Thread by @shayshinecastle

Big item of the night: Police oversight. This is the second reading, public hearing and possible vote to make this a reality. boulderbeat.news/2020/11/05/bou…

Staff presentation: www-static.bouldercolorado.gov/docs/Item_5A_-…

This is actually the more informative story. Didn't include much background in the most recent update. boulderbeat.news/2020/09/26/cou…

Michelle Denae, a member of the task force which researched oversight and helped write this program, reminding people why we're even here: The confrontation of Naropa student Zayd Atkinson while he picked up trash outside his home.

Slide 3 shows a police cam-view of Zayd with his hands in the air, surrounded by armed officers.

"It's been just shy of two years" that Boulder has been working on this, Denae says. Change usually takes a long time. The task force built an option for oversight "in record time" that is tailored to Boulder.

Reminder of the model: Boulder hired Joey Lipari, an independent police monitor, and will seat a 9-member civilian panel.

These folks will review alleged officer misconduct, plus department policies and procedures. All can make recommendations for change.

This ordinance specifically creates the Police Oversight Panel and the auditor/monitor position (his job).

The monitor will oversee investigations into officer misconduct — triggered by internal or external complaints — that are being conducted by the police dept's internal standards unit. He and the Oversight Panel will make recommendations for discipline to the police chief.

She will consider those, along with the recommendations from the internal investigation, in her decision.

Seating the Oversight Panel: The implementation team (who has been putting all this together) will pick original members, along with reps from two local nonprofits. Interviews for those candidates will be public.

9 members; 2 students. Non-students will serve three years; students will serve 1 year.

Recommendations for those panel members will be subject to council approval.

Implementation team member Todd Conklin going over key changes since council last saw this issue. That's covered in the first story I posted earlier.

First big change (which is actually a bit older)
The monitor won't be directly involved in internal investigations, in order to preserve independence. But if he notices something "flagrantly wrong," he will flag it to the police dept.

Monitor may recommend additional investigation, and there is an appeal process for the Chief's decision, up to the city manager.

Police Oversight Panel meetings will be public, except when they are looking into specific cases of alleged officer misconduct. Those have to be private while ongoing, for legal reasons.

Info on misconduct cases will be presented when investigations are complete; or, while ongoing, without identifying information.

I feel like I'm not doing a great job presenting this, in that I'm not spicing it up enough. It sounds boring using all this lingo, but I assure you it's really important.

Conklin on not changing the name of the Police Oversight Panel: "The word oversight is the industry standard term. That's the professional term for the work the panel will be doing here. ... We don't see any historical link between the word oversight and the word overseer."

As in slave overseers, which councilwoman Young said she wasn't cool with. It gave the impression of one group "lording over" and exercising power over another. (The panel over the police)

Which I'm pretty sure is the point. Not the lording-over part, but the citizens-having-power-over-police part.

Young: "I want to thank you for the reconsideration of terminology. I appreciate what you have concluded."

Young: Will panel member interviews be available, via video or audio recording?
Yes, Lipari says.

Friend to task force members: Is there anything you're still dissatisfied with in this ordinance? Something your hands were tied on or that is a flag for you?

Conklin: I think in our last meeting, we all had a sense of finality and accomplishment that our work was done. I don't think there are more outstanding issues.

Lipari: "I'm satisfied with it. I think we're in a good place. I think we have all the elements the city of Boulder needs."

Lipari: The one big q is whether the monitor has investigative power while those are ongoing. The team discussed that at length and decided to give the power of review. So we settled that.

Only 3 ppl signed up for public hearing; not sure they're all even here. Early hearings on this topic were quite a bit longer, so it seems like we're in a good place.

But I guess we'll see once the panel members are recommended.

Denae answering Friend's q (and kinda building on my last tweet): "There's always more work to be done. We have done something monumental ... I think if I were to have a criticism it's that anything other than a growth mindset is a failure."

"In this instance, I think we achieved what we set out to do. Let's not think that we're done. We're not done. We have done something and we have to keep building and growing."

Marcos Ospina saying that several of their friends signed up to speak but didn't receive a link to the meeting, so maybe we'll get some more speakers after all.

"The panel's legitimacy is a still birth" if city council gets the final say on who sits on it, Ospina says. They don't answer emails; their VM boxes are full. They don't listen to unhoused people; they represent privileged, white homeowners, not the community.

The department will continue to "police themselves as they always do," Ospina says. This panel is obsolete and changes nothing; it's "synonymous with the police department."

Council is going to let Misha Toor speak. Toor had issues signing up; Weaver makes the point that if this was an in-person meeting, ppl would be able to sign up until the end of public hearing.

There are limitations to remote meetings.

Toor is cutting out a bit, but I heard: "You offer us this take force and call it progressive. You're allowing police to investigate themselves."

"At best, this committee will be useless. At worst, it paints an anti-racist veneer" over a violent organization.

We don't need police to keep us safe, Toor says. "Council has proved time and again they don't give a fuck" about our safety.

Young makes a motion; council members thanking implementation team members and staff.

"Your efforts have produced a really remarkable program I'm really looking forward" to seeing work here, Brockett says. To critics, he notes that the panel and monitor are independent of the police dept.

"It will be a new day, and I'm glad to see it happen."

Friend: I just want to go on the record that I disagree with council having veto power on panel members, but I'm not asking council to discuss it since we already did and I was outnumbered.

Unanimous council vote to pass this ordinance and implement the program.

Denae: "I just want to ensure members of the community that this was not something that was held lightly by any member of this task force. We did and do represent this community and will continue to grow with you."

That's all for this one. @threadreaderapp please unroll. Thank you!