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It seems like @adrienneeadams had a real fire-and-brimstone opening to this @NYCCouncil Public Safety Committee meeting, ripping the City's police review, which many are calling a whitewash, but the stream is glitching so hard we only got pieces of it: https://council.nyc.gov/livestream/#virtual-room-1
“Here we are, 7 months after the Governor’s executive order, and I have nothing to review this morning, nothing to give you feedback on today, nothing to speak of to enlighten or inform of any progress at all," @adrienneeadams says.
"It's a real missed opportunity, and I question the value of the work you *have* done," @adrienneeadams says. "Listening sessions with no direction aren't going to get us anywhere."
"I'm concerned about the NYPD's role here," @adrienneeadams says. "It's not hard to see that they're leading this process. But I have yet to see a true commitment to reform from the NYPD. I question whether they can partner with others to reform themselves."
"If the leadership didn’t get the message this summer on what’s wrong with policing in America and in New York City, I quite frankly don’t know if they ever will,” @adrienneeadams says.
Breaking a long-established pattern on the Public Safety committee in which NYPD staff testify, then walk out before others can testify, Adams informs everyone that NYPD critics will speak first, and the police will stay and listen to them.
Chelsea Davis, from the Deputy Mayor's office, testifies that the NYPD reform working group has held 9 public meetings. (Critics say those meetings were poorly advertised, and that the NYPD selected who could attend in person, and screened comments from online participants.)
Why isn't the city following the Governor's recommended timeline in drafting this report? @adrienneeadams asks administration officials. Does not receive a meaningful answer.
Who's in charge of writing this report? @adrienneeadams asks. The First Deputy Mayor's office, she is told. Has anyone started writing anything yet? she asks. "We have absolutely started to think through..." etc.
"Can you provide us with a list of all the stakeholders you've had meetings with so far?" @adrienneeadams asks. "We can absolutely follow up," with that information, Davis says.
"If we don't have leaders who are committed to reform, than none of this is really worth our time," @adrienneeadams says, before reading from the recent OIG report quoting NYPD leadership saying there wasn't much they'd have done differently over the summer.
Davis punts, but Adams presses: "Can leaders who refuse to acknowledge mistakes accomplish real change?" Davis won't address the specific point of NYPD self-absolution in the OIG report.
"Why has the NYPD hosted all the meetings so far?" @adrienneeadams asks. Thomas Giovanni of the Law Department answers it would be "inappropriate to interpose" another agency between the NYPD and the communities it's trying to hear from. "They should be at the forefront."
"We're six months into a nine-month progress and it sounds like the only agency that's held a listening session is the NYPD," @adrienneeadams says. Has a single other city agency held a listening session on NYPD reform? Are other agencies in this conversation?
Davis answers that actually all these hearings have been held by the entire collaborative, not just the police. She runs through other city agencies she says are involved in the process.
Subtext here is that public defender groups and major police-accountability groups have been at loggerheads with this city initiative. Invited to participate, they asked for details and commitments to make sure they weren't signing on to a whitewash, and haven't heard much since.
"The process that the mayor and commissioner have rolled out is smoke and mirrors," public defenders wrote in the Daily News last month. "It gives the illusion of something real when, in reality, it is designed to reinforce and justify the status quo." https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/ny-oped-this-time-we-need-fundamental-nypd-reform-20201215-kg4hyd3jdnc57ntyq6smq27o2e-story.html
Lastly, @adrienneeadams asks about James Kobel, the NYPD officer and recent head of the Department's Equal Employment Office who City Council recently outed as a prolific poster of racist filth on a police bulletin board. "I want to know whether or not he's been fired."
No, the NYPD tells Adams. Instead, he's been suspended without pay for a month. "It appears to me that there are little consequences for bad behavior," Adams concludes. https://gothamist.com/news/nypd-officer-accused-racist-online-comments-suspended-without-pay
Testifying now, @NYPDChiefPatrol seems to say that, per the DOI recommendations, the NYPD will be training more of its officers in disorder control. (The DOI report actually faulted the NYPD for relying too much in its training on a disorder-control model for policing protests.)
Now @StephenLevin33 asks about reporting showing that the @NYPDShea overturns or reduces all but 29% of @CCRB_NYC discipline recommendations.
Does this administration agree with @CCRB_NYC chair @FredDavieUSCIRF that it's time to take final disciplinary control away from @NYPDShea? "No idea is off the table," says Davis says by way of answer.
Now @IDaneekMiller notes that police are telling community members they can no longer do their jobs properly because of bail reform, and are directing New Yorkers to call their Council Members about it. He asks the NYPD: Is that true?
But then Miller has to bounce from the meeting to attend another simultaneous City Council hearing, so he doesn't get an answer.
Council Member @bradlander asks why the CCRB charges against the cop who killed Delrawn Smalls 5 years ago still haven't been processed. NYPD official says he doesn't have that info in front of him. Lander suggests he address that answer to Smalls's family, who are on the call.
"This hearing can't move us forward as it is," Lander concludes, suggesting that if he were running the meeting, it would adjourn now until the NYPD answered the question.
Council Member @HelenRosenthal notes that over her tenure on City Council, training reform has been demanded and promised time after time, with no meaningful result that she can see. "How are you going to change the *culture*?" she asks.
"Your answers are not god enough," Rosenthal tells Davis, adding that what she's heard today confirms for her that the mayor and his administration have no real commitment to reforming the NYPD.
Rosenthal challenges @CrimJusticeNYC's Marcos Soler to name a single initiative under consideration that might change the NYPD culture. Soler points to discussions around shifting the conception of officers' role to include both crime-fighting and *problem solving.*
Jumping in, @AdrienneEAdams asks Soler if there's been any discussion of transferring more functions away from the NYPD. Yes, he says. Like what? "I don't want to prejudge the internal discussions we're having," Soler says.
Chelsea Davis from the First Deputy Mayor's Office jumps in to mention discussions about EMT-only responses to mental-health calls, and getting the police out of responding to family violence calls, homeless outreach and vendor issues.
Thomas Giovanni from the NYC Law Department tells Council Members that getting final discipline away from the NYPD is a legal knot, because the issue is controlled in large part by state law.
In round 2 of Council questions, @StephenLevin33 asks again why the NYPD overturns so many CCRB disciplinary decisions. Soler says we need to look into whether CCRB is properly considering the broader "trajectory" of the officers it investigates.
Worth noting that the rate at which CCRB's recommendations are overridden isn't that different from other jurisdictions, Soler says. Part of the problem may be the multiplicity of oversight bodies.
As to whether the administration agrees that final disciplinary control should be taken away from the police commissioner, Soler says it's tricky. Do you really want a department head who isn't in control of his own staff?
Striking watching this hearing how the bulk of the testimony is coming from the First Deputy Mayor's Office and @CrimJusticeNYC. NYPD speaking relatively little. (And frequently inaudibly, due to a lousy connection.)
Council Member @NYCCouncil38 asks the NYPD for an update on discipline for other officers who killed NYers. "Sitting here right now, I don't know the status of any individual," NYPD official answers. "When can you get that to us?" Menchaca asks. "Next month," the NYPD promises.
Thomas Giovanni of the Law Department tells City Counselors that his office often winds up on the receiving end of litigation over police behavior that probably could have been headed off by listening to complaints before the city got sued over it.
Expecting the year-long process around the Governor's Executive Order 203 to definitively fix a 175-year old NYPD culture simply isn't realistic, Giovanni says. Best we can hope for is a reorientation towards addressing the problem.
Next up testifying before City Council, @FredDavieUSCIRF and Jonathan Darsh of the @CCRB_NYC. Davie says the CCRB needs the NYPD to start sharing evidence in a timely way and to stop downgrading CCRB disciplinary recommendations.
Now @msisitzky of the @NYCLU tells council members that the current process is clearly run in bad faith, and incapable of achieving anything significant. Defunding the NYPD and reinvesting in black and brown communities needs to be the organizing framework of the city's efforts.
The NYPD has no credibility, @msisitsky says, noting that the NYPD and the current administration fought efforts to repeal state civil rights law 50-A and are still misrepresenting crime data.
Maryanne Kaishian of @BklynDefender agrees, telling the council members that if they want to do something, there's one path forward: reduce NYPD budget, power, responsibility, and headcount. Put those resources elsewhere.
