One of the most contested planks of the Black Lives Matter movement’s platform is the idea of divesting from police departments. This is the demand that government agencies divert funds from law enforcement and put those resources into programs for the communities, particularly black and Latino, actually want, like affordable housing.

The explosion of protest across the United States in recent days makes clear that the crisis in Minneapolis is a national crisis. It has been A little that has been changed in how poor communities of color are being policed. It’s time to rethink superficial and ineffective procedural police reforms and move to defund the police instead.