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it seems wildly inappropriate to me for the city of charlottesville to issue this scathing press release about statements they claim were made by members of the police civilian review board at a meeting that was not attended by any city employee. 
the press release claims board member josh bowers made false representations of his email exchange with police chief brackney. i can't imagine how he could have mischaracterized her emails in reading them, in their entirety and without commentary.
the city claims the board "falsely stated" that the chief did not have any availability in the month of june for a public meeting. josh read (again, in its entirety) his emails with the chief's scheduler, stating that the chief had no evening availability.
the press release also states that council will NOT extend the terms of any current members of the board, but also says that the board will present to council in june. which is after the expiration of 5/6th of the board members' terms.
it is alarming to me that the city saw fit to issue such a vicious rebuke of one of its own boards on the basis of a single newspaper article. did the city manager's office seek confirmation from anyone in attendance? did they reach out to the board first?
whoever writes the headlines at the daily progress should take some responsibility for mischaracterizing and sensationalizing what was actually said at the meeting, but the fact remains that it is wildly irresponsible of the city to make decisions based on clickbait headlines.
at a meeting between CRB member sarah burke & city councilors galvin and signer at midday on wednesday, the issue of extending the terms of current board members was not settled. 48 hours later, with no meeting held in the interim, the city says there will be no term extensions.
this could be a death knell for the nascent civilian review board. when the terms of all but one member expiring june 1 (and the 6th member's term expiring a month later), there will be no one left to finish the remaining work ensuring a new board can be selected.
the only conclusion i can draw from this is that the city wants to smother the infant board in its crib. this is despicable. i hope the daily progress objects to the use of their reporting to kill police oversight in charlottesville.
and, according to this just-published daily progress article, neither the city manager’s office nor the police department contacted any member of the board or anyone at the daily progress before issuing that press release. unbelievably irresponsible.
in a column published two days ago, i was hopeful that the city would be supportive of the CRB’s mission. this is a deeply concerning development.
