Dear friends,
When I started writing every day last June, the primary target of the actions was police violence. It remains the overarching justice issue, connected to all the other issues in ways that are sometimes obvious and sometimes not.
A new report of the International Commission of Inquiry on Systemic Racist Police Violence confirms what we have seen up close. The team of twelve commissioners found themselves shocked by their findings:
Under color of law, Black people are targeted, surveilled, brutalized, maimed, and killed by law enforcement officers with impunity.
It doesn’t sound like good news, but it is important call that they have called on the international criminal court (ICC) in The Hague to take steps to prosecute. Truth is the necessary foundation of reconciliation and healing.
This week, the Newark, NJ police department announced an important policy change: they will no longer arrest people who have “outstanding traffic warrants or non-indictable bench warrants of $500.” The policy is designed to avoid imprisoning people for being poor and to redirect police resources to crime prevention.
Arrests for domestic violence-related warrants will continue.
Under the new policy, when officers initiate a stop, they will complete a report, including the outstanding warrant number, criminal charge, date issued, municipality of the warrant, bail amount and updated address and contact number of the wanted person. They will then inform the person to address the outstanding warrant as soon as possible. These reports will be forwarded to Newark Municipal Court for their information, according to police.
This is a refreshing example of a reform that promotes public safety and subtly alters the relationship between the police and the public. It is a step in the right direction AND it is not enough.
Other reforms to policing in Newark made 2020 an exceptional year. I’m not sure how I missed this, since I have an enduring interest in the city of Newark, but it was reported in January that Newark’s
officers did not fire a single shot during the calendar year 2020, and the city didn’t pay a single dime to settle police brutality cases.
At the same time, crime is dropping, and police recovered almost 500 illegal guns from the street during the year.
One critical reform was the introduction of violence interrupters, the Newark Community Street Team. In 2014, the US Department of Justice issued a consent decree following an investigation that exposed a long and brutal history of police abuse and misconduct. The evident lack of training in de-escalation techniques became a focus of the federal intervention:
[S]erious crime in Newark has dropped by 40 percent in the last five years…. [T]he key to that success is that Mayor Ras Baraka and Police Director Anthony Ambrose took the mission to heart.
They hired more Black and brown officers, began training programs based on best-practices, required any officer who uses force in any way to report it in detail, and for the supervisor to review it.
I am aware of only four mayoral candidates who have expressed a commitment to violence interruption programs and deescalation training: Donovan, Morales, Stringer, and Wiley. That said, I am waiting on the public safety scorecard from The People’s Plan. Scorecards are coming to help you and all the other voters figure out whom to support (remember, we are ranking to five!). This is going to be important, as it seems that most New Yorkers remain too overwhelmed to consider the large field of candidates and the broad array of issues.
This Thursday, The People’s Plan and New Yorkers for Racially Just Public Schools (RJPS) are launching the Education Platform:
We’ll break down the 12 movement-centered policy goals for the next Mayor and City Council to ensure every NYC student has a quality public education, and discuss strategy to ensure those goals are centered in the incoming administration. This event will feature a panel of The People’s Plan NYC contributors, and a Q&A discussion on the plan and strategy.
The Education Platform is part of “a comprehensive, multi-issue roadmap” to set a progressive agenda for the city.
Join activists, advocates, and policy nerds on Thursday to talk Education.
Some other bits of good news:
Last week, the US Department of Agriculture announced that the universal free lunch program will continue until June 2022. This is good news for the millions of young people facing food insecurity.
Biden has pledged to send 60 million doses of vaccine to India in addition to other supplies. This is a small commitment, but it is a step. Aren’t you glad you wrote to the president yesterday?
Senator Gillibrand, who has spent years trying to address rampant sexual assault in the military, has won support from Senator Joni Ernst for new legislation, which is likely to bring some other Republicans along. The bill would “remove military commanders from a role in prosecuting service members for sexual assault.”
The Senate has passed a hate crime bill that will facilitate data collection on anti-Asian hate crimes. This is a necessary step toward prevention and prosecution of these crimes.
President Biden acknowledged the Armenian genocide.
Sometimes, it’s good news to talk about bad things. I recently reread Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, a play that I love. In the preface to my copy, Donald Margulies writes:
Wilder illustrates the failure of society to help its own and the insidiousness of systematic ignorance. “The only thing the rest of us can do,” Mrs. Gibbs opines about Stimson’s public drunkenness, “is just not to notice it.”
Margulies goes on to note that the audience often laughs at Mrs. Gibbs’s remark, but it is chilling, nonetheless.
Today is a day for noticing things.
with love,
L