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Announcement :: Civil & Human Rights |
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More hearings on citizen oversight of police |
Current rating: 0 |
by Ricky Baldwin
Email: baldwinricky (nospam) yahoo.com (verified)
Phone: 217-328-3037
Address: 801 E California, Urbana |
24 Jul 2006
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The Urbana City Council will take input from area residents on a proposal for citizen oversight of local law enforcement this Monday night at 7pm at the beginning of the council meeting at 400 S Vine St in Urbana. |
(Urbana) Tonight at 7pm the Urbana City Council is taking citizen input at the start of its regular meeting on the subject of establishing independent civilian oversight of local law enforcement.
This is a PUBLIC HEARING.
A citizen police review board has been a key demand of local civil liberties groups, African American groups and others for over five years. Now it finally has a good chance of happening, but not without a fight. The police union, FOP, is currently entering contract negotiations with the City and has staretd turning out their boosters to criticize this proposal as somehow anti-police, even though the FOP president as well as the current police chief participated in months of positive meetings as part of the Mayor’s Taskforce on Citizen Police Review from October to June of this year. It was that taskforce that produced the draft ordinance that the City Council will soon vote on. It is definitely NOT anti-police.
A citizen police review board would provide an unbiased venue for area residents to lodge complaints about the police, for ordinary citizens to hear those complaints and review police policies. A determination by such a body could give both community members and the police the satisfaction of knowing that a credible, true third party had reviewed a given case and found merit or lack of merit in a given complaint – without the perceived bias of an internal police investigation. The Coalition for Citizen Police Review, a local group, sees this proposal as a means of improving community-police relations and helping restore some of the confidence in the system that has been lost by distrust that has built up over the years. That has been the experience of dozens of other cities, large and small, around the country that have established independent citizen oversight of their police departments – and many of the strongest advocates of citizen oversight are former law enforcement officers.
Please come tonight if you possibily can. This is an opportunity that Urbana should NOT miss. We need to hear the voice of reason. We need to hear from Urbana residents especially, but anyone is welcome.
For more info, call 328-3037. And thanks in advance. We can do this! |
See also:
http://www.prairienet.org/cprb
http://www.city.urbana.il.us
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This work is in the public domain |
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Re: More hearings on citizen oversight of police |
by GreenGuy
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
25 Jul 2006
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How'd it go?
Has the council made any indication as to if they're going to implement a board, or a timeline? |
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Re: More hearings on citizen oversight of police |
by Ricky Baldwin
baldwinricky (nospam) yahoo.com (unverified) |
Current rating: 0
26 Jul 2006
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It went well, very well (see the News Gazette, 7/25/06). About 50 supporters showed and many spoke. Eloquently.
We do not have a timeline as such, but we will be discussing what indications we do have tonight at 7pm in the PRC Metting room of the IDF (I'm posting an announcement in a minute). The short version is, we think it will happen soon.
Thanks again to everyone who has supported this effort, and especially those who showed up Monday night!!! |
