Fayetteville Police Department Needs Equipment, Asking For Donations

The Fayetteville police chief sent out 52 letters to insurance companies asking for donations, whether it be monetary or the actual equipment for the accident investigation team. All because the money isnt there in this years budget. In fact, in the 2007 budget for Fayetteville police, if you take out the personnel -which is salaries, that leaves you with about 2.5 million dollars. We looked at where exactly your tax dollars are going: Animals in Fayetteville are a top item. From the animal shelter to the veterinarian, animals get about $560,000. The drug law enforcement department gets nearly half a million dollars. And accident investigations - something that they are budgeting for, nearly 3300 this year, averaging almost 9 per day. And the animals and drug enforcement are getting priority as far as money goes. Shannon Gabbard says, "well i can tell you that as far as accidents are concerned, i dont view accident as a just a police problem. Accidents are a community problem in any community that you go to." A community problem, taxpayers are payinig police to clean up, and ticket - which, by the way, they make money off of those tickets. As a driver, would you want the most accurate account of your accident, so that you can collect properly from your insurance company - a service that you pay hundreds for "what if" situations?