So, local governments publish their budgets, so I can see that the increases happened. But they don't publish their reasoning for the increases, thus, I can only guess on the intent.
I don’t read meeting minutes for most cities, but I do follow my own. Essentially with crime increasing the city council members in my extremely blue city were scared to cut police funding (fearing being blamed for a crime increase). It’s nothing nefarious. It just means activists need to do better challenging status quo opinions.
Oh yes because government officials never lie on record...