This covers anything released to District policing and police reform issues.
The Washington Informer reports that the DC City Council has voted to reduce the number of school resource officers (SROs) in public and charter schools so that the program will end in 2025. The school resource officer program is run by the DC Metropolitan Police Department (MPD). The suggestion to remove officers and replace them …
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The Vera Institute of Justice recently published a Police Data Transparency Index to see how locations across the United States are performing in their release of data and how much public access to the data that is available. According to Vera, their analysis of police transparency reflected in the index is “rigorous and informed by …
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An article titled The People Responding to 911 Calls Instead of Police presents several people currently working as non-police alternatives to community crisis responses. The article tells real stories of people now involved in this work. The article notes that a high proportion of calls that come in through 911 don’t actually demand a police …
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Jody Kent Lavy, co-executive director of the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth, got this opinion piece published in the Washington Post. Ms. Lavy made the case demonstrating why tough-on-crime policies are not the answer to crime. From the article: “The tough-on-crime approach fails to keep us safe, and, equally dangerous, it requires us …
ReThink Justice DC Coalition New Visions Committee co-chair Malcolm C. Young has drafted a concise report noting that the DC parole authority model proposed by ReThink Justice and the DC Reentry Task Force [link] would be a successful model based on a national comparison. The report, titled How the Proposed District of Columbia Parole and …
The DCIST reports that the Arlington County Board has voted to create a civilian group that will oversee police. The group will have the ability to subpoena police to investigate and scrutinize police actions, but will not initiate investigations or be able to discipline officers. VIEW THE DCIST article
As reported in the DCIST, Council Chairman Phil Mendelson has introduced a bill largely drawn from recommendations by the D.C. Police Reform Commission, though the bill tackles only a small portion of the commission’s 90 recommendations.
Maryland has passed a very sweeping police reform package despite Governor Hogan’s attempt to veto it, which the Assembly was able to override. Reforms in the Maryland legislation include:
The April 2021 ReThink Justice monthly meeting featured a presentation on the recently publish final report of the DC Police Reform Commission. The report included a comprehensive set of police reform recommendations. The briefing was given by Blaine Stum, Legislative Policy Analyst for DC Council Chairman Phil Mendelson . Mr. Stum, on behalf of Chairman …
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As reported in the DCIST.com: Mayor Muriel Bowser has nominated longtime police official Robert J. Contee III to lead the Metropolitan Police Department in the wake of Chief Peter Newsham’s planned departure for the Prince William County Police Department.
