The events of the past year have put all public employees in the crosshairs of the knife-wielding budget-butchers, from the halls of the state capitol in Wisconsin, to Capitol Hill in D.C. They are sharpening their meat cleavers, and law enforcement agencies from across the country are no different from any other government entity.

While this will force many departments to abandon wasteful policies and operate more efficiently, it will also set back the entire field when it is going through a chrysalis of sorts, combining new metrics and technology with people in effective ways to combat crime.

If we are to continue on our current path of slashing services in the name of revenue preservation, we will be cannibalizing the next generation of all government workers as well as sending mixed messages about a call to public service as a career.

This is especially true in an era where "the job" requires an entirely different skill set than in the past, such as enhanced verbal and written communications, more than a rudimentary knowledge of psychology, sociology and even the ability to decipher increasingly more complex data.

We need an affirmation from these high-ranking public officials that their policies will convince the youth of this country that the public safety field is an honorable vocation. It makes no difference whether it is federal, state or local, or whether it is police, sheriff or corrections.

But with the temper of the times hacking away at departmental operational appropriations, demagogues are instituting a climate of fear, one that will have a disastrous trickledown effect.

It would be naïve to think that in the near future when this retirement cycle reaches it height, an experience void will not exist. Filling this chasm-like gap will require agencies to pursue a limited qualified talent pool.

In the real world, we all know that government simply cannot compete with private industry in such areas as salaries and training, thus intensifying the problem.

So as we hear them hone their blades to cut our budgets, they might as well lock, load and pick a foot. Doesn't really matter which one, the result will be the same.

The extremity will be blasted away along with the forward progression of our profession.

David J. Terestre is a sergeant with the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington, D.C.

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