Markeshia Ricks Photos
Activists speak with Alder Adam Marchand after meeting.
Emma Jones: “Do the right thing.”
Two weeks.
That’s about how long activists pushing for a strong civilian review board (CRB) have to convince alders that citizens seeking to keep cops accountable should have subpoena power.
The Board of Alders had planned to vote at a City Hall meeting Monday night to approve an ordinance that would create a long-awaited new version of a CRB, as required by a 2013 charter referendum.
Then the alders decided to postpone the decision two weeks to give activists — who overwhelmingly dismiss the current proposal as toothless — one more chance to change their minds.
Activists had made what they thought might be a last stand Friday during a rally on the steps of City Hall with hopes of getting alders to hold off on voting and reconsider creating a CRB with little power to investigate police misconduct. That rally ultimately resulted in a sit-down with Mayor Toni Harp Monday afternoon. Harp had said on WNHH radio’s “Mayor Monday” show that she believes the activists made good points worth considering.
Though the word seemed to have spread to many that the vote would be postponed, nearly 100 people showed up to Monday’s meeting. Norman Clement said many people turned out to make sure that that was in fact what would happen.
With little fanfare, Majority Leader Richard Furlow repeated what he’d said at the public caucus 30 minutes before the board’s full meeting: Colleagues by consensus had agreed to pass over the item. In short order, they moved on to other more routine items such as mayoral appointments and a resolution expressing condolences on the recent death of the 41st President George H.W. Bush.
Alders Furlow and Winter talk with CRB supporters in the aldermanic chamber.
Activists stayed until Board President Tyisha Walker-Myers asked for a motion to adjourn, with many of them hanging back at the close of the meeting to talk with alders.
Chris Garaffa was among the activists who had an opportunity to sit down with Mayor Harp earlier Monday. He said the postponed vote gives CRB supporters a little more time to work on reaching out to alders and educating them. (Read more here about the outcry against the current version of the ordinance before the board.)
“Nothing would better than what they proposed,” he said.
One key sticking point is whether the CRB should have subpoena power. It wouldn’t under the current version of the ordinance. Activists argue that experience in other cities shows that without subpoena power, a CRB has little force to probe police misconduct and protect citizens’ rights.
President Pro Tem and Dixwell Alder Jeanette Morrison disagreed. Though she has voiced concerns that alders don’t have the authority to grant subpoena power to a CRB and that state law must give alders that authority, Morrison is very much in favor of a new CRB.
“Every day we go without a CRB is a day that my brother, my son, my colleagues who are black, brown and male and my constituents are subject to not having their rights protected,” she said.
Morrison said her belief that the alders cannot give subpoena power to another board is rooted in the research that has been compiled for alders by legislative staff. She said if there were a state law that explicitly said it was OK, she wouldn’t hesitate. The city’s corporation counsel has argued that the alders do have the ability to confer subpoena power; activists have suggested several ways to do it.
Majority Leader Furlow said that alders will be requesting an updated opinion from the city’s Corporation Counsel on the issue of subpoena power.
“We just want to protect our city from litigation,” he said.
Activists and some members of the board have advocated for creating a CRB that has independent investigatory powers and the authority to recommend disciplinary action. They also recommend that members be selected from approved neighborhood organizations and that the new board collects and report data about its activities. They also recommend that the board get 1.5 percent of the city police department’s operating budget so that it has the staff and resources needed to help facilitate its work.
EINO SIERPE PHOTOS
Cops slam & injure unarmed protester Nate Blair last year; no officers were disciplined.
President Walker-Myers said that several members had amendments that they wanted to add. She decided not to begin the process of considering those amendments Monday night because other alders didn’t have enough time to review them.Everyone agreed to pull back so people can submit their amendments and give the entire board an opportunity to review them.
“The work is going to be done,” she said. “All of the amendments will be looked at an vetted and then we’ll see where we’re at. “
She encouraged people who want to have a say about what should go in the ordinance to submit their information so that it can be considered as alders make amendments.
One of the alders who will be making amendments is Steve Winter. Among several suggested changes, the Prospect Hill/Newhallville/Dixwell alder wants to specifically make it clear that the CRB would have subpoena power. (See his markups of the proposed ordinance here and read a letter he wrote to his board colleagues here.)
“The charter demands a CRB that instills public confidence,” he said after the meeting. “It will take significant changes to make this ordinance that.”
Morrison, with Jones: “I understand the passion. But there is a process.”
Emma Jones said she’s seen the process of creating CRB through now two mayors, and different members of the Board of Alders. And the only things that seem to change are the faces of the elected, not the amount of knowledge that people have on the issue of why a CRB is necessary, she said. She said that means that those who support a strong CRB often have to educate and re-educate alders through endless hearings.
“I’m just exasperated with all of the doing,” she said.
Jones is the mother of Malik Jones, who was shot dead in 1997 by an East Haven police officer after a high-speed car chase into Fair Haven.
“I’m hoping that this is not a pause to come back and do the same thing,” she said. “I hope it’s an opportunity for the board and the community to come together jointly and do the right thing. That’s what my hope is.”
Without the power to subpoena documents and witnesses, the Civillian Review Board becomes merely the Cilvillian Board.
Rev. Ross-Lee