Published by the Capital City Hues - October 18, 2024
This is the point where communities get to see who is really serious about police accountability for the long haul. It’s the point where all get to see which side politicians are on, if the city budget reflects the needs of the community, and whether there is a shared vision of public safety. Madison is truly at a crossroads.
The mayor had done an about-face since the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police and subsequent calls for more humane policing to defund the police. She first hailed the local efforts as a way to seek transparency and contribute to greater “community confidence and trust” in the Madison Police Department (MDP). Now Mayor Rhodes-Conway is asking the city council to pull the plug before the agencies can get stabilized.
The PCOB’s start has been understandably shaky. With all new entities comes a learning curve and wobbly first steps. But when that city entity is about scrutinizing the police, additional hurdles and distractions will abound. Madison has about 80 boards, commissions and committees composed of citizens who have an interest in supporting a particular area and who want to play an active role in shaping our democratic structures. From my experience, none of these citizen-driven formations will get the criticism, intervention and undermining that police oversight is destined to get.
I can tell that sincere thought went into the vision of the new oversight office. A good example is the intentionality of who will serve on the diverse oversight board— those most impacted by police violence. I was impressed by the creation of legal services to help citizens with their police complaints. The PCOB is making sure the right person is hired for the critical position of the independent monitor.
The police department will fight relentlessly against all forms of accountability and transparency. In addition to frivolous lawsuits, it will employ tactics of deception and stalling to keep citizens from getting to the truth and the facts. It will refuse to comply with Sunshine and other open records requests. (Journalist Bill Lueders and others have already experienced the latter.)
The current interrogation and assessment of this country’s law enforcement is rooted in its refusal to self-correct over decades, to respond to legitimate concerns about its unapologetic abuse of authority. I encourage the Madison PCOB to stay the course, to remember its mission and to fight for its very existence. It can be one of the vibrant solutions to transforming a failed, expensive system of arrest and incarceration into a re-imagined, holistic system for meeting human needs and keeping citizens safe.
