Indianapolis Recorder, Indianapolis, Marion County, 7 April 2000 — Page 5

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FRIDAY, APRIL 7,2000

THE INDIANAPOLIS RECORDER

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POLICE

ContlnuMl from A1 physical confrontation between tiu/ens and several police officers that ImiI consumed a considerable uinquiit of alcohol while attending a baseball game earlier in the evening in one of the suites at our new baseball field. Several areas in the city became tinderboxes as information and misinformation about the incident spread. Police-community relations were understandably at an all-time low as many citizens raised questions as to how the incident would be handled and whether a trust-destroying whitewash could be expected. There were diverse views within the city and there were some that thought process should be largely aborted in order to get speedy results and bring the accused officers to an accounting. It was in this atmosphere and aftermath that the Citizens’ Complaint Process Working Group was brought together and asked to do a service for the city. Those who consented to serve were aware that they were being used as leavening. They were also aware, however, that from the very ill wind of the brawl there might come some good in terms of a new citizens’ review ordinance that could be generally applied while also helping the city through future major crises. The document that was delivered to the Mayor and the Council after months of meetings and literally hundreds of hours of work arrived as a “pre-compromised” document. The task force that produced the document was extremely well balanced. It was a true reflection of Indianapolis in terms of racial and ethnic diversity, socioeconomic status, gender, sex and sexual orientation. There were persons from the business community as well as from community based organizations. Law enforcement Was represented. There was also a much-needed presence from the teligious, professional, legal and academic communities. Few, if any, ordinances in the history of

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Indianapolis have been initiated and worked through with this kind of citizen involvement and support. Consensus building within this very diverse group brought together by city leadership to work on the Citizens' Complaint process, was no mean feat. It should be very understandable then, why there is concern when one member of the Indianapolis CityCounty Council decides to capriciously toy with the ordinance without sharing with the working group, it's leadership, the public or even fellow Councillors the good to be achieved. The immediate case in point is the current effort by fourth (0) District Councillor William Dowdentocircumvent both the intent and the spirit of the law by making a political and out of process appointment to the Citizens’ Complaint Review

Board.

Of the many contentious issues involved in creating the new Citizens’ Complaint Ordinance, the issue of board composition and selection probably required the greatest amount of time, energy and attitude of compromise. This issue also included questions about whether law enforcement officers should be allowed to sit with vote on a citizen complaint board. In addition to requiring that all members of the Citizens’ Police Complaint Board live within the police special service district, the ordinance says that “Voting members may be selected from nominees submitted by the five (5) Indianapolis Police district [citizen] task forces...’’ The use of the word “may” rather than “shall” was a failsafecompromise that was meant to be used only in the event that the untried, innovative district task force system was unable to generate the needed candidates. The system is working, however, and there has been no need to go around it. it is very significant to note that the question never was whether the technical wording of the ordinance permits the Council and the Mayor to make direct appointments to the Board. The question, as now opened by Councillor Dowden, is

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whether such an approach breaks faith with the people who bought into the process with some very clearunderstandings. Amongthose clear understandings was the good faith agreement that thedistrict task forces, working with district police chiefs, would create the pool of candidates from which final selections by the Mayor and Council would be made. This thoroughly discussed procedure became acceptable to all the involved parties and remained viable up until the injection of the Dowden proposed shortcut and direct appointment of recent Republican Council candidate Matthew Hooker. If the proposal appointing Matthew Hooker to the citizens complaint review board is passed at the Monday, April 10 meeting of the Council, the implications and the actual and symbolic spill over will be great.

For example:

tionships of integrity and trust.

• Those persons and groups in the Indianapolis community, who wanted a much, much more severe, almost punitive ordinance, will feel vindicated in their earlier assessments that the system and city cannot be trusted to keep their word.

• Because there is no apparent rationale for what is being attempted, the appointment and the appointing process will be viewed as adeliberate act of sabotage. The local and national accolades the city has received for the way we picked up the pieces after the “brawl” and found some good in the ill wind, will turn to criticism of the way we tricked the people in order to borrow time until the ill wind blew over.

• Community Policing, which absolutely must be based on integrity and trust, will suffer a great setback as some citizens determine that they have been duped, that the understandings they thought they had with the chiefs have been broken and that the city no longer feels and obligation to work through the police citizen task forces and other community groups.

• Those complaint review committee members who responded to the call of the city to help during a particularly delicate and volatile time, will feel that they have been merely used to get the city over a hump of bad press-and community ill-will. They will certainly feel less inclined to help again when similar circumstances arise. Others will take their lead.

• The dynamics of the board will completely change if Mr. Hooker is allowed to take a seat along side those persons who were legitimately appointed through the intended process of the ordinance. He will accurately be perceived as the only hand picked political appointee. He will carry the image of the person who was used to help diminish the board and undo the work of a significant number of

Indianapolis citizens.

• The Council will find itself answerless to questions raised about why it consciously and deliberately chose to resurrect issues and feelings about the brawl and why, after doing so, it essentially defaulted to the judgement of one Counsellor.

• Deputy police chiefs will be embarrassed and will lose much of their effectiveness as the community task force persons with whom they work become aware that the Council does not listen to what the chiefs say and have little concern for the time and energy that must continuously go into forging rela-

If the Council consummates the appointment now, it will be the beginning of a nibbling process and the city will eventually find itself back at the place where it was before the brawl. For some, this is the goal.

Rozelle Boyd City-County Councilman

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