Sep 10, 2020 Use-Of-Force Ad Hoc Committee on 2020-09-10 6:00 PM

Good evening, this is the City of Denton Use of Force Ad Hoc Committee meeting Thursday September 10, 2020. We are going to start the meeting. We will go first to Sarah and then Sarah will then Sarah will hand it over and we will go into our presentation tonight. Thank you Sarah. Thank you Chair English and good evening committee members. One second while I share my screen, I'm just going to review a few quick slides with you and then I will turn it over to Michael Kronig who is our Deputy City Attorney and he'll be reviewing tonight civilian oversight options as requested by the committee. But before we begin into that presentation, I just wanted to provide a reminder of our timeline, remaining timeline. So we've run over this slide previously, so last Thursday the committee did start to discuss some recommendations and common areas and themes. We use a facilitator for that meeting, Patrick Ibarra and what he is doing is working on framing up for the future discussion on September 17 where the committee will be discussing and working on finalizing and prioritizing those recommendations. So he is currently completing that work. For tonight, our goal of the committee meeting is to provide information that was requested by the committee regarding potential oversight options for use of force for the Denton Police Department. And the committee may begin some discussions around recommendations, but there will be no voting on recommendations tonight that will continue on into September 17th regarding all of the recommendations. At the September 17th meeting, we'll also begin to review a draft framework for the report and it's likely we may need a quick meeting on Thursday, September 24th for the committee to review that final draft report and vote on that as well. And then our goal is to bring that forward to the city council during their October 5th luncheon. And before I turn it over to Mike to review what are the potential external civilian oversight options, I did want to remind the committee that we have provided information in regards to our internal affairs division within the Denton Police Department. So in terms of how we internally receive complaints and then investigate those complaints. So a number of topics and information have been covered and you can see here I tried to link from our previous meetings on July 16th, July 23rd and August 16th. I'll kind of review a little bit of that information on the next three slides just as a way of reminder. I also want to point out to the committee that we have in the last few weeks started a data initiative page for the Denton Police Department that's located at DentonPolice.com and it includes a number of reports including some that the committee has seen previously. And then as well at DentonPolice.com as way of reminder for any citizens that may be watching or the general public, you can file complaints online through the website or through the phone numbers listed here on the screen. So at that July 16th meeting, previously Mike had covered some information in regards to the Civil Service Act, the Meet and Confer Agreement and then in regards to investigations of police misconduct. There are a number of reports and data given during this meeting, it included just the general DPD complaints over the last five years, a breakdown of complaints by year, complaints by race, disciplinary suspensions by year, sustained complaints and forms of corrective action. So a number of different things were reviewed with the committee on that July 16th date. Over the five-year period, we've had 539 complaints received and that's both internal and external representing about 0.1% of the calls or contacts for Denton Police Department during that same time period. There were a total of 18 complaints during that five-year period that related to use of force and tasers and you can see that broken out here in regards to 14 for use of force and four for taser. During that committee meeting on July 16th, the committee expressed if more information could be provided regarding those 18 complaints and incidents and we actually came back that following week on July 23rd and provided more information as legally permissible. And so that's this report you see here on the screen, just kind of a screenshot to remind you it had some summary information in regards to each one of those complaints including the disposition of that complaint. Also accompanying that report was the training dispositions as well for those complaints that were sustained. And then further on August 13th in your backup, we provided a report with more information and there was just some general information in regards to how the Internal Affairs Division has been restructured to enhance accountability. So just kind of a before and after October 2018 and that's when Chief Dixon took command of the Denton Police Department. As you can see, a number of steps were taken to improve the processes and the accountability and just by way of providing some information and a data point, you can see the total number of complaints from 2017 to 2019, including going down to disciplinary suspensions and then counseling and reprimands. So it may have been a result of some of those improved processes and increased accountability within the Denton Police Department. So as the committee starts to look at part two, regards to use of force review and transparency, a couple of questions for the committee to consider. On this first question, we started to have the committee started to have some discussion around last week in regards to recommendations to enhance reporting of information and transparency of that information to the public. And then secondly, does the committee think civilian oversight is needed? And if so, in what form that is allowed? And so at this time, I'll turn it over to Mike Kroening, who will provide more information to the committee. Thank you, Sarah. Let me see if I can share this with everyone. Hey, Willie, can you put your camera on mute? Okay. Let me start out first with you folks may be asking what experience do I have with oversight that even qualifies me to talk about this. When I joined the city attorney's office in Austin in 2000, March of 2000, the city had just finished a citizen focus group on oversight for the police department. They came up with a template for oversight. We were sitting down with the police association at that time, and we were going to make oversight part of the meet and confer agreement that we were negotiating at that time. There were questions about whether citizen oversight had to be negotiated in the contract, because if you remember, I was talking about those confidential files. So we determined in 2000 that we were going to make oversight part of meet and confer agreement. And my job was to take that template and then basically write every article that was dealing with oversight in the contract. So I worked, I was the city attorney's representative on five meet and confer contract teams between 2000 and 2018. My job was to write the oversight articles for each one of those contracts. And then if the police association filed a grievance challenging something that was being done in oversight, my job was to represent the city and defend that process. So I've been involved in oversight and how it's related to state law and a meet and confer agreement for 20 years. So that's my background on oversight. As Sarah pointed out, one thing, actually a couple of questions I'd like you to keep in mind when I do this presentation. The first one is, as she said, do we even need oversight? That's I think the big question, do we need it? And two, if you think we need it, what form should it take? Should it be, and there's other cities, and I'll go into it a little bit, like Dallas and Fort Worth and Austin that have a police monitor, one person with the staff, or should it be a civilian review board, all the volunteers, or should it be a combination of the two? So the first question is, do we need it? Second question is, if we do, what form should it take? And then a third question should be, what do you envision oversight doing? Is it simply reviewing internal affairs investigations? Do you think they should actually have the authority to do their own investigation with subpoena power? So those are the kind of questions that I'd just like you to keep in mind as I go through this. This presentation, the purpose of it is to discuss common goals of civilian oversight of law enforcement. I'm going to compare some of the civilian oversight in different Texas cities. We did look at other cities around the country, but every city, every state has different laws, different contracts, so I'm focusing on the Texas cities. I think that's really what's more relevant. Then going to talk about the limitations on civilian oversight for the Denton Police Department that are imposed by Texas Local Government Code Chapter 143, and then the meet and confer agreement that the city has with the Denton Police Officers Association. And then the last part, I'm going to talk about potential models of civilian oversight for the police department and kind of the pros and cons and what I think we can and can't do. Common goals of citizen oversight, the National Association for Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement, NACo, that's their acronym, has identified the following common goals. They are one, to ensure that the police complaint process is accessible to all and that there are few, if any, barriers to the filing of complaints. That can involve how complaints are taken, putting out that information in different languages, that type of thing. Second goal is to ensure that investigations are fair and thorough, the findings are reasonable, and discipline is appropriate. The third goal is to improve public confidence in the police. Fourth, to enhance the transparency of police organizations by publicly reporting on the police efforts and holding officers accountable. Five, to improve the policies, practices, training, and management of law enforcement agencies by analyzing patterns and complaints and other police-related data. Sixth goal is to deter officers from engaging in misconduct through the creation of more effective and consistent investigation and disciplinary processes. Seven is to reduce legal liability associated with officer misconduct. Eight, to improve the public's understanding of police policy, training, and practices through community outreach and other avenues such as mediation of citizen complaints. And like I did in my last presentation, after I have a slide where we'll stop and see if anyone has any questions, Nicole published a webinar about a month ago, and I've brought this up before. There's not one size that fits all, and these are the statements that they said. The complexities of social and political contexts make identifying successful practices employed in one jurisdiction transferring them to another a challenging and unreliable task fraught with potential errors of interpretation and extrapolation. Then they said, "Jurisdiction should focus on the best fit rather than best practices when considering how to structure civilian oversight." And I think this last one is real important. It is impossible to suggest that any one model of oversight is better than another. Each jurisdiction must evaluate its own police agency, its culture, its leadership, its overall current capacity to police itself, and its future potential in that regard before choosing the most appropriate form of oversight that will have the highest likelihood of success over time. So that kind of goes back to what I said, there isn't one size that fits all. You folks need to review all the information that we've given you and come up with recommendations that you think work and fit best for Denton, not what works in Austin or Dallas or New York City. Does anyone have any questions about that kind of background information? I do, but I'm really sorry because my dog is barking. She's wild because someone's doing something outside. But you mentioned before that your experience has something to do with, I didn't understand the agency or contract you were talking about is related to this. At the very beginning, I don't understand what that is. Could you explain that a little more? Sure. Yeah. The civilian oversight was created and incorporated into the meet and confer agreement that the City of Austin has with the Austin Police Association. So the oversight has to follow and comply with the contractual provisions that the association and the city agreed to. And a little bit, and a few slides, I'll be talking about some limitations that Denton has because of provisions that we have in our meet and confer agreement with the police association. Thank you for that explanation. I also wondered if you could put back up the slides that talked about the goals of a committee oversight board. There were like six or eight. Sure. Yeah, and this is taken directly from the NACOL webinar that I was referring to. Is there anything specific you're focusing on, or you just want me to leave each slide up for 30 seconds or so? No. There was one slide about the goals of an oversight board. And let me see. Is the slide up? I don't see, we don't see any slides. Let me see. You might have to share your screen at the bottom. Yeah. Let me do this again. Is it up now? Okay. And there's three slides, I believe, so I can go through each one if you'd like. Okay. That would be really helpful. I'll just give you all a chance just to read this one again, and then I'll move on to the other two. Or if you have any questions about any one of these first four. I'll go to the next one, and I'll go to the next one. Actually I guess there was only two slides that dealt with specific goals. Is there anything specifically about any of those that you have a question about? I didn't write these, so I can give you my opinion on what they mean, but I'm just taking these directly from their, the NACOL website. I didn't have a question. I just wanted to be able to refer back to them during the discussion that we have later. Sure. They should be in your packet. Okay. I'll move on, then, if there's not any other questions on that. I'm sorry, Michael. I do have a question. Yeah. Sure, Travis. So from your previous experiences, what is the background of the members that are on these committees? One of the slides that I'm going to address a little bit later on, different boards around the country have different qualifications for people. What I've seen in a lot of them is you can't be a police officer for that city, obviously. It kind of makes sense. You can't have a family member that's a police officer of that jurisdiction. Some of them say you can't hold a political office. You have to be a resident of the city. They will have qualifications that you can't have any pending litigation against the city. Some of them have restrictions on criminal backgrounds, can't be a convicted felon. But they try to get people of diverse backgrounds, race, ethnicity, jobs. And I'll get to, I think I talked about Houston a little bit, where I go into the different types of people that are on their commission there. But they try to get a diversity of education and experience and gender, race, all of those things. Anybody else? Okay. The meet and confer contract -- well, I'll start with this first. If you remember, when I did my presentation a while ago, I talked about this provision of the Texas Local Government Code. And this was really kind of the big obstacle to any oversight process in the state of Texas for cities that have adopted Chapter 143. As I mentioned before, the voters have to approve it. The voters did approve Chapter 143 for Denton years, probably 40, 50 years ago, I think back in the '40s, I believe, but I may be wrong. But this is the one major, for lack of a better word, obstacle. Police department may maintain a personal file on a police officer employed by the department for the department's use, but the department may not release any information contained in the department file to any agency or person requesting information relating to a police officer. And when this is referring to department file, that includes internal affairs investigation files that did not result in the officer being suspended for at least one day, demoted, bypassed for a promotion, or indefinitely suspended, which is the civil service equivalent to firing. So this provision can only be changed by the legislature or through the meet and confer agreement. Now as I mentioned in Austin, we changed this through the meet and confer agreement by allowing a police monitor and a citizens review panel to have access to these confidential files. I do want to clarify this a little bit, because if you read it, it says the department cannot release any information to anyone asking for it. Back in 2000, the attorney general was asked an opinion about this and the opinion the attorney general issued at that point or at that time was that the city council or the governing body may authorize other people to review those confidential police department files, but in that case, it involved the city manager and the city attorney. Those were the two people that the attorney general ruled or opined could have access to these confidential files. And the reason the attorney general said that is because the city manager appoints the police chief, the city manager has the authority to remove the police chief, the city council does not, and the city manager is the supervisor of the police chief. So the city manager needs access to these files in order to do his supervision of the police chief and the police department. For the city attorney, we give legal advice to the police chief and to the city manager. So we need access to this confidential information for the city attorney to do his job. So after the attorney general rendered that opinion back in 2000, the city council here in Denton passed an ordinance that authorized the city manager, the HR director, and the city attorney to have access to these confidential files. That's it. And there's been one other attorney general opinion that I'll talk about in a little bit that talks about citizen volunteer committee members access to these confidential files. But I just wanted you to know that this is not an absolute. There is the ability for other people besides the police chief and people in the police department to have access to these confidential files. But as you start getting further away from accountability to the city manager and the police chief, that's where the legal justification for getting access to these confidential files starts to get very tenuous. And I'll explain that a little bit more. So that's one of the limitations on oversight. The other one is the meet and confer agreement with the police association. And there's a provision in there about protected rights of officers that the officer who is the subject of an investigation has the right to see certain evidence against him or her prior to an interview. So if you want an oversight process that says, well, for example, an officer has the right to a copy of the complaint and to see this information 48 hours before he or she is interviewed by internal affairs. If you want an oversight process that has the authority to actually talk to and interview and investigate officers, that process still has to comply with this provision of the contract. And this is one that I think is probably even more important and a greater limitation. In the meet and confer agreement, there's a section that says there shall be no legal or administrative requirement, including but not limited to subpoena power or an order from the city manager or the department, the police department, that an officer appear before or present evidence to any individual panel, committee, group, or form of any type. So what this means is that if you have a citizen review panel that wants investigative power which would or subpoena power, which would include actually talking to that officer, the meet and confer agreement prohibits that. The officer cannot be forced to talk to a civilian oversight committee. That is a provision in the contract and we can't get around that. We negotiated it. It's an enforceable contract. So the 143 provision I just talked about and these two contract provisions are limitations on what we can do on civilian oversight in the city of Denton. What I did, and in a minute I'll see if you have any questions, what I did was put together this chart. I looked at Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, Galveston, Houston, and San Antonio. All of them have a form of oversight. Austin, for example, Austin is subject to chapter 143 provision I referenced and they have a meet and confer agreement. They have a police monitor who is a full-time city employee that reports to the city manager. They have a, it's a 10 member, I just confirmed that today. They have a 10 member. They call it a, give you the exact name, community police review commission. But that commission was created by the meet and confer agreement. Those volunteers are non-paid. They are appointed by the city manager. They can be removed by the city manager. The process in Austin does not have investigative or subpoena power. They have a police monitor. That police monitor can attend any interviews, can monitor investigations, can sit in on disciplinary meetings with the chief, but does not have the authority to conduct independent investigations. They can have public meetings for the panel. And the oversight process in Austin can review all types of cases, no limitations. Dallas, on the other hand, is not subject to chapter 143. So all the, the restriction that I was talking about, the 143-089-G confidential file, that does not apply to Dallas. So what Dallas can do, they're not under the same limitations. So Dallas has a full-time paid police monitor. They have a 15-member advisory board to the chief, the city manager, and the council. They are not paid. None of the citizen volunteer processes in the state of Texas are paid, they're all volunteers. In Dallas, the city manager appoints the monitor, the council appoints the board. The city manager can remove the monitor. The council can remove the board members. Dallas is a little different. The monitor may conduct an investigation and can issue subpoenas. But the Dallas ordinance specifically says that the monitor cannot issue subpoenas for a city employee or police officer. That's part of their ordinance. I don't know why, but that's what it is. Dallas does have public meetings, the panel, and the monitor can review all types of cases. However, the citizen board only reviews critical incidents like shootings and deaths in custody and external complaints. There's just two cities there. Fort Worth is subject to 143, and they have a meet and confer agreement. They have a full-time monitor, full-time employee. They don't have a panel yet, and I don't know if they're going to. The city manager appoints the monitor, and if they do have a board, then the council will appoint those people. The city manager can remove the monitor, and if the council decides to have a board or commission, then the council members can review them. The police monitor in Fort Worth does not have an investigative of subpoena power. She can hold public meetings where people can come in and voice their complaints, and the monitor in Fort Worth can review all types of cases. Galveston is also a 143 city, and they have a meet and confer agreement. They do not have a police monitor. What they have is a seven-member advisory panel to the police chief, and that seven-member panel is appointed by the mayor and the council, very subject to removal by the council. The chief's advisory board does not have investigative subpoena power. They do not hold public meetings, and as you can see, they do not review all types of cases. They review excessive force, discharge of firearms, incidents resulting in serious bodily injury or death, or any other cases requested by the chief. Let me do these last two, and then I'll kind of sum up. Houston is a little bit different. Houston is subject to Chapter 143, and they have a meet and confer agreement. They do not have a police monitor. They have a 29-member panel. It's divided into several, they have several different panels. I think it totals 29. I think the panels may be seven or eight people. They're appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the city council. The mayor can remove them. Houston is what they call a strong mayor system. This panel in Houston does not have investigative subpoena power. They do not hold public meetings, and as you can see, they do not review every type of case either. Houston is a little bit different. Houston is subject to that provision, that 089(g) limitation provision. Their oversight process was instituted by the mayor or former mayor on an executive order. I don't know how they did that because they are subject to that subsection (g) provision I referred to. The police association has not challenged. They haven't challenged it saying you have to negotiate that with us through the meat confer agreement. And I've talked to some people down there, and I'm not sure if there was some side agreements or how that happened, but it has not been challenged. It is not part of their contract. It is something that the mayor put in himself. The last one I want to talk about is San Antonio. They are subject... Mike, before you leave Houston, how many years has that panel been in place? I don't know offhand, but it's been quite a while. I can get you the answer before we're done, but I don't remember when it began, but I'm sure it's at least 10, 10, 15 years. It's been there for a while. San Antonio is a 143 city as well. They have a meat confer agreement. They do not have a police monitor. They have a chief advisory board made up of 14 members, half of them are police officers and half are citizens. The citizens are appointed by the council and the police representatives are appointed by the chief. The citizens can be removed by the council and the police officers can be removed by the chief. They do not have investigative subpoena power. There are no public meetings, but this advisory board can hear testimony and they can hear and review any type of case. So as you can see, no two cities are really the same and you just have to kind of think about what you would want to, if we have oversight here, what you would want them to do of all of these different things, would you want a monitor, would you want a panel, who should appoint them, who can remove them, should there be public meetings, what type of cases should they do, should they have subpoena power. Those are all the types of things that I think when you folks make your recommendations that you need to consider. One other thing I just want to point out and this goes to the earlier question about who's on these panels, the citizen panels, I just looked at Austin, Dallas and Houston. For Austin, you cannot currently be a city of Austin employee, you cannot hold a public office and you cannot have an immediate family member who is currently or formerly employed by the Austin Police Department. For Dallas, you cannot be employed by the Dallas Police Department or have an immediate family member who is an employee of the Dallas Police Department. For Houston, you cannot hold a political office, you cannot be employed by any law enforcement agency, not just Houston. You cannot be an employee of the city of Houston, you cannot be an immediate family member of any Houston Police Department personnel and this was an earlier question. The 29 member panel that they have there includes experts in criminal justice, civil rights attorneys, retired judges and prosecutors, and academic experts and scholars. So that just kind of gives you an idea because I know one of the questions that I think Cameon you may have raised was who can be on this should they have any relation to the police department any relation to law enforcement totally. So I just wanted to show you at least these are the three major cities in Texas that have oversight and I just want I'm really just dealing with the relationship to someone in law enforcement or a family member so that's what this slide is about. So let me I'm happy to answer any questions about any of this question about the process of complaint as it pertains to those three agencies because the issue that I'm I guess trying to understand is like how these cases get to the committee because in my mind I'm thinking that it would it would be a great idea for us to not for that for an oversight committee to not have to deal with every single case and entrust you know the police department but then if people who are arrested or detained or whatever if they feel that they've gotten unfair treatment that they may be given the option to choose if they would like to request an oversight committee or if they would like to file a complaint so that we could get you know those funneled through and is that even a thing and then if and if if the oversight committee themselves if themselves if they come across a case that that they may take issue with that they could they they could have the option to review those cases but that by and large it would mostly be via the a complaint does that make sense yeah and you can write any process you want if you want in Austin for example the a person can go to the police monitor's office and file a complaint and then once it's investigated the police monitor can either take the complaint to the citizen panel depending upon the nature of the complaint or the citizen can ask I would like the panel to review my complaint so you can you know whatever recommendation you want to make that you think it should be this way or that way it's totally within you know your purview to make that recommendation all these different systems are a little bit different on how things ultimately might get to a citizen panel is there currently a system in place in Denton where people can make complaints and it's a pretty streamlined system I'll let let chief Dixon answer that for you yes there is so there's a number of different ways they can make a complaint currently they can call in they can do them online they can come in and do them anonymously through a drop box that we have in the lobby or they can come in and meet with internal affairs which is not located in the police department it's located where parks used to be if they if they're being arrested is there a process like with within the arrest where they can request absolutely anybody can anytime you can ask for a supervisor you can say I want to make a complaint and then the officers will get a supervisor over they'll take the information and forward it to internal affairs but they have to initiate that correct so they would have to know that they can make a complaint or is it like you have the right to file a complaint no the person has to ask has to initiate it okay Jamie my question is in regards to those cities with the monitor do you happen to have any information about what type of job description or qualifications those people typically have yeah I've been involved in the writing the job description at least in Austin I can tell you about that originally when we hired our first monitor back in 2002 2003 somewhere in there they wanted someone that was an attorney had no prior affiliation with the city and trying to remember what else some of the qualifications were they I don't remember offhand but that is something that you folks if you think we should have a police monitor you can make recommendations as to what the qualifications for that person should be just like we would for any other job came on did you have and Rhonda did you have your hand up okay came me on I have a few questions though so why I guess I'm wondering I just want to understand again I'm sure you explain this what is it that makes us a 143 like what's the difference between us and like Dallas what are they they're not a 143 yeah and your volumes a little low I don't know if I heard you question yeah okay chapter 143 provision of the local government code gives the voters of a city the right to hold an election whether or not they want to adopt chapter 143 for their city and I don't know how many offhand how many cities in Texas are trapped at 143 but there's probably got to be at least a couple hundred I believe what's that Frank 92 okay last time it was about yeah around 100 or something so it's up to the voters whether they want to adopt that or not for example in Arlington the voters just approved a year or two ago chapter 143 but just for their fire department not for the police and that's because the fire fighters wanted chapter 143 but the police officers haven't asked the voters to approve it I don't know why Dallas has its own civil service system if they wanted to adopt chapter 143 I think the voters could put that on the ballot if they wanted to but they they haven't at this point okay I guess I was also wondering it looked like from a slide that our contract around the 143 or meet and confer I don't know if they're kind of the same thing indicates that you can't have subpoena power like it's explicit in there and so I was just wondering if you could explain why that might get added in if it goes beyond oversight boards like what is that all about well your contract doesn't express expressly say anything about civilian oversight and I'll see if the chief wants to address this my belief and I wasn't here when that contract was negotiated but before I came here I read that police contract and I looked at and I said I wrote that I wrote that language I think what they did is probably take some of the things from Austin and incorporated into this contract the language looks familiar so I think they may have cut and pasted part of that into that but I don't know and I'll let the chief address it if he wants to I don't know that that provision was necessarily focused on oversight if we ever get it I think it was just kind of a cut and paste and but it's in there and an officer if we put in an oversight process that allows a committee to subpoena an officer the officer will pull that contract out and say right here it says I can't be subpoenaed and then what we probably would do I could say if we went to a grievance over that I could say well that wasn't intended for oversight because the oversight's not mentioned in the contract whatsoever and the officer and his lawyer would then say well but it's clear it says you can't subpoena me so I don't care what you meant by it that's very clear and explicit Frank did you want to address the oversight at all I think Jesse Jesse did you have your hand up I did go ahead chief and then Jesse Frank did you want to address the issue just of and I don't know if you were here when the contract is negotiated of including the officer rights article or I was and there was no talk about oversight at the time they were looking at a number of different from what I know I'm obviously on the management side not on the labor side but I just think they were looking at a number of different contracts around the state and they pull language that they liked and put in there I'm not saying that I mean weak that's a battle that we could fight about what does that language actually mean and what's the limitation on it and the con the meeting confer agreement has a dispute resolution process in it well we could go to an arbitrator who would rule on what that means but just the clear language says an officer can't be subpoenaed before any board or panel or anything like that so on its face you can argue that it it you can't subpoena someone but I have I think I have a good argument just the opposite way but my point in bringing that out was there are some potential contractual limitations as well to the form of oversight that you might want to recommend thank you for that I'm assuming that the subpoena power was added to the Austin agreement because of the oversight board yeah it was specifically the police association did not want officers subject to being called before a board like this so we as part of the negotiation overall negotiation for that contract we included that in there now let me just clear up yeah let me say one more thing the city manager or the police chief have the right to order an independent investigation so that provision about not being required to talk to anyone or subpoena does not apply to an independent investigation ordered by the chief or the city manager so that's kind of a totally separate issue than what I'm talking about on oversight I had another question are there ways in which panel members are added without being appointed directly by the mayor or not directly by an additional council like for instance I don't think didn't need the council and an oversight board but how could committee members be placed on it without being nominated by the mayor well he did say the city manager would place them on there well I mean I guess I'm wondering without city involvement like is there a way for folks to apply to be on it or like are there different models for that one of the issues and I'll get to it in a couple slides is as you start getting further away from accountability to either the police chief or the city manager the law starts getting very fuzzy as to whether or not volunteers can have access to these confidential files if the city manager was to appoint these people who are accountable to him that's a stronger argument but it and some of the proposals that are the options that I talk about in the later slides actually deal with these issues maybe just cover it when we get there okay Jesse and then well thank you Mike you've done a lot of kind of going over the structure of things and how different cities put these groups together you have some more slides on you know options for Denton things we could look at could you tell us just a little bit if you think it's appropriate about what it is these groups actually do city by city you know if they get a complaint what do they do with that complaint you've told us about how they can investigate it but where does it go from there where do they send do they do a report did they are they accountable to somebody who's looking for their advice specifically like what is it that these groups actually get accomplished with their work when it comes right down to it all they do is make recommendations to whether it's to the police chief the city manager the city council the mayor by state law only the chief can impose discipline and so ultimately that really is all they they do is make recommendations now they do like we've talked about they could have input into policies training investigations discipline in a sense that maybe making a recommendation to the chief on a particular case now again it depends on whether or not they're going to have access to the the IA files but but ultimately they they recommend and that's really about it they don't have the authority to fire somebody or hire somebody they don't have the authority on their own to demand or implement policy changes but that's all kind of part of is this group what do you think oversight should do should they have more authority to not just to recommend or I'm not sure I answered it but it really is just an end of in an advisory capacity now there are some some oversight processes in other cities around the country that actually have some I won't say teeth to them but actually do have the authority to impose discipline and fire people we don't hear that state law gives that solely to the chief but again every every city around the country is operating under different laws and maybe different employment contracts well yeah mr. Coney in terms of the the monitor the full-time monitor it's some of these departments as one who wrote the job description for that in Austin could you give us maybe just from your perspective the pros to having a full-time monitor in the department the cons to that what what from your vantage point in all your years or the pros and cons sure I reached out to my counterpart in Austin the other day and I asked him how many complaints have you had so far in 2020 and they've had about 1,500 complaints just this year alone now about a hundred of them or so from these recent protests so let's say probably by the end of the year it's probably safe to say Austin will have 2,000 complaints when you compare that with Denton how many we've had over the past five years of something this just my opinion but you folks can recommend something different I don't think you need a full-time monitor if you want to recommend that one be put on the payroll and be an employee subject and accountable to the city manager you can make that recommendation or do you think we should have some kind of process where we have somebody on retainer that if it's a specific case a critical incident that we can hire that person to monitor the case or review it or something but I just don't and I'll even let the chief chime in if he thinks we we have the volume of complaints that we would need a full-time monitor just from my experience and working with the monger in a different city they would be very they wouldn't be busy so I don't know how proficient they could get unless you got someone that had experience they did it part-time but that's just looking at the volume of work that they would have to do so the pros is really just if it gets if the number of complaints gets to a certain level you're saying that's whatever you would subjectively determine that to be that's really where the benefit of it comes in you've got one person devoted to doing that full-time but until then from your perspective it seems not not efficient I mean I don't see the low number of complaints being a bad thing I think that sometimes we can get caught in the trap of we don't have enough complaints well you know for me as the chief executive officer it's kind of a good thing that we don't have a lot of complaints because it speaks to you know the department of the city overall I think the relationship between the department and the city although it's not perfect we're in a pretty good place and we work very well together this being one of the prime examples to it so that's just you know my observation I have a question and then somebody just had their hand up oh Jamie just had their hand what in comparison our department we have we don't quite have 200 police officers so in comparison to the other departments that you put up what is the number of officers that they have Austin has around 2,000 Houston has I think around 5,500 San Antonio I don't know offhand but I don't believe they have more than Austin Galveston is a small department I don't know Dallas I think has maybe around 3,000 or something like that so of course when you have more employees at bigger cities you're going to have more citizen contacts more complaints so I can understand the need for them to want a full-time monitor as you can see those bigger cities also tend to have a lot more officer involved shootings which we don't fortunately we don't have here so you know just based on my experience and as the chief pointed out I just don't see that you need a full-time monitor on the payroll ultimately that's a decision for somebody else but I just don't think there's the workload or need for it it's just my opinion okay Jamie and then Pam my question actually was answered in that so I'm good now if you were at were if the recommendation was made to get a monitor on retainer how difficult do you think that would be mr. Conning I'll defer to I'll defer to the city manager on hiring processes and how that would work just wondering how difficult that process might be for you all well I think is the chief said if it's if it's a part-time employee yeah I'm retaining I don't I don't think it would be that difficult there are there are firms around the country that have been set up with ex-police executives in fact that's something the chief and I talked about at one point was you know do would we want to bring somebody in to take a look at our policy updates best practices give us some feedback on on how certain incidents were handled but I think that the the contract relationship brings somebody in you know we do this at DME for instance with our trading floor bringing somebody in every quarter every six months to take things give us some feedback on best practices training curriculum it can be done okay thank you I was just wondering cost wise so it would be less if that recommendation was made thank you yeah um I think Jamie has a question and then Willie did you have your hand up okay and Jamie and then I think after that we'll move on to the next portion my question is in direct response to the city manager it's a follow-up to what you were stating about some of the other potential contractual work related to training and policies and things like that um that's something I'd like for you to kind of describe a little bit more in terms of if if we as a collective group decided that we thought it might be a good idea to have a monitor on retainer or something could they also do some of the additional pieces that we may be recommending is that kind of what you're thinking or is it an entirely different thing no I think I think they work together we've we've spent quite a bit of time and and are getting close to having most of our policies updated best practices updated right now and a monitor that's under contract is going to have the expertise to evaluate situations against the best practices and provide us with that expert feedback on where additional training might be needed where you know if there's any holes that need to be fixed any other suggestions so that is what they're going to do but they wouldn't be the ones actually putting the training program in place they would be evaluating what they're what they're saying how the officers behaviors as sorts of things against the best practices in the in the up-to-date policies and there could be an opportunity where they would actually even suggest that we create different training opportunities depending on what they're saying so it actually works in conjunction with one another go ahead Jamie I'm sorry Cheryl I promise to no you're fine Mike my question now Mr. Cronick is for any of the the cities that you looked at that do have a panel or board what is the tenure of those positions is it a one-year appointment to and how many of those can I have can I sit on it until the end of time or did you have any details about that everyone is different sometimes they try to have staggered appointments so that not all of them have to be reappointed but I think they're usually two or three year appointments and there may be ability it's like the Civil Service Commission Mr. Baines I believe I think you can be reappointed certain times and again that's you know that that's saying the devil's in the details if you if you write a an oversight process you can put that in there can't serve more than three consecutive two-year terms or whatever you want to do you can craft whatever process you want now part of what I'll have to do is whatever recommendations are made is go back and see if there we can do it under the law and under the contract but those are things that you folks can just say here's what we recommend this is the way it we would like to see it Todd is there consistency for those terms across city boards and other commissions is there sort of a Denton standard or does it vary by each commission it varies by each commission we have some that are two three and four so it's all over the board yes Kamiya thank you Michael you mentioned that there's no oversight boards that pay volunteers I'm assuming you got all of my recommendations for oversight I'm wondering if there if there's any research even outside of Texas of folks that played a small stipend for I just am a believer of paying folks for their mental and emotional labor and not like a huge stipend like when we have interns we pay them a small stipend right like it's not like paying them to be part-time or anything but just something I just didn't know if that was ever a precedent in any other city I don't know but let me ask you this if you're going to pay this board a stipend then I think as a matter of fairness once you have to pay people who serve on other city boards and I would agree with you yeah but I don't know it is possible I know in the municipal civil service commission in Austin which here's deals with the non-sporn people those commission members have wanted to and feel like they should be paid for their meetings and the last I knew they weren't paid and I don't know if council had put that on the on their agenda but none of the boards of commissions that I'm aware of in Austin or anywhere else around here get paid doesn't mean you can't as far as I know I mean it's an issue we'd have to look at but again it's a matter of fairness to you know for every other person on a board and commission anybody else so we'll move we'll have my go to the next presentation thank you so what I tried to do is come up with what are some options so what I tried to do was kind of go from the most defensible to the least defensible and based on my experience the attorney general opinion that I referenced the most defensible structure is a police monitor that is a city employee or an independent contractor that reports to the city manager now as I mentioned back in 2001 the council passed this ordinance that allowed the city manager and the city attorney and the HR director to have access to these files if we hired a police monitor that was reporting to the city manager then my recommendation would be that we amend this ordinance to allow that person to have access as well and why could that person monitor have access to these files that person would be acting as the eyes and ears of the city manager who as I said is the direct supervisor of the police department and the police chief so a police monitor is acting on behalf of the city manager and that's why I believe a police monitor who reports to the manager would lawfully have access to these materials another option too is you could make the monitor a paid employee of the law department that reports to the city attorney who also has lawful access to these materials this structure in my opinion does not require an amendment to chapter 143 by the legislature or a meet and confer process now I will tell you this in Austin the police association felt like we could not even have a police monitor without a provision in the meet and confer contract and when we did not have a contract in 2018 this police association sued the city and I believe from what I remember I was in the courtroom the judge rejected their argument that we could not have a police monitor absent a contract so I believe a police monitor reporting to the manager is legal and valid even without a contract so I think that's the most legally defensible process another option is what if the police chief creates or utilizes an existing police department committee to review or audit police department operations and the chief could create a committee or utilize an existing committee that includes dentin residents to periodically review or audit police department policies practices training internal affairs operations and again this is a volunteer committee and as I said when you start getting into volunteer issues it starts getting more tenuous whether or not they can have access to these confidential police department internal affairs investigations okay thanks so I do believe that the chief could create a utilize an existing committee now as I say here at the end is noted in age is AG opinion which is on the next slide there may be limitations so if the chief has a committee an existing committee who wants to create one to advise him that issue came up back in 2010 and this involved a police citizen review board appointed by city council and the attorney general opinion didn't tell me which city and it was a police civilian review board appointed by the council and assigned to the police chief as an advisory board to review disciplinary matters use of force cases weapon discharges those types of things and here's what the attorney general said whether members of a civilian advisory board may view a personnel file under section 143.089 g of the local government code will depend on one the board's status and function as part of the department and two limitations on the board's use of the g files to department purposes only which will depend on the specific facts of the board's appointment so even the attorney general here is questioning whether you can have a volunteer civilian advisory board have access to these confidential files I don't know the answer to that definitively there's been no court cases on it but this 2010 attorney general opinion kind of says maybe maybe not and as I said the devil is in the details another option what if the city council appointed a committee a board or commission and absent a legislated or negotiated change to the 143 citizen volunteer access to g material may not be legally permissible I'm not saying 100% definitively they cannot have it I'm just saying my concern is that if we put in a citizen volunteer panel with the existing state of the law the police union or an individual officer could file a lawsuit against the city seeking an injunction to prevent us from implementing any process that involves a citizen committee and ask the judge to rule whether or not citizen access to this g file material is lawful so so as you can see we're kind of getting from least in my opinion we can do it too I'm not sure we can do it so that's that's another option and and by all means just because I'm saying this don't don't not recommend something to the mayor and council if you think it's something you want us to consider I'm just trying to give you the the the lay of the land so to speak and what the law is but we're kind of getting further away from use of the department file by the department a fourth option might be and this is what I think I don't know if it was you Jamie if you brought up a citizen panel selected by the community again when you have a volunteer panel now you're getting even further away it's not the city manager it's not the chief it's not the city council it's the community who are picking these people you're now starting to get further and further away from what I think is a legally permissible use of that confidential file we also run into issues that we can't just put if it's a if this is a city sponsored program board commission or approved by the council we can't just put people on because of their race or their gender we can say we want diversity but to say it's only going to be people of this color or this religion or this or that I think that violates federal and state discrimination laws and the city can't condone setting up a group or working group or committee or commission that is based on people's race or gender or religion and then you know this is one of the things we talked about earlier who's going to be on this if we have a civilian group who's going to be on it if you start excluding people who either have an affiliation with law enforcement or family members you want the police buy-in the officers buy-in to this process they have to trust that it's going to be fair and if you start excluding people they may not have faith or trust in the process it's just something else to think about and then the last option I want to talk about and this was brought up I believe one of the officers what about the city's police and fire civil service commission and I don't think that's a viable option and here's why the commission has no oversight authority or role in officer misconduct under chapter 43 the meeting confer agreement or the local rules that the civil service commission adopted the commission does have investigative authority but it's limited to investigating compliance with the civil service rules not misconduct and I think there's an inherent conflict of interest if the commission was involved in oversight because an officer can appeal discipline to the commission so how can the commission be an independent oversight board monitoring an investigation and then turn around and supposed to be a fair and independent appellate process for that very same case so I think there's just an inherent conflict in that and I don't think it's possible and and the commission by law only has access to police department internal affairs investigation records if the officer was suspended for a day or more so there's some legal impediments to the civil service commission being oversight they have their job under the law and it is not civilian oversight of police misconduct so those are some of the different options I do want to say that can we have oversight of the Denton police department absolutely I think we can the question though is going to be in what form and what are the responsibilities and duties going to be of the people involved in that process so hopefully I've given you a little some things to think about and I'm happy to answer any questions about any any of the slides in this last part of this presentation Kamiya let me get to where I was typing thank you so much for that info um you mentioned that the committees have a lot of the committees that you showed us have rules around no law enforcement no city workers no one that's been related to police but then you also mentioned the need for police buy-in so I was just wondering if there was evidence or information or some research around these cities that you have mentioned to us and whether or not there's buy-in have there been issues like what what's the deal there when I say buy-in it the the police officers if you want oversight have to have faith that this process is going to be fair and not judge them before all the facts are out there so chief do you want to address this at all I mean I mean there are there are officers around the country I know that do not trust oversight and are adamantly opposed to it and think it's nothing but you know a group of people who don't know what officers do who are out to get them but if you and here's something to think about if we're going to have oversight in Denton I would certainly recommend that we involve the police association because we need their agreement their input because if we put a process in that isn't fair that they see as biased against them one they're not going to support it they're not going to cooperate with it and I'm not sure that anybody really is going to benefit from a process that they vehement vehemently oppose and I'll let the chief talk about what he feels as far as maybe union buy-off or if you want to chief so the the other cities that have implemented this and they had to make amendments to their meet and confer contracts they had to get the police association buy-in if you don't have their buy-in like Mike said if they don't think the process is going to be fair and equitable kind of like the same process that we're going through right now the reason you all are assembled then they're not going to amend their the contract they're not going to agree to any amendments and then we're kind of stuck in this perpetual what can we do what do we do so that's the primary reason for it is if you don't get their buy-in then you're most likely not going to get any form outside of the most minimal and they'll fight it and what I mean by that is they'll challenge it every time every time the committee reviews a case they'll file a grievance or a lawsuit saying that's not authorized by chapter 143 of the agreement you can't do it so we certainly want to during negotiations if we're going to put it into the contract I'm not saying you should or should not but in my experience union input is really important then most importantly if I make a disciplinary decision and it's appealed that will be brought up during the appellate process so you have the the ability to greatly harm any disciplinary decisions that I make let me throw out one more thing I just want you all to think about if you have an oversight process have you all thought about are you going to be subject to being called as a witness in a disciplinary appeal are you going to be called as a witness in a civil trial a criminal trial if you're reviewing these cases and it ends up in a lawsuit or a criminal trial would you if you were one of these panel members would you want to be subpoenaed to court to testify about your role in the oversight process just something else to think about I know I want I would prefer and in fact in Austin in our contract it says that people involved in the oversight process cannot be subpoenaed in an administrative disciplinary appeal the issue has never come up about a civil suit or a criminal trial but in our contract we specifically put in that people involved in oversight cannot be subpoenaed by the city or the officer in a disciplinary appeal just something to think about and Mike would they in a particular situation where they would be on that committee are they covered would they be covered by errors and omissions by the city or would they have to have their own personal errors and omission insurance hadn't thought about that I'm not sure that they're I mean all they're doing is making recommendations they're not they're not making binding decisions on someone's employment or anything so I don't think I don't think that would be an issue okay I'm Pam and then camion even like even as a volunteer they wouldn't be covered though because like our board members are covered as volunteers you know I'd have to defer to Todd if he wants to answer if he knows yeah I'm just saying I don't know yeah yeah I don't think it would be an issue because I think it's a little bit different issue they'd be covered or no they wouldn't be covered two different things one I don't think would be an issue only because I think they're making simply recommendations which the mayor council or the chief can accept or reject so they're not making a binding decision like I think some other boards and commissions might have the authority is there anything you want to add on that Todd if not that they could still be sued I mean or party to a suit is my concern anyone can be sued for anything nowadays so it's always been that was my concern to Pam yeah I really hadn't thought about that I don't I do not know in my 20 years in Austin there has never been a single time that a police a member of the oversight art well the police monitor has been sued as a defendant alleging that she's hasn't done things properly but individual members of the citizens review committee that we had had never been named as a defendant in any kind of lawsuit I just wouldn't want to if we recommended this to tell them oh you you have coverage and then they actually don't it God forbid something did happen I would assume I'd want to check it out I would assume that they would have the same coverage as any other member of any other board or commission the Tina did you have your hand up I did I was gonna ask um she had her hand up I'm sorry she had her hand up before you did came in I didn't say it's okay I am was wondering for the police association are they like the ombudsman for the den police department or is there an ombudsman um yeah that's what I wanted to know what the association represents its membership um I represent the chief so I mean they're two different entities and I think they have a good relationship but you know like the police um like an officer's advocate like do y'all have I know for um the state they have the that whole ombudsman process where they're police advocates so who would be police advocates or what organization would that be so like a police association is there local advocates they're under the umbrella of either plead or tmpa and the officers have a right to choose either one of those but the den police officer association is the only one that can bargain with the city for labor rights here in the city so because my thoughts are that representation from some uh some group that is already established as um a police advocate organization might be helpful in getting the police buy-in so if there's one or two or however many you know that could be on the committee on the oversight committee then that would be that would ensure representation I guarantee you that if we ask the association for their input they will have one of their staff attorneys um on the committee um camion and then jamie yeah I had a couple questions so is it possible for the city manager to work with community members to appoint these folks are they allowed to get community input and then be the ones that choose or like has there has there ever been a collaboration in that way between the city and the community for boards and committees I don't I don't know what they've done in the past the the problem well the city manager certainly can solicit input to recommendations for who should be on this committee uh but I don't think the committee can choose those people themselves and again it goes to that issue of as you start creeping further away from the city manager's authority and appointing and removal uh you're just kind of creating a lot a less strong argument that these people should have access to this confidential information does that answer your question yeah um ultimately it sounds like it's up to the city manager which I understand especially to get the most buy-in and be able to change the 143 and all of that I get that part I'm just wondering if there's a way to collaborate with community members for that um my other question it's still the thing I had before I don't feel like I clearly got an answer around if there's evidence in these other cities that not having law enforcement or city employees has been prohibitive completely from being able to work with the police department on this as a community oversight board you mentioned they applied it a lot and I'm like what how many how is there information around like how many uh police have been like no we don't want this to these oversight boards in the cities that you mentioned I don't know specifically I know in Austin they started it before I got there in 2000 but I mean you hear all the time where if a community wants to institute some type of oversight there's pushback and resistance from the police because they don't trust that they don't trust that they're going to be treated fairly they don't think that they should be judged by people who haven't walked in their shoes I think so I don't know the answer to your question that if there's pushback I mean if there's pushback then the union is probably going to file a lawsuit to try to stop it but I'm sure that around the country there's been I mean I know I read about it that there's a lot of disagreement about oversight and doesn't mean that if the union doesn't get doesn't give their buy-in that it's not going to be successful or hasn't been successful I don't know we didn't really kind of ask in that much detail but it's probably a fair statement that if there's been a lot of animosity between a city and the union that is probably hindered the ability to have an effective oversight process I can't say that for a fact but it's probably not unreasonable to conclude that I mean I can certainly find out more information but I think it would really mean having to call these these different cities and say did you get union buy-in and yes or no and what's you think it's been effective if they've put up some resistance to it but that's a way to avoid it is let's get the union people involved in it and see if we can't come up with a system that we think is going to be effective and fair to not only the complainant but the officer I just I just am wondering how is the committee us can talk about the balance between community members having buy-in and feeling safe to participate in this structure as well as having police DPD buy-in and trust around the community oversight board to support the community members I'm just wondering what is the balance there and I know you don't have the answer I'm just posing that as a question to our group okay Jamie I'm I'm gonna share an observation first at least to make sure that I'm on maybe the a page that makes some sense and I'm gonna try to reframe what I think cameo's question is in my own way because I feel like I'm struggling similarly so let me start with my observation my observation is we have some members of our community that are apprehensive and distrustful that our law enforcement community treats them with equity right so that's one side and that do not feel comfortable using the processes that are already in place to share their feedback or concerns or whatnot you know either they're not taking advantage of the filing report or they they aren't doing that they're going to their trusted already community units maybe and talking about it and it doesn't get elevated to the department necessarily where something can be done that's potentially one observation on the other hand you have law enforcement community who rightfully so in my personal opinion believe what is Jamie Blanton know about being a good police officer other than what she's learned in these few hours of meeting together she's not done everything that I've done she doesn't understand how difficult it is to be on calls like that and like what the hell does she know right so you have you have that sort of idea as well what I am trying to understand is in a quantifiable way what's the cost benefit analysis for me as a member of this group of making that recommendation to have an oversight committee or not and so while I understand there's not a dollar amount attached to the committee in the same way there is a monitor like I like the monitor idea because I can attach a dollar amount to that and then I can determine if that dollar amount is worth it based on the number of complaints they see like that makes sense to me because I like to think linear linearly in that way so what I'm struggling with is with an oversight board that is voluntary that comes from all backgrounds who has no real authority is creating that entity or recommending that we create that entity going to end up costing our community more money time energy resources than it's going to save and so I understand that you can't paint me a financial picture in the same clear way but to me that's what I'm I'm looking at so to come back to what camion was asking for me what I heard her trying to ask in my own way was is there any way to show how many times in these cities the board has been like what's the word I'm looking for like push down or sued or where there's been like financial implications to having the board in place any like general umbrella statement at all I understand that you would have to probably call each of those cities back and get some specific information I'm just looking for like ballpark generalities because I feel like as a community whether it's looking at the picture nationally or locally there is a sense that there's a cost potentially to not doing it but I don't know that I know or understand what the cost would be to do it does that make sense at all and thank you for letting me sort of editorialize around to make my point I appreciate that that no I think it's an interesting question I think what we're what we see at least in Texas with the 143 cities is there's a general fear from the officers that that the oversight boards tend to be politicized which they get their back up even more you can you can follow the larger cities and the members of the citizen oversight boards these conversations have been going on for years and years they've evolved to a certain place and they realize they don't really have any authority and they get frustrated with that because they can't effectuate change without the associations the 143 stands in their way they don't have the ability to to see police records disciplinary records that becomes a big issue and you see this general sense of frustration from from the process which you know and I think the I think the volume issue is is is something that Mike's brought up that's it's a real variable here the monitors at least and I think I think the way to apply around that is some of the transparency initiatives that we've been talking about in terms of really what the community wants to know is are you taking these things seriously and what are you doing about it and you know and so I think that's kind of where we're heading right now and the way to address this but just watching and reading the papers in these cities and watching the cases and watching the politics and watching how some of the city councils also try to use the citizen oversight boards which does nothing but push the officers even further away it's their fear and it's and it's a justified fear based on what's been going on in some of these big cities so I think the I think getting into this sort of slowly making sure there's a lot of vetting of information that it's very transparent and and you know one of the things I've talked to the chief about is just you know getting out there at least on an annual basis with the report saying here's everything that happened last year here's a couple of cases here's to here's you know changes that we're making to training whatever it could be as a result of you know some of the criticism some of the oversight some of the best practice analysis it's probably the place to start but our officers get to read the clipping services just like we do and that is probably as motivating a factor and you know and some of their fears are very warranted based on what's happening in Austin and San Antonio and Dallas and that is going to be a very real issue so I think there's various ways to get there slowly without without completely polarizing the police association I don't think that they're looking to be polarized but I think there are ways of making incremental progress and and I think Michael's given you several options there that we can talk to them about but that's that's just sort of the environment we're in right now even this process we're having to explain it's it's everything that we're doing it's a major change for folks and you know having this discussion it's a big difference has never been done it's a so everything that we're doing is is exponentially you know more than has been done in the past with this level of transparency and so it's just a matter of what are those first few steps to be taken I didn't really just to follow up on what Todd said one of the other options and I mentioned it briefly though is the chief could form a committee that meets let's say yearly does an audit of use of force complaints suspensions discipline but you know racial bias you know racial profiling and then the chief prepares a report and then does a public presentation to council once a year and that report is public so I mean that's another way of involving citizens in an audit yearly that the chief actually has to publicly present that to council it's just something else it's one of the options I put in that's like I mean number two but I just wanted to elaborate on that and the last thing we want to do is we don't want you folks and a committee to do a lot of work and then we get sued and we get an injunction and then we spend the next year or two in court and oversight is dead and that's kind of what happened in Austin when we were when we didn't have a contract for a year we had the police monitor kept going but the citizen oversight panel stopped for an entire year because we didn't think that they lawfully had access to the confidential files until we got a new contract now Austin put in a new 10 member panel so I just would hate to to do all this work and then we get an injunction and and we're basically stopped in our tracks well yeah just I just want to double check that I'm clear maybe going all the way back to Jesse's question about what these oversight committees really do and you said in essence they're making recommendations similar to this committee even but all of these different groups when you even just named perhaps you have a group with the chief that he meets with and they're looking at specific case you know excessive use of force those groups still they're not looking at the specific files right I'm trying to get in my mind like when even some of these lists that you've given us of I'm trying to remember maybe Galveston was one Houston you know they they monitor types of cases reviewed excessive force discharge of firearms incidents resulting in serious bodily is are they receiving something similar to what we've received in their review because they're not looking at the individual cases right because they're not legally allowed to do that based on 143 it depends on the process for an Austin for example the police monitor actually sits in on every interview of every witness every officer gets to see all the evidence so it's really going to depend and I can't speak to the specifics of what San Antonio Houston gets to see because I just don't know but every process is different and if you were to put oversight into a contract of course that's a negotiation you can specify those details what happens and everything but there is a question when you have volunteers is that attorney general opinion noted it's questionable whether if it's an ongoing internal affairs investigation which is confidential can those volunteers have real-time access to that documentation and the attorney general didn't give a definitive answer it was just kind of it depends on the details so I wish I could give you an absolute yes or no but unfortunately it's kind of one of those is really no definitive answer but you're saying in Austin they changed the contract because I'm because then Todd was saying of because they don't have any real authority and because maybe they don't have access then it turns in and spirals into this politicization thing but it sounds like maybe in Austin or at some places they do have more access so it is a little bit more of a significant recommendation because they've maybe seen some things yes and that's because they've negotiated in their meeting confer agreement the access okay that's that's that's really kind of a key is if you can negotiate with your association and contract and put in the specifics of what the and I'll be happy to get get this group a copy of the article in the Austin police contract that talks about oversight and what the monitor and panel the responsibilities and what they get to see and don't see that Austin is different Houston looks at San Antonio they all have contracts and in those contracts I don't remember if Houston does offhand but the contracts will specify the San Antonio contract for example they created this police advisory board in their contract so that's a way of getting around these restrictions to that g-file material is negotiating it with the Union but ultimately it still is like you said a recommendation more than anything else now if you want to negotiate something that says these recommendations are binding on the chief and you know if the city wants to negotiate that change you know a city can do that if they want to I don't know that I guess maybe it might be helpful for me to see because I think it's pretty clear with the monitor especially in the model that you gave us is the closer they are to the city manager or the chief obviously the more legal access they have but then the further you get and you get into these committee you know and you gave us all these different models in these different cities you know you don't want it to spin out of control because it's powerless and it can't really even know what's going on because you can't I mean it feels like that would be futility but it seems like maybe there are some groups that do have a little bit more access for one reason or another it might just be good to see the comparison of those so we even know what are we talking about you know yeah I'll tell you in Austin the police monitor and the panel can make recommendations to the police chief the police chief then has to respond in writing and I believe the current contract and past couple ones makes those recommendations public so if the committee recommends something let's say in training and the chief decides not to do it then he has to justify in writing why he's rejecting that argument that's going to be made public so that by itself is going to put some pressure on the chief to institute some of these changes so but again the group in Austin is making those recommendations to the chief based on a certain level of access that may be different with Alveston you're absolutely right get at is just which cities have what access and how does that inform whether it becomes what Todd was talking about or something maybe a little bit more fruitful in regards to collaboration between the department and the community where everybody feels safe and accountable and all those sorts of things for most of the cities that I'm talking about it's been negotiated access has been negotiated in their meet and confer agreements and I think the thing that's important to Michael can provide these provisions to you but each one of those cities gave you know gave something up to get that and you know with with San Antonio for instance there's there's very different benefit packages very different things that were so you just never know what what the trades were and I guess we could try our best to do that but even in those cities where you've seen you know the the access being granted to some extent with the panels they're simply recommending bodies which tends to be frustrated they still are subject to huge politicization I mean we're seeing that in Austin over and over again especially when they get sidelined over a meet and confer contract so it's it's one of those things where you know every situation is going to be a little bit differently and how it how it works if it can work and then once you don't have the contract they're put on pause so it it's not going to be clean we can certainly provide the language but there's going to be a backstory to every one of these that has to be taken into consideration and it's going to be a lot of time as well to get to a point where you can have those conversations little in hi and I just wanted to share just a couple of thoughts I completely understand what you guys are saying and as a member of the civil service commission I totally understand as well that it is frustrating and what the limitations are and how hard it is sometimes to even understand the role what we're we're tasked to do but I think as I've said listened to the presentation as I've heard you know all these different groups and what they have and it's clear to me that the chief has representation because it's the city attorney the officers have representation because those are the unions the only ones that I don't see have total representation or even a voice to voice frustrations or whatever they might feel are the residents and I think that that's from the moment that we started talking about oversight committees from weeks and weeks ago that's what was missing that's why we wanted to bring that up you know we wanted to at least feel that we have a voice now if a group of panelists formed in whatever capacity if it even is just to review certain cases with the chief wants or whatever at least there's a voice at least we can provide a recommendation but I think that the way things are right now that's that's the part that's missing I also was listening when someone said you know well who would appoint and the city manager would appoint I know that in the past or the way it's done now a council member might recommend a person to the city manager and then the city manager decides you know to be a point or not does the person want to do it you know do they meet minimum requirements and that's how they get appointed I don't see why that would be any different I don't I don't see why that would be or have to be any different for this specific committee now the recommendations that are done by this committee right and I understand the whole thing that the city manager is the chief's boss and to my understanding the way I understand government and the city council has the right to fire a city manager so in my opinion the city council is also supposed to be tasked or it's a it's a system of checks and balances right with what the city manager is doing so if at any moment um you know y'all mentioned under certain laws the city manager has the right to these personnel files the HR department has a right to the personnel files I don't see why the city council wouldn't I don't understand the whole thing about the attorney general I don't know if you know Mr. Cronin can say whether it's a definite no it's a hard no or it could be possible but why wouldn't we that would be another way to say well we do have representations because we're the ones that vote in our city council members so why wouldn't they have as much access as a city manager I'm also not in favor of a monitor I think that's just another person on payroll and honestly it's not to speak speak ill of anyone but it's just one more person on that on that same in that same structure and it's missing the citizen input right so those are just some thoughts I'm curious what other people might think and you know what's going on in everyone's mind right now in regards to that I do think the city council could appoint or make recommendations to the city manager and I think the most defensible way I don't know how the current ones are doing if the manager uh then picks from the recommendations but I certainly think council can have input into who's going to be on this panel uh the council as a body also has access to these confidential g-file materials because they're the governing body they set the uh budget for uh for the city and the departments and so as a body they do and they can under the ag opinion they can decide who else within the city government has a basically a business need to see those uh but again as you start getting into volunteers who aren't even city employees that's where the it becomes kind of hairy so I understand and I do I do think there's a way to do what you're saying part of what in Austin when someone comes in to file a complaint the monitor I don't I don't know if the word ombudsman is certainly the right word uh but they help them through the process tell them what's going to happen uh kind of give them feedback so I understand what you're saying that when someone comes in there's no one on their side there's just a citizen who doesn't understand what's going to happen and that may be something we can talk about of trying to develop some kind of a budsman uh position a person to help people who are filing complaints so they don't feel like they're alone Gary did you have your hand up yes madam thank you uh I'm gonna put you on the spot Michael you've given us several options I think you've heard the committee over a number of weeks um you know the two associations very well you understand the limitations so what is the best solution in your opinion for what we're trying to achieve in denton I don't know the associations for uh the chief knows them better than I do I've had very few dealings with them the most legally defensible one is to have a police monitor who is an employee uh that reports to the city manager uh is appointed by the city manager can be removed by the city manager uh I think that's the most legally defensible one uh and if you want to get a citizen panel my suggestion would be try to negotiate that through a meeting confer agreement uh I think that's probably the most legally defensible way to get a citizen panel in place that's just my based on my experience I just want to say thank you for all the research you've done you've provided a wealth of information you're welcome Jesse yeah two things really quickly first I kind of want to um clarify and qualify something uh Mike said a second ago about the the g file section g files the city council members don't have access to those individually we in our official capacities as a body you know the council can vote itself power to take a look at those files that's not something the city council can do now or that we could individually reach into those files or get permission to see those files individually uh without a pretty good reason acting as a body um the second thing Mike I wonder if you might say a word about open meetings and some of those groups on your list have open public meetings some of them don't and Denton almost every single board uh border commission that we have is subject to toma and uh Texas open meetings um we broadcast some of them over the internet just like we're doing this one can you say a word about um those groups that do and don't have public meetings anything you know about the reasons behind those that don't have public meetings um and what kind of implications that might have um I could think of some exceptions to toma for a group like that but what are some of the implications to having those meetings be public when we were drafting the language in Austin because and I keep going back to that because that's what I'm familiar with we talked about having a public hearing where the public could come in and hear their grievances part of the problem was that a lot of the things those panel uh those citizens want to talk about is confidential investigations that didn't result in discipline they're upset that nothing was sustained and the officer wasn't suspended so we were concerned that the panel members can they ask questions about a confidential matter are they going to be in a public forum discussing confidential information that they shouldn't be so that that was really the police association's concern is what's going to happen at these meetings are we going to have a citizen panel who just sits there like potted plants and listens and can't ask a single question and that is the way it originally started uh citizen comes in and complains and the committee members go and ask him any questions through the meet and confer contract over the year that's become more and more uh liberal so to speak uh where a lot more can be said but uh I tell you officers are not going to get up in a public meeting and defend themselves uh I can't think of any I was not the attorney for the uh oversight process in Austin because I was attorney for the police department's kind of a conflict there but you could probably count in 20 years on one hand how many police officers who were the subject of an investigation actually went and spoke to that committee especially if the person that complained against them was there as well so there are there are issues with what can be discussed uh and is it really nothing more the officers I think consider to be nothing more than a public uh I don't want to word the word lynching is not the right word obviously that has negative connotations but they feel like they're getting hammered in a public forum by someone coming in and saying how horrible they are and they're reluctant to get up there and defend themselves so there are issues with the public meetings and what can be discussed and confidential information some of these like you said processes do have public meetings I think Dallas does but it just again it just varies from from city to city about what their process is and what's going to take place at these meetings I wish I could give you more definitive but there there are legal concerns about what's going to take place at the at a public meeting Katina so I'm I'm still stuck on um what police officers would feel would be equitable in order for us to have an oversight committee I'd like to hear from um the officers um that are on the zoom call as well as Dr Williams because you all represent the department and work with officers so I'd like to hear what you think is fair and what would work for the citizens and the officers I can from my point of view um and it's it's why I asked the question earlier about what uh what the members on the committee what is their background and what is their you know what experience do they have uh in my opinion in order for something like that to work I think you would have to have someone who not necessarily police officers but someone who knows the the field knows the profession um I I had a conversation with someone a while back after one of these meetings and my example is that I don't think I'm qualified to sit on the medical board and determine if a medical professional is doing their job appropriately or you know correctly so I feel like someone would have to have some kind of working knowledge in a profession to be able to pass judgment on someone's profession you know I don't think I can speak to anyone else on the zoom call as far as if you're performing appropriately in your profession without me having some kind of previous knowledge or some kind of uh you know education in your profession so that's just my my take on it I'll tell you my take on it okay go ahead Nancy oh I'm sorry uh my take on it is a couple of a couple things one uh and I'm only speaking for me I'm not speaking for on behalf of all the officers of the association I'm speaking for myself uh you're gonna have to have somebody on the board that's fair uh fair is a big thing on being an officer we're always judged off of people biases or opinions so you also need to be impartial you know let all the facts present itself and then judge based off of the facts that present it not based off of your feelings or what you think your friends or family is going to say or how other community members is going to look out to you and uh I'll tell you one last thing Mike hit on it a couple of times is going to be the confidentiality a lot of times when you're going to be going into uh if you get a oversight board or whatever you're going to have you're going to receive confidential information or you're going to see some confidential information not only just of the officer but uh of the citizen themselves so if you are on the board or whatever how as an officer how do I know that you're going to keep that information just between you and the panel that's on the board and not go spread that out throughout the community because it's not just the officer on trial here or you know being judged here about a panel it's also the citizen that the officer that actually filed a complaint or the grievance against the officer uh so fair and impartial as well as the confidentiality that's going to be some of the big things that's especially in my boat Lillian I completely agree with um BNC I I would hope that the people on the school board the board of trustees members are fair and impartial and looking for the best education for all kids right I would hope that city council members are the same way um in response to officer um Nicholas um I I you know when when a city when a person runs for city council they're not experts in everything but they're tasked with making decisions that involves millions of dollars you know what I mean not all of them have the background that they might need so they have staff that provides the information I believe that they are probably responsible do their own research same with uh United States board of trustees they're not all former educators and so I don't believe that a person that is doesn't have a background in uh policing can't be a person on this on this panel um but I I do completely agree Yancy that they have to be impartial they have to um they have to have a willingness to to stand for the people and also uh and for the community and and officers are part of that community as well and so I just want to put that out there because I don't think it's fair for anyone to say no they can't do it when all of our representation look at our council our council members look at our Texas state reps none of them we have people running for you know other elected positions that have no kind of background are hair salon stylist owners you know and they're still running and so that doesn't disqualify anyone I believe one of the requirements to serve on the board we could put in that you have to undergo certain training by the department so we could put that in yeah just real quick um since you you were answering my questions um initially if they're regarding confidentiality if for the board um the oversight committee committee I'm sorry I'm so tongue-tied I'm not feeling well today I'm sorry um if there was a confidentiality agreement that any um disposing like disclosed disclosing of information would result in maybe a penalty of of forfeiture of the of the case or something like that could that leverage um you know the confidentiality and hold the person responsible knowing that if it's found out that you know you've discussed this case or you know disclosed any information that basically you're going to forfeit your position and and potentially the case could be thrown out would that be fair yeah we could do that and there's even state laws that might even deal make it criminal that if you disclose confidential information that you've come into because of your position potentially could be a crime I mean the way you get around a lot of this stuff is if the city and the union wanted to is you just put it in a contract and try to negotiate all of these issues so that we're all on the same page and we don't have to worry about them yeah my my my concern is that you know a lot of the things that I'm hearing from the officers would be the same things I would hear from people in the community and historically um that has been the experience of the community um no lack of representation um which I completely understand on the officer end you don't want to witch hunt um and I I personally wouldn't I mean I wouldn't want to witch hunt but everything that you're that I've heard so far in defense of you know protecting the officers I've heard you know and felt on the citizen side of protection representation um people doing their jobs um relying on the training and expertise versus you know winging it or you know having bias or abuse of power um so I feel like if we can come to some type of agreement that leverages you know for both sides um and gives opportunity for citizens to have a process of complaint that doesn't just stop at police but is um you know given over to the citizens to to the community but then at the same time knowing that there's going to be a high standard in ensuring that um there's not a witch hunt that is fair and equitable for officers and citizens jami I just um we had offered dr williams the chance to respond to the same question and I think our our group kind of jumped jumped in with questions and stuff so I just wanted to offer him if if you are interested in sharing your perspective I'd like to hear it dr williams hey good evening so I can't I can't speak to the concerns of the associations or the officers uh concerning any any reservations that they might have that's not something that I can speak to okay thank you um don't forget that all these ideas we're going to meet next week and we're going to put all of these into the top you know whatever top 10 top whatever um so we can start getting the recommendation together to go to council sarah you want to jump in on that one sure so patrick the facilitator from last week has taken the conversation the ideas some of the main themes and is developing a list we will send that in advance of next thursday's meeting to the committee um to kind of get you prepared for that next conversation on the 17th around um regarding to start to vote or have discussions around which recommendations the committee wants to put forward and in what priority um those recommendations may be made yes jamie so I may be the only one that's not able to attend next week's meeting um but just as a point of order since we are going to start voting and discussing those initiatives would preference be sarah for us to share our comments back via email so you can share them with the group or to wait until the following meeting or how would you like to handle that sure if you're unable to attend if you could email both chair english and myself we can share those thoughts with the committee members and then there would be the opportunity as well on the september 24th meeting yes both i've got another question about this i wanted to circle back to mr croney to give this isn't the time to do it that's okay i just i'll do you and then camion and then then that'll that'll be it yeah i just wanted to tie it off as i start thinking about even recommendations and thoughts convictions whatever from tonight mr krone you said okay gary asked you what's your legal and otherwise your perspective on what we should do you mentioned the the monitor is the most legally justifiable then you started to go down the road of you know some of these cities have both that and we discussed that a little bit whether it was worth having one in our city and then you went to the oversight board as well the potential of that and then we got lost into some weeds of it in all the models of the oversight board that you've portrayed that you've seen that you've thought about if if we were going to make a recommendation in that direction which one of those would you recommend the one that is connected to the chief the one that's connected to the city manager is there a particular form that you'd lean toward in that recommendation if we were going to make it i think from a practical standpoint if you want independence i think something that reports to the chief just isn't practical i think you want to go to the chief's boss and i think if you have a monitor that reports directly to the chief who's the supervisor to the city manager who's the supervisor of the chief i think you're going to get a lot more in my experience this the police monitor in austin reports to the city manager and i tell you when she calls him and says hey i got a problem with this uh the chief in austin gets a phone call usually from the assistant city manager about what's going on you know with this uh so i think that's probably the most effective oversight process is a monitor that is responsible to the chief i can tell you there's there's a feeling that sometimes oversight is if all they can do is make recommendations is it even any good is it a waste of everybody's time if the chief can simply say yeah thanks but no thanks so you know you can try to build in a process that has some some teeth but i would go with a police monitor i think a citizen panel if we can do it is important because then you actually have the citizens who are giving input and not just someone who's a paid employee of this of the city and i think that's real important that the citizens feel like they're actually having some stake in what's happening and making recommendations and making the chief answer to those recommendations why aren't you going to do this recommendation and making that public and make the chief report to council every year i think that's an incentive for the chief to to uh take these recommendations to heart but you're saying that citizen committee that was maybe the heart of my question you think that citizen committee should report or work directly with the chief or with the city manager i think the most defensible process is uh with if you made it part of the police department that citizen panel is part of the police department reports to the chief that's probably the most defensible because now it's part of the police department but i don't think that's practical you know i mean i don't think anyone on this committee thinks that a panel should report to the chief when their job is to oversee the chief i think i think it should report to the city manager thank you camion i just wanted to thank you um mr kronig for that information you just shared about uh community input as well as say that i do agree with yancey around people being impartial and um keeping things confidential if necessary especially to support community members as well as the police force i know that um last time i think it was yancey asked a question around what can community members do to actually help bridge the gap between police and the community and from the goals of a community civilian oversight board one of the number three goals is to improve public confidence in the police and i think a number of things that we've heard from den pd have been around there there's low complaints we heard that today there's fewer complaints um i think that if we had one it would increase support from the community and help bridge that gap whether we have law enforcement a part of the committee or not i don't think we've decided on that um but i just wanted to say i see this community oversight board as a way to bridge the gap between community members and police and i wondered if folks who are part of law enforcement or maybe just the chief saw or has any input around what jamie asked earlier around what would be the implications of not doing something like a civilian oversight board to help bridge the gap between community and the dpd like what do you i guess do you see an impact in not doing this that would harm further harm relations with the community we have a training advisory board that we meet with and talk with already we go in front of this i go in front of the civil service commission whenever they have questions about processes with civil service and i already present at least i can't count how many times i present presented the council in the last year on a myriad of different subject matters we produce an annual report annual use of force report um annual racial profiling report and they're all on the open data page right now as we speak so you know all those reports are out there and presenting them to council isn't going to be any more work because we do it already so like i said before my only concern is if you get a full-time monitor that doesn't have the workload for a full-time monitor what are they going to be doing and is that the most cost efficient for the citizens of denton to be paying for that in lieu of having someone that is on retainer or having a committee that i work with on an ongoing basis throughout the year jamie j-five a follow-up question do you feel like the citizen committees that you work with already are already doing enough work to help you build trust rapport and improve communication in the community do you feel like you have enough human beings doing that work with you that it or would it benefit you to have more in that army so to speak so i'll answer that by asking you a question how many people on this committee have reached out in your respective communities to help bridge the gap since you've been a part of this committee because that's what we're really missing is getting people to meet us and i could give you some examples of that but it's really going to take all of us working together and that part seems to get missed sometimes the police department can only do so much outreach we talked about that last week we can only hold so many events and show up different places we've got to have people want to come meet us you know meet me a quarter of the way not even halfway but give me a you know a show of goodwill so we can really make some good sustained change for everybody but yeah i think that we have more than enough people you look at all the leaders on this call right now in your respective communities we've got just a great city full of compassionate people it's just a matter of us working together towards the same goal all right well we're going to wrap it up for tonight and we'll be back here again next week and sarah you want to you got one more thing to say before we go no i do not okay the next meeting will be next thursday um september 17th at 6 pm and patrick will be back yes he will be all right good night everybody all right good night thank you