the individual officer to agree that all cops are bad. Even so, not only are you working toward a goal of abolition, you’re simplifying its actualization. Why police in Austin, Texas? Police do not protect us. Police in Texas are clearly no exception. From its inception, policing has always been a failure and will continue to fail again and again and again. (In Texas specifically, the first police agency was created in 1823 to protect land taken from the Comanche by white settlers. At this time, citizenship was restricted to white men.) In August 2020, during a global outcry at the death of George Floyd, and following the murder of Austin resident Mike Ramos by APD, APD’s use of excessive force during anti-police brutality protests, and the murder of protestor Garrett Foster at the hands of US Army sergeant Daniel Perry (who tweeted threats of violence toward demonstrators and protestors), the Austin City Council unanimously voted to cut the police department budget by $153.2 million. This new adopted budget redirected that $153.2 million from police funding to: • Reinvest approximately $31.5 million of APD funding into “permanent supportive housing and services, EMS for COVID-19 response, family violence shelter and protection, violence prevention, workforce development, and a range of other programs”

• Transfer a number of APD functions (including Forensics Sciences, Communications/911 call center, strategic support, and internal affairs) (and related funding of approximately $76.6 million) out of APD over the course of the fiscal year 

• “Create a Reimagine Safety Fund to potentially divert approximately $45.1 million from APD toward alternative forms of public safety and community support as determined through the year-long reimagining process”

But while Austin was the only Texas city that actually reduced its police funding following these latest protests over police brutality, almost all of that decrease came from an accounting shift of money that still allowed traditional police duties to remain funded, but potentially in different city departments. (Alicia Dean, the city’s Reimagining Public Safety Communications Lead.) So that sucks. At the time of the budget cuts, the Reimagining Public Safety City-Community Task Force (a group of city staff and community members created at the direction of City Manager Spencer Cronk) conducted an eight month-long study and series of meetings that found that less than 1% of the calls APD responds to are related to violent crime, and self-initiated police activity represent 35% of “call” volume. (34) More Austin police in the news: November 2, 2020: “Austin Police Pledged To Stop Using 'Less Lethal' Rounds On Crowds. Then It Ordered Thousands More.” April 7, 2021: “Austin Police Association concerned about growing number of officer resignations” February 17, 2022: “19 Austin police officers indicted from investigation into 2020 protests, sources say” February 23, 2022: “Gov. Greg Abbott floats pardons for Austin police officers charged with excessive force in 2020 protests”

In May 2021, the Texas House of Representatives passed HB 1900, which would financially penalize the state's largest cities if they cut their police budgets. As of May 2, 2022, APD’s contract with the City of Austin allows for police records to remain secret and prevents holding officers accountable, and even when an officer receives discipline, it allows them to be hired and promoted. (Austin Justice Coalition) The incoming cadet class (to begin Fall 2022) is alleged to be “more diverse” etc. etc. in response to calls for abolition, but we clearly this is not, and never can be enough. We don’t need nicer cops, or more diverse ones, we need fewer ones. We need none.

Rather than let all this bullshit and legislation render us hopeless, this project allows us to experiment with creative ways to divest people power from the department until the Austin Police Department is altogether eliminated.

Parts Introduction video We hired the only man on Fiverr who fit the look we wanted for the video (semi-neutrally authoritative, white-–as to not necessarily put the burden of messenger on a Black person or person of color) and didn’t have a restriction on filming political or “controversial” material. We co-wrote a script and sent to him, with the intent to fill in the other sections with “testimonies” from people positively affected by the initiative. Then Sam had the truly genius idea to hire right-wing/right-leaning/police-loving public figures/celebrities via Cameo to give pep talks for us. We trial and error experimented with a super succinct script (Cameo requires a character count of 100 and 200 characters for their request sections) and since each Cameo request has to have a name for it’s recipient, we came up with “Trooper” as one that sounded vaguely on topic enough as to not be totally suspicious. Sam made slight cuts to what we received back, but mostly what we got back worked great. The video stars Sheriff David Clarke, Sheriff Mark Lamb, viral dancing star Officer Nae Nae, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Rudy Giuliani, and Jeffrey Hopkins, and features music from Devin Curry. Script: “Hello and welcome! We are exceedingly pleased to announce the launch of the Austin Police Department De-cruitment Initiative! This is a very special program, brought to you by popular demand.

Austin is one of the most exciting cities in America, with a wide range of outdoor activities and living amenities that provide for an excellent work-life balance. As our population grows, we have a need for more highly qualified, motivated and compassionate people to stop becoming, and quit being, police officers, in order to protect our citizens and visitors, and to serve our community.

The goal of APD De-cruitment is simple: to prevent people from joining the Austin Police Department, and to convince existing members of the APD to quit their jobs.

So many of our decruits have gone on to thrive as active, patient, open-hearted members of our city.

Not convinced? Here are some testimonials from a few familiar faces:

[Cameo inserts]

Are you currently a member of the Austin Police Department? Quit today! Quitting has never been easier. Experience all that post-police life has in store!

APD De-cruitment: Together, we can achieve more.” Rewards program I brought up to Sam the idea of trying to get local businesses to offer discounts to people who quit their police jobs, to mirror the benefits that currently exist for uniformed officers. We reached out to around 30 businesses and organizations to take part, and at the time of launch, 4 businesses agreed to offer discounts on their products or free tickets to their events. We also had Bookwoman, a local feminist bookstore, curate an abolition reading list for the site. Posters

Iterations Fusebox Festival The project first debuted at Fusebox Festival in April 2022 as a booth in the “It’s Not Fair” Fair curated by Michael Anthony Garcia. The booth had two large vinyl images of scenes from the APD website with police taken out of them (pictured below), three posters on foam core like ones you might find in a decruitment office, one tent “made of” “discarded APD uniforms,” and one looped video with an introduction to the program as well as (Cameo) testimonies from cop-loving luminaries encouraging viewers to find a new job.

Website APDdecruiting.org went live on June 27, 2022.

Reception TBD

Future of the project There are a few key elements of the project we’d like to flesh out in the near future: Expand Rewards Program: We’d love to have even more businesses join our Rewards Program and have a network of organizations who promote it as regularly as uniformed officer discounts are. Write ups: We’d also love to have some press coverage of the project. Ex-cop counselor: We’re hoping to get connected with an abolitionist mental health worker or counselor, who we could direct decruits or confused potential recruits to to address the emotional and psychological needs of discussing abolition or time spent in the force. Indeed partnership: Ideally we’d love to develop a partnership with a job search service like Indeed, that allows us to redirect people to alternative professions and get them into new/different jobs and careers.

References