Much of the debate Thursday at a Toledo City Council committee hearing about granting subpoena power to the Civilian Police Review Board centered not on whether it’s a good idea but on how fast to do it.
The Public Safety & Criminal Justice Reform Committee met for the second time this week as Toledo councilmen, community leaders, and local activists weighed in on proposed legislation related to police reform.
Many who spoke in favor of granting subpoena power to the CPRB wanted it done quickly, arguing it would give the board much needed power and authority, and several people took issue with what they believed was the Toledo Police Department’s attempt to stall or stand in the way of the proposed ordinance.
“Year after year after year we have begged for these common sense reforms,” said Julian Mack, from the Community Solidarity Response Network of Toledo. “We have waited a long time for these changes. We cannot continue to wait any longer.”
Councilman Yvonne Harper cited other recent legislation that council has passed, such as requiring officers to carry and distribute business cards, banning the use of chokeholds, and requiring officers to intervene when another cop is violating the law. This recent momentum in police reform is something she doesn’t want to lose, she said.
“This is the furthest that we’ve gotten and I don’t want to stop,” she said.
Councilman Cecelia Adams voiced her support for the measure and her disappointment that people still wanted to debate the issue.
“There’s nothing to continue to debate,” she said. “This is a very simple matter.”
Deputy Chief Michael Troendle told the attendees the police department wasn’t against giving subpoena power to the review board, only that it would make more sense to wait until officials know how the board is going to be structured and staffed before doing so.
Both Councilman Gary Johnson and Councilman Chris Delaney — a current and former member of law enforcement, respectively — also pointed to recently-passed legislation and how, once approved, council had to then go back and meet with police to figure out how it would be implemented.
“I do not see a reason to rush this,” Mr. Delaney said.
Mr. Johnson also said even if council passes this measure during its meeting Tuesday, if the structure of the board changes then it could be six months before the board’s subpoena power could take effect.
The committee also heard from Ron Huberman, CEO of Benchmark Analytics, an organization that uses data from police departments to identify and correct officer misconduct. Benchmark Analytics is compiling data from TPD — one of 70 police departments it has partnered with across the country — and the full system will be up and running later this year, Mr. Huberman said.
The data involved includes arrests, stops, and uses of force for each officer, among other items, he said. And broadly, the data shows that officers who have engaged in misconduct rarely have a singular incident — most of the time, there’s a pattern of behavior.
And the solution to correcting that behavior is not always more training, he said. What appears to work are things such as pairing low-performing officers with high-performing officers, assigning low-performing officers a supervisor in a kind of highly-structured mentorship, and breaking up clusters of low-performing officers because they tend to work together, Mr. Huberman said.
“Training as a sole intervention will not get you there,” he said.
First Published June 25, 2020, 11:46 p.m.
