Holding Up Police Improvements

The National Security Agreement, which was signed in late 2008 following a wave of popular anguish over the Fernando Martí murder and general discontent over the rising levels of insecurity, called for increased vetting and training of state police. A new report shows that this plainly has not happened, with just 8 percent of the state cops being vetted, and only 11 percent receiving any sort of training. This failure to carry out even the best designed reforms (which this was not) is a persistent problem in Mexico. Here's another example with regard to the judicial reform. In this case, unlike the judicial reform snags, it's not a budgetary problem, as the states spend only two-thirds of their security allotments from the federal government. It seems to be more a lack of capacity at the state level, which is a much trickier barrier to overcome.