DC Police Budget Ranks 'Worst' on Return on Investment, Study Shows

Washington, D.C. ranks 110th in the nation when it comes to return on investment (ROI) for the money the city is spending on its police budget, according to a new study released Wednesday.

The study shows the nation’s capital spending $978 per capita for crime-fighting.

WalletHub conducted an in-depth analysis of 2015’s Cities with the Best & Worst ROI on Police Spending. (See map below.)

The study looked at how efficiently the 110 most populated U.S. cities spend taxpayer dollars on police protection. WalletHub calculated each city’s ROI on police spending based on crime rates and per-capita expenditures on police forces after normalizing the data by poverty rate, unemployment rate and median household income.

See the rankings here.

In order to measure police effectiveness in the face of budgetary constraints, WalletHub ranked the 110 largest U.S. cities by dividing the total safety rate (100 percent minus property and violent crime rates) by police spending per capita.

According to the latest finance data from the U.S. Census Bureau, “local governments comprised 86.8 percent of the state and local government total spending on police protection,” which added up to $97.0 billion in 2012.

Data used to create the rankings were obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.

According to the latest finance data from the U.S. Census Bureau, “local governments comprised 86.8 percent of the state and local government total spending on police protection,” which added up to $97.0 billion in 2012, WalletHub noted.

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