CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- A criminal justice organization report said the Chicago City Council’s Public Safety Committee has not been doing its job for at least 20 years; and is now hoping the report prompts the committee to get busy on police department reform legislation.
The Chicago Justice Project looked at the last 20 years of meetings by the Public Safety Committee and its predecessor the Police and Fire Committee. It found that from 2000 and 2020, the committee held 186 meetings and considered nearly 500 agenda items; and of those, only 15 percent had anything to do with the Chicago Police Department and 80 percent were unrelated to police oversight.
Tracy Siska, executive director of the Justice Project, told the Sun-Times that instead of acting to hold the police department accountable, the committee has spent more time donating police and fire equipment and doing whatever a particular mayor wants.
She said it is time for aldermen “do their jobs.”
“We have experienced misconduct and abuse for decades in Chicago with no end. The Laquan McDonald murder didn’t happen in 1980. It happened in 2014. Anthony Alvarez just happened. There’s a long line of misconduct and abuse for a hundred years that the City Council has turned their back on and shirked their responsibility for,” Siska told the Sun-Times.
“Don’t ask the police department to make changes. Demand them. They’re the legislators. They set the rules. It’s time to start doing it...and restrain policing for things they don’t want to happen.”
The Chicago Justice Project wants the committee to start moving on four proposed ordinances that would rein in police during searches, provide for stronger civilian oversight, create a database for misconduct complaints, and provide transparency. See more details below:
1. Pass the Police Settlement Transparency and Accountability Ordinance. This ordinance would ensure Alderpersons will be provided with the facts of the case before voting on police misconduct litigation settlements, mandate that a meeting is held by the Committee on Public Safety on settlements and judgments every month that includes a settlement for city council approval, and that the committee holds meetings twice a year solely focused on the CPD and its accountability structure.
2. Support the Empowering Communities for Public Safety (ECPS). This ordinance combines the community proposals of the Civilian Police Accountability Council (CPAC) and Community Commission of the Grassroots Alliance for Police Accountability (GAPA) to finally create the community-led Community Commission that Chicagoans were promised five years ago.
3. Pass the Anjanette Young Ordinance. The ordinance would make the superintendent or designee directly responsible for signing off on every search warrant. The warrant must include a detailed plan which protects children and other vulnerable people inside the home.
4. Create a robust Police Accountability Database. Chicago citizens need a publicly available database of misconduct complaints filed against Chicago police officers. While one was proposed by Mayor Lightfoot, it would only make a fraction of the complaints public.
Public Safety Committee Chairman Alderman Chris Taliaferro (29th Ward) told the Sun-Times oversight is not the job of his committee.
“We are not an oversight body. We’re a legislative body. Yes, we create ordinances that affect our police department and fire department. But we should not be looked at as one of oversight. Rather, one of legislation,” he said.
“I don’t think you should ever cave in to any type of political pressure to get something done. When you get something done, it should be thought out, negotiated and then passed. For their assessment to be ‘you rush ordinances and you rush legislation to vote,’ I think, is a poor assessment by them.”
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