Facts:
“If I had to wait for the money later in the year, it would be too late,” Mr. Coleman said, noting that he had to close a budget gap of nearly $100 million. “I had a very narrow window of opportunity.”
The urgency, he said, was not that crime was getting worse — Columbus ranks as the eighth most dangerous city in the country of cities with a population of 700,000 or more — but that if people didn’t feel safe, they wouldn’t invest in the city. “It’s easier to create jobs when it’s safe,” he said.
William L. Scott, 35, is one of the immediate beneficiaries. He is one of the 25 police recruits who were sworn in Friday. On Thursday he said he was crushed when he was laid off, having moved to Columbus from the Dayton area specifically for the police job. He was looking for other police work when word came that the jobs were saved.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/07/us/politics/07states.html