On Monday, December 19, Police Chief Richard Bowers briefed the Greenbelt City Council on the department’s proposed actions to address the remaining nine issues not addressed by the January 2022 police reform resolution 2096-2. Council appeared to be content with the chief’s proposed approaches and Mayor Emmett Jordan, with apparent consensus from his colleagues, did not think that further legislation was required. Bowers also updated council on progress toward incorporating the resolution changes into the General Orders.
Resolution
Based largely on changes proposed by then-mayor Colin Byrd, the resolution mandated 22 changes to the police department’s General Orders although not all have yet been incorporated. Bowers said the department has completed 19 or 20 of those changes.
Council, however, does not approve General Orders. That is the responsibility of the chief, who reports to the city manager in his role as head Public Safety Officer.
Bowers explained that there are several periods when the General Orders cannot be changed. The department will be holding promotion tests in March. Since the officers are tested on the General Orders, Bowers explained, it would be unfair to change the orders while the officers are studying them. Also, the department will undergo its annual accreditation review with the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA) in May. The General Orders cannot be changed during this process either. In addition, some of the changes in the resolution could not be incorporated directly as they conflicted with or used different terminology than CALEA uses. For example, the resolution uses the term “baseless” with respect to complaints. However, this term is not used in either the state disciplinary matrix or CALEA standards.
State police reform legislation made significant changes affecting use of force and internal affairs requiring changes to or rewriting of some general orders. Bowers said that these changes are nearly complete and will be sent to council soon. Changes also are reviewed by the Greenbelt Fraternal Order of Police per their contract with the city.
Prince George’s County also made changes affecting city police, including a Police Accountability Board. This board is not yet operating. The board has been incorporated into Bowers’s General Orders, but further changes may be needed.
Nine Issues
Council had deferred action on nine of Byrd’s proposed changes. Bowers prepared a memorandum showing Byrd’s proposal, the recommendation of the Public Safety Advisory Committee (PSAC) and his proposed action. PSAC’s recommendations are mentioned below only when they differ from Byrd’s. While members of PSAC were present, they declined to comment on the spot with Chair Peggy Higgins stating that they would provide comments in writing.
Two of the proposals are now covered by state legislation so the department is not proposing any additional city action. These include proposals 1) to refer the investigation of any officer whose conduct results in a fatality to the state’s attorney’s office, and 2) specifying interview procedures with juveniles. The state requirements will be reflected in the city’s General Orders.
Body Cameras
Byrd had also proposed requiring the release of body camera footage within seven working days of a request and within three days of a request related to a use of force incident. PSAC proposed a tiered deadline structure.
Captain Tim White reported that the department fulfills requests in the order in which they are received, with most completed within one week. The department has a single person responsible for handling and redacting the footage. Many of the requests are from attorneys and insurance companies. The department proposed a 15-business-day time frame for citizens’ requests and 30 calendar days for requests from attorneys, insurance companies and other commercial entities. The 30-calendar-day deadline is established by state law.
In response to questions from council, Bowers said high profile incidents would be treated differently with the aim to release the footage sooner. For cases involving a fatality, the state takes the video and the city cannot release it. State policy is to release such video within 10 days.
Bowers noted that redaction is not easy. The staffer must blur faces of individuals not involved in the incident, license plates, etc. It can take two hours, he said, to redact a 15-minute video; an hour-long video could be an all-day process. White noted that procedures are different for videos involving juveniles. Some legal issues are still to be resolved.
Stop and Frisk
Byrd had several proposals regarding the city’s policy regarding stopping and frisking individuals. In one, he proposed that supervisors review all incidents where officers stopped and frisked someone. The department proposed linking this requirement to the Firearms Search report to allow the department to ensure it can track the reviews.
A separate Byrd recommendation called for expressly banning all stop-and-frisk tactics that have been declared unconstitutional. PSAC took a different approach, recommending inserting definitions of reasonable suspicion, proactively patrol and aggressively patrol into General Order 620 and providing examples. Bowers proposed that language referring to aggressive and proactive patrol be removed from General Order 620. He noted that a definition of reasonable suspicion is included elsewhere in the General Orders. In addition, General Order 625 addresses adhering to the constitution including investigative detentions.
Byrd also proposed expressly prohibiting stopping people solely based on race and gender. PSAC recommended that the General Orders specify that the criterion for frisking someone is a suspicion that the person is armed.
Bowers noted that General Order 620 already prohibits stopping a person based on race, gender, sex, national origin or sexual or religious preferences. In addition, General Order 625 states that to frisk a person the officer must “fear the individual may be armed and dangerous to him/her or others.”
Finally, Byrd recommended that the department explore the feasibility of reporting on the number of stop-and-frisks including race, gender, age, place of residence and whether the person was subsequently arrested.
Bowers stated that the city does not have a system, nor will it that can create reports of this type. The data does not flow in a way in the system that would allow such a tabulation.
The department expects to have new data dashboards on its website by the end of January that will provide additional data to residents.
Citations
Byrd suggested officers provide cited individuals with a card in English and Spanish, explaining that the traffic court has the authority to dismiss or reduce the ticket and/fine. Bowers noted that the State District Court explains this information on the citation form. As this is a legal document, he said the department should not create a separate set of directions that may conflict with the state form. The state form, however, is only available in English, although a search by Councilmember Kristen Weaver reported that there are videos on the state website that contain this information in both languages and suggested officers carry cards with the links.
Detention
Byrd recommended banning the detention of a civilian not suspected of a specific crime. Bowers is proposing no additional action as the topic is covered in General Order 602, which states that police may conduct an investigative detention “only when there is reasonable and articulable suspicion that a crime has been, is being or is about to be committed.”
CALEA vs. State
Bowers noted that he is not implementing the provision of state legislation that prohibits the police from taking anonymous complaints. The accrediting agency, CALEA, requires departments to take anonymous complaints. Bowers said that he has chosen to comply with CALEA saying this action is about accountability and transparency
City Board?
Councilmember Judith Davis noted that giving municipalities the option to create their own accountability boards is a Maryland Municipal League (MML) legislative priority. Bowers cautioned that this might not be a good idea. Such boards are expensive as they must be chaired by an administrative law judge, at a cost of about $500 per hour. Davis noted that the main driver behind the MML proposal was the delay implicit in using the county board. She suggested that municipalities could band together, such as the city already does with its Four Cities Coalition.
Staffing
Bowers reported that the department could soon be at or slightly above its authorized number of sworn officers. He noted that when he was hired, the workforce was 70 percent white. Now it is about 40 percent white. Ten to 12 of the officers now on staff are Spanish speaking. In addition, the department subscribes to a language line service that can provide interpretation for interactions with speakers of other languages.