By Michael Bielawski,
Burlington City Councilor Melo Grant told the Morning Drive Radio show this week that the voter-approved charter change to allow an unelected police oversight body to determine penalties for officer misconduct should go forward.
“Most of what was on that ballot item was fine with everyone,” she told Monday’s audience. “We’ve had these extreme situations [incidents of police misconduct] in Burlington, they happened so there has to be recourse for that.”
In September 2018, there was an incident that put the police under new scrutiny regarding their use of force policy. The Associated Press reported that The Queen City paid $215,000 to settle a lawsuit accusing one of their officers of excessive force when he grabbed a man and slammed him to the ground, knocking him unconscious. There were a few more use-of-force incidents in previous years.
Power shifted away from the elected?
The Morning Drive’s cohost Kurt Wright, a former city councilor and state lawmaker, suggested this policy may take accountability away from the public.
“That is a dynamic shift in power to take an unelected board and give it the authority over the mayor who is an elected person,” he said. “So from a Democratic stance, I’m always concerned when unelected boards have more authority than elected ones, because then just nobody is held accountable.”
Some law enforcement are concerned now fewer officers will want to work with a city largely perceived as unsupportive.
“Why do you not believe that those police officers who are concerned about recruitment and retention and say that the charter change is going to cause a problem, why do people outside the police force know more than people inside the police force?” he said to Grant.
“Can’t trust” Police Commission?
Grant had criticism of the Police Commission, suggesting they can’t handle their workload.
“Part of the problem too is that you had members of the Police Commission who regretably keep complaining about the workload,” she said. “And I kept thinking to myself, well then just resign. If you are not up to this very important job at this time in our city, then resign.”
She suggested some trust in the Commission’s decisions.
“They need to talk to the community in a way that they have not done so that they can address the real issues, how some people in our city don’t trust their decisions and that’s a problem because we cannot afford that right now,” she said.
City Council “hostile” towards police?
A quote from a response to a survey of police revealed one officer’s perception that the City Council is currently perceived as “hostile” towards law enforcement.
“People do not want to come to work in Burlington because of Burlington, not because of the agency," it read. "The city leadership has shown themselves to be outright hostile toward law enforcement. Until that changes and very publicly changes, the staffing issue cannot be fixed.”
Grant’s reaction was to point to the new mayor, Emma Mulvaney-Stanak, as an example of the city supporting police.
“When you look at the new mayor, I don’t think that’s been the case,” Grant said. “When you look at the actions that she’s taking with regards to the funding levels and the programs that she’s trying to enact to be supportive.”
Mulvaney-Stanak however is at odds with police regarding the oversight body. She wrote, “This charter change helps ensure fair and impartial policing practices and is born out of critical community conversations about racial justice in 2020."
The author is a writer for the Vermont Daily Chronicle
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