Despite decades of police community relations and police outreach programs, there has been little progress in improving the police image within the African-American community. The police are still seen as an oppressive occupying force in most urban areas. Whenever a black person is injured or killed by the police there is an instantaneous outcry of police brutality by ‘community leaders’ who have never walked a single minute in a cop’s shoes. Never mind the facts of the case.
There’s no other way to describe it: Oakland is a cesspool of black crime. Allowing civilians – and that would be mostly black civilians who are prejudiced against cops - to investigate the police is a real lousy idea. They might as well just lynch any cop accused of using excessive force or of shooting a person without cause. To many African-Americans, the police shooting of a black person is never justifiable.
While the investigations and follow up actions of civilian review boards in neighboring San Francisco and other cities have worked fairly well and mostly free of controversy, that would probably not be the case in Oakland with its predominantly black population.
Admittedly, there is some merit in questioning the reliability of police investigating themselves. But there are other remedies besides what Oakland is contemplating. Those who feel they have been wronged by the police can ask the District Attorney’s Office, the State Attorney General and the U.S. Justice Department to investigate their complaint. In Oakland, there is absolutely no need for any civilians to investigate charges of police wrongdoing.
OAKLAND CONSIDERING USING CIVILIANS TO INVESTIGATE POLICE
By Sean Maher
Oakland Tribune
June 12, 2011
OAKLAND -- Among the most fundamental relationships in Oakland's struggle with crime is that between its police officers and its residents. That relationship could see major changes in the coming months as a years-old proposal to shift control of police oversight into the hands of civilians is gaining traction.
Currently, the city primarily relies on the Oakland Police Department to investigate complaints against its own officers. Some community activist groups and council members are pushing to tip that balance in the direction of civilians with no connection to the department to do that work instead.
It's a hefty job. The police department's Internal Affairs Division, or IAD, has a staff of about 35 people. It received 1,570 civilian complaints of officer misconduct in 2010, according to its own reporting, an average of about two complaints per officer. Of the complaints, 415 concerned use of force.
Oakland's existing Citizens' Police Review Board has been around for more than three decades. It is staffed with four investigators, but has never been the primary resource for residents to bring police complaints and has never had the resources to tackle more than a handful of cases. Last year, it handled 80.
In San Francisco, by comparison, the Office of Civilian Complaints -- an all-civilian team the same size and a little more than half the cost of Oakland's sworn staff in IAD -- took in about 850 complaints for about 2,300 officers, or about a single complaint for every three officers.
Adding to the task in Oakland is the city's settlement with the federal government over the Riders scandal. In that 2003 settlement, OPD committed to dozens of reforms. Federal monitors said in April that after eight years, an unacceptable number of those reforms remain uncompleted, and most are at least partly the responsibility of IAD. The judge in that case has gone so far as to threaten putting Oakland police under a receivership, which would place the department in federal control.
Mayor Jean Quan said avoiding that takeover and finalizing the police reforms are her next priority, right after solving the city's catastrophic budget deficit. She's met with the judge and the monitors several times and said she's set to make some changes to IAD. In the next several months, she's planning to move eight to 10 sworn officers currently in IAD back into street work. To compensate for the department's loss in manpower, lower-level supervisors would process less severe complaints, rather than make investigators handle every one.
Beyond that, Quan said, she hasn't finalized how to change the existing system, though her staff is exploring ideas about how to civilianize at least parts of IAD.
One popular idea for the first step would be changing the staff that handles complaint intake.
Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan (at-large), who said she solidly supports the idea as long as it can be done while abiding by the Riders settlement, argues that a civilian who feels mistreated by a police officer is more likely to feel comfortable making a complaint if he or she can do that with a fellow civilian, rather than one of that officer's co-workers.
However, Quan and her team will need to meet and confer with union leaders over any major changes.
Police brass seem willing to go along with the idea. Capt. Paul Figueroa, who commands IAD, said he is working with Quan's office and the city administrator to "determine the best way to move forward with civilianization of IAD."
Sgt. Dom Arotzarena, president of the police union, declined to comment on the issue of civilianizing any police jobs, saying no city official has yet approached him on the topic.
That makes sense, as Quan said she's prioritizing other negotiating points at the moment. Her negotiations have been focused on police contributions that she says are crucial to resolving the city's dire budget deficit. She's been calling on officers to pay 9 percent into their pensions since she took office in January.
Nonetheless, Quan said she's planning to work hard on police reforms, including civilianization, in the second half of this year, after the budget has been settled.
Rashidah Grinage, director of People United for a Better Life in Oakland, is pushing for big changes now. Since civilian investigators cost about half what sworn investigators do, she argues, it could be a money-saver to find some money in the upcoming budget to bulk up the CPRB.
At the least, according to Grinage and about a dozen speakers at a recent City Council meeting, Oakland's review board should be staffed to handle the intake of all complaints from residents.
The CPRB currently investigates when residents bring a complaint to them separate from filing it with IAD. The board is able to subpoena officers and hold hearings, parallel to any work done within the police department. As far as its "teeth," CPRB passes its findings to the city administrator, who may weigh those findings against any he gets from the police department, then administer any discipline.
Making a change that required residents to take their complaints straight to the CPRB would boost its limited public profile, Grinage said, and a copy of every complaint still would be sent to the police, leaving the door open for internal investigations.
Community members who spoke at a recent City Council meting say they want to see more resources going to civilian oversight overseen by investigators who have a professional understanding of the laws police must follow, but who don't work in any police department and therefore have no horse in the race.
The civilianization idea has been popular with the City Council since at least 2009, when it approved the change with the stipulation that the money to hire new CPRB investigators had to come from somewhere else -- hiring 10 new civilians as the city was continuing to lay off scores of workers was a tough sell. The projected cost to do so is $1.2 million, and the money hasn't turned up yet.
Quan said last week that she's reaching out to grant foundations to secure the cash and hopes to hear back starting in July.
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