For the average person, that doesn't really think through things as much as they should, when it comes down to the question as to whether something like electricity is more important than having a policing arm of the state, they may well feel that societies would not be civil without that policing force, and therefore policing is of more importance. In point of fact, hands down, electricity is by its very nature is of far more civilizing influence upon societies and therefore is of far more value than policing, and always will be.
First, it is important to note, that no civilization could be considered to be modern, if it did not have electricity, for we utilize electricity for just about everything of real merit, such as for the power that we need to power up all our devices that run or need to be recharged. Further to the point, electricity itself is something that can come from a variety of power sources, such as wind, solar, nuclear, coal, and further electricity can thereby be stored so it is available to be utilized at any time of the day or night. So too, electricity gives us the ability to have light, whenever we desire such, so that we are not limited to just the light that our sun gives out; as well as the salient fact that all the other parts of modern day civilizations, such as the cleanliness of drinking water, sewage, gas, security, food, clothing, buildings, housing, hospitals, communication, computers, phones, transportation, and so on and so forth, rely either directly or indirectly on the need for a reliable means of electricity. We are so dependent upon electricity that civilizations begin to quickly collapse and erode, when electricity is suddenly gone, such as through a blackout, and thereby every possible means to restore electricity as quickly as possible to the population is generated.
On the other hand, as much as some people desire to believe that it is only the active presence of the police that are preventing us from devolving into some sort of dire chaos, the fact of the matter is that police as they currently exist, is a rather modern invention, and that further, for the unenlightened, that the policing arm of the state is primarily there not really to protect and to serve the general population as a whole, but rather to protect and to serve those that are the power brokers within those communities. In fact, rather than seeing police, as being entities that equally and fairly apply the law against miscreants, it would be far more realistic to see them as being instruments of and beholden to their superior civilian authorities, utilized to keep those that have little or nothing in line, so that the privileged elites are never in harm's way.
Truth be told, police are not now, and never have been mandatory, for those that are in neighborhoods, and communities, are well able to handle their business in a way in which they are able to protect those that make up their community as well as to apply justice as they see fit, and have done exactly that in the past. In contrast, electricity is absolute mandatory, because without such, neighborhoods and communities would soon revert to far more uncivil and primitive times.