- Yeah all set.
- We are ready, so welcome everyone.
I appreciate you taking
the time out of your day,
before this holiday weekend
to join our second part
of our Social Justice Forum.
Our quick action forums that we have been
compelled to do much
sooner than anticipated
because of some of the recent
happenings in United States.
If you don't know who I
am, my name is Rob Delaleu.
I'm the director of Multicultural
Affairs, here at Bristol.
And Melissa is my activities coordinator
and worked for Multicultural Affairs.
And we've been working diligently to try
to put together some of these forums.
And we have six of them
that are in play right now.
And we're talking to a lot
of the community members.
And this one was extremely
important after our first one,
which was the, that we
did about a month ago,
which was, it was a
powerful, powerful event.
And we will recap that in a second,
but that event it was the
standard or the driveway
for us to kind of really get
these things moving along.
Over this time period,
we were talking to business professionals,
police sergeants, community
members, national agencies,
national social justice
institutes and agencies,
to really try to bring
together these forums,
that are of tastes and create solution.
And that's what is
different than this forum.
'Cause I've been in the
last, I wanna say a month,
I've been to maybe almost
close to 20 different forums,
just to see what is happening nationally.
A lot of the forums are
discussions that are happening
and they're very, very important.
What makes us unique
and where we're starting
to get a lot of national recognition,
is as we're sitting down
with these professionals,
whether they're educators,
public servants,
we're looking to find solutions
that are going to create
a better community
and we can be the leader in doing that.
Why not us?
Correct.
So we're looking to
really implement things
and really get things
moving to help our youth,
to help our people of color,
to help our police departments,
to help our educational
institutes to get there.
And today we will have a
broad range of individuals
from the community.
There's a lot of,
so this is not just a Bristol
Community College event.
We have a lot of people
from Bristol County,
who may be affiliated
with Bristol or may not,
who will be in the audience.
We have individuals from other institutes
across the nation that
other EDU institutes
that will be partaking and
taking notes themselves.
And then we also have, many
of our brave men and women
who are law enforcement agencies
that will be part of this today as well.
And I'm excited to have them here,
as well as some of our, other agencies,
which are, work on the
social emotional components,
that we need in these that
we need in these times.
So with that said again,
I like to kind of just recap part two here
and then so we can go to the
next slide, please Melissa.
So our first Social
Justice event took place
on June 4th, 2020.
We had about 162 participants,
which was a great break for that event.
Today, we had about 143 people RSVP.
So hopefully we'll get up to that number,
but we know how things happen.
People may or may not get there.
However, this is a recorded event.
So we will, anyone who did register
will get a copy of today's event.
The forum, the reason
why we kind of jumped
into this forum ahead of time,
was because what triggered
with the death of George Floyd.
Which was something
that was caught on film
that was pretty gross
and kind of will stick
with a lot of people.
However, one thing that we did speak
about in that last forum,
we understood that even
though that it was an incident
that is awful, we know
that this is not something
and hope this is not something
that is normal to some,
but it's normal to a lot of others, okay.
And we did speak to,
we did speak about this in the last forum
and that last forum lasted about
almost four hours, it went over.
Today we won't go over.
These are forums that are,
that we're making sure this has an agenda
that we will stick to.
And we will kind of really,
and we will end right
when it's supposed to.
But if you do have any
questions and things further,
this is why this is creative,
so we can continue this conversation.
So in the last one, our participants,
they were able to share
their personal experiences,
comments and questions with the group.
It was powerful, it was
timely, it was fast.
I think we were the one of
the first in the country
to put out a forum like that.
And we did it really fast
with the work of our campus,
our president, Laura Douglas.
Who gave us the avenue to do this,
our college communications department
came together right away,
to make sure that we had the tools
that we needed to get
things on our website.
We have a pledge that's out there
that has over 700 people
from the community.
The sign that race and
discrimination and hate,
that those types of things,
racism, I said race,
but racism is not acceptable, right?
These are things that we don't want
and our college condemns that.
We want to make sure that
we have an environment
that is safe and that is
accepting to all of our students.
And it's important that that
messaging went out there.
And we were one of the first to do that.
So kudos to our team at
Bristol for making that happen.
Next slide please.
So just a quick note, just so
that we have an idea, okay.
That all these trainings
for Multicultural Affairs
Social Justice series,
are happening this summer and fall
and they are all introductory trainings.
So what does that mean?
Because they're introductory trainings,
that these will be
surface level trainings,
and we are gonna get
some more intense things
later on for each one.
So this is part two of
the Social Justice series
that we've rolled out,
but this is part one of
the Criminal Justice Race
and Policing Forum, all right.
So there will be continuations of this,
as we move on semester to semester.
So I'm excited to announce that,
and we will continue working
with many of our different
police departments in doing this.
And as our other forums,
we'll also work with professionals
within each one of those subcategories.
Additional to Police and
Criminal Justice Trainings
will be offered.
So we're looking to dive
deeper into policy, law
and specific topics.
So please stay tuned for
these as we move forward.
Next slide please.
So today's agenda.
What are we going over?
So obviously I'm speaking right now,
as you can see, we have
a panel of professionals.
We have chief of police of
Bristol Community College,
and deputy chief will speak.
chief of police from Fall
River Police Department
will speak.
Demetrice Phillips who is Sergeant
at Pittsburgh Police
Department will speak.
Justine Caverio, who's a director
at Bristol Community College.
Joseph Marshall of Veterans
Center will also speak
and Kenton Kirby, director of practice
in Center for Court
Innovation out of New York,
will also speak in today's program.
The first hour or 50 minutes,
will be really dedicated
for those individuals
to speak without any Q and A.
After that, the questions
and comments will come in
and we asked you to kindly reserve
from the comment box until then.
Even if you wanna make
a point, that's fine,
those are things are maybe
write it down and keep it.
And then when we open
questions and comments,
then you can utilize the chat box
or send private message or whatever it is,
if you would like to speak, okay.
Once I do that, I'll give you the floor.
If you can just reserve
your time to pretty short,
if you're asking a question,
maybe about two minutes per person.
You can ask multiple questions,
but I do ask for people not to dominate
the microphone as we want to hear
from many, many perspectives
as we move along in this.
So, and then at the end,
we'll go to next steps
and closing remarks.
So the next steps is you're going to see
what we've built into this program today.
You're gonna see from these professionals,
they're going do a lot of things there.
Because I think transparency is key
and something that we don't
normally see a lot of.
Even though it's open,
we don't really get that
communication sometimes
from other professional
entities around the country
and the police departments
in the community.
Sometimes even though there's supposed
to be a greater synergy
between the community
and the police departments,
you don't necessarily see
things that are out there
that can be proactive, right?
And we wanna be proactive in our,
we wanna be proactive in this fight
to creating social change.
So today you'll see from our presenters.
They're going to speak
about their experiences
and why they are doing
what they are doing.
But they're gonna talk about
what's happened in the past
or what they've done in the past.
'Cause sometimes the
community may not know this.
Then they will speak about
what they're currently doing.
And then lastly,
we'll talk about what they
plan on doing in the future.
And what's great about this.
I sat down and met with
them a couple times
over the last few months,
a few weeks, I'm sorry.
And the things that we've talked about
is like where can we go?
And how can we be transparent?
So the general public
can see what we're doing in your field
and how can that be innovative
in order to create social
real, social change.
For not only people on our campus,
but people within our
Bristol County community.
And then for also people
who may be chiming in
from areas that are
outside of our local circle
that may be able to
influence change there.
And then how did that compel me?
What compelled me to do this,
is remember in our last forum,
I did mention that we needed
to create social change
and we need to influence
our circle of influence,
whether big or small, how
do we do that to create it?
We're not gonna just talk and complain
about the things that are happening.
'Cause the things that are happening
have been happening for a long time.
So let's get ourselves to a place
where we're creating the social change
and we're making things happen.
And these fine gentlemen
that are gonna be speaking today,
once I brought this up to him,
every single one of them jumped on board
and was excited to do this.
And I think this is the norm.
There's more people that want to help,
than there are people that do not.
So, but we have to create a space
and how I'm influencing my area is,
I can create these types of
spaces, these types of forums,
so you can hear from
these great individuals
that will start talking about change
and making our world a better place.
Next slide please.
So let's begin.
In a second Melissa is gonna go over
a couple of the research
and why are we here.
And what is the point of having
the Policing, Race and
Criminal Justice Forums.
Go ahead, Melissa.
- Hi everyone, so like Rob said,
I'm just here to frame today's forum.
So we've pulled up some statistics
that show the intersection of race
and policing and why we're here today.
So as you can see,
more than eight and 10 black adults,
say that blacks are treated
less fairly than whites
by police in the criminal
justice system as a whole.
Additionally black and
African Americans believe
that they are half as likely as whites
to have a positive view of
police treatment of racial
and ethnic groups or
officer's use of force.
And when speaking about police officers,
most white Latino officers,
say that fatal encounters between blacks
and African Americans and
police are isolated incidents.
Whereas the majority of black officers
disagree with this notion.
And these are just like,
Rob and I had said,
just to frame the discussion
and to show why we are having this today
and why we need to have
conversations like this.
- So thank you, Melissa.
So when looking at social
justice forums like this,
the one thing that we wanna keep in mind,
that right now we're
looking at race relations.
It's a lot bigger because systemic racism
and all the different things
that we're talking about,
different ways of policing,
these things are,
how people are able to access help
if there's mental issues,
mental health issues,
these are things that are important.
And we wanna kind of frame that as well,
and in this conversation.
And we may go into those areas.
And we have people like
Kenton who are certified
that can really speak to that.
And some stuff that they've done
for those communities as well.
So we wanted to make sure we
covered that in doing this.
So let's begin, let's move forward.
So we wanna talk about
Bristol Community College
Police Department,
I would talk from my lens
and from my experience.
The police department here at Bristol
has been nothing but collaborative
with me and my department.
My department, I work
with students of color,
with various identities,
coming from various
neighborhoods like in Providence,
in New Bedford in Fall River, Taunton.
Some of them have grown up
in some tough situations
and there's been situations
that have happened on campus,
but the transparency was there.
I was contacted if a
student was in trouble
or needed something, or was in need.
We did collaborations with some where,
when I used to coach men's basketball,
we had a talk with, you know,
I had a student that did something
that they weren't supposed to do.
And it wasn't just a
persecution of that student.
It was like, how can we get to a place
where we're all getting along better?
These are all things that had taken place
way prior to any incident
or these types of forums.
And then today we're
gonna have to the leaders
from New Bedford police that,
I don't mean New Bedford,
I'm so sorry, from
Bristol Police to speak.
And then we'll kind of go from there.
Next slide please.
So first,
our first is our chief of police,
Bristol Community College is Mark Nataly.
And chief Nataly is married for 14 years,
five children, lifelong
Bristol County resident,
born in Fall River.
Favorite activities
and hobbies are sports,
motorcycle riding, movies and music.
Proud graduate of Bristol
Community College.
He's a Northeastern graduate as well,
and also a graduate of
Salve Regina University.
And then he's been a
police officer since 1995,
and he's been a Bristol's
chief since 2018.
Next is Baxter Smith,
and he's a deputy chief of police
at Bristol Community College.
So Baxter has been with
the Bristol for six years
and he's began working with
Campus Police Department
as a patrol officer, and
was promoted to Sergeant
and was recently promoted to deputy chief.
Baxter earned his bachelor's
and master's degree
in criminal justice from
Sacred Heart University
in Connecticut.
Outside of police work, Baxter owns
and operates his own small
landscaping business.
Enjoy spending time with
his family and friends.
He enjoys being outdoors.
Baxter loves his job as
a campus police officer
because he enjoys interactions
with students, staff and visitors.
And he believes that
working with the community
is the best way to make Bristol
a safe place to learn and work.
So welcome.
And chief Nataly and deputy chief Smith,
and the show is yours now.
- [Baxter] All right, great.
If we could put the slideshow
up, please, Melissa.
Thank you so much.
So I just would like to start with
speaking about what we have done here.
Here at the college, we
focus on community policing.
And with that being said,
that means that we are
walking around the campus
and trying to stress our instruction
with student staff and community members.
When you create those relationships,
trust is built and that
helps when officers
are dealing with a situation that staff
or student may feel more
comfortable with that officer,
because of a past positive experience
from community policing.
We also listed a few
events that we have done
in the past with the community.
We would like to continue these
and work in collaboration
with all campus partners
to get creative and build on these.
Next slide.
- Alright, good afternoon everyone.
Thank you for this opportunity,
as Baxter said we,
(clears throat)
Excuse me,
we prioritize intimate
contact with the community.
Familiarity breeds trust
and that's no secret.
He went over some of the
things that we have done,
I'll just touch upon some
of the things we are doing.
And then we'll move on to things
that we have on the schedule, if you will.
What we're gonna do in the future.
Not only do we continue to
do what we have been doing
by our community relations
and working with really every
aspect of the community,
which we do our best to do so.
I was also working with
other police departments.
I have had brief conversation
with the chief Cardoza in Fall River.
We haven't had time.
The pandemic is throwing
everyone's world upside down.
So we have not had time to really meet
and dive into things
as deeply as we'd like.
We have met with the
Multicultural Affairs Office.
And again, prior to the pandemic,
we had plans to initiate some trainings
with that department and our department,
to benefit the community here.
Other things we are doing,
obviously we continue to
take pride in activities
such as the Mobile Food Market,
things that benefit
not only our community,
but also show the outside
community, if you will,
the best that Bristol has
and what we try to do to help.
Again we are taking
part in online trainings
for the most part right now,
because quite frankly, that's
all that's available to us
during the Corona virus era.
A large part of those trainings
are diversity awareness,
some racial relation awareness trainings,
and things of this nature.
This forum is a big part of our education,
as well as the educator,
hopefully the education
of our entire community.
I've taken part in similar
forums throughout my career.
And I've seen firsthand the benefits
that come from open and
honest communication.
It's unbelievable and I have no doubt
that we're gonna improve upon
our standing practices now.
Thanks Melissa.
Next slide please.
- All right.
And here are just some points
that we are planning to do.
We are always striving to
build on the relationships
that we have already developed
by taking part in these
social justice forums,
meeting with other apartments
and clubs and student unions,
because that is how we will learn
how we can do better
and how we can become more ingrained
with our staff and our students.
We are also looking to
create social media,
to showcase all of the
events that we have done
and that we will be doing.
We are also looking to create more ways
to recruit a more diverse
pool of candidates
for our officers here at the college.
And at the end of this,
we want you guys to help us,
tell us what we can do to be better,
because that's why we are here.
We're here to serve the college,
and that's why we all work here.
I appreciate the time.
- [Rob] Thank you.
Am I un-muted, good.
So thank you guys for that.
And you'll have a lot of
time after to ask questions
to both Baxter Smith and
to chief Nataly as well.
So if we can go onto the
next slide, please Melissa.
So our next guest is chief of police
of Fall River Police
Department is Jeffery Cardoza.
Chief Cardoza has been with
the policing for over 30 years.
He has a masters in Public Administration.
He's a graduate of the
FBI National Academy.
He's a graduate at the
Senior Management Institute
for Police.
Also a graduate
for the Law Enforcement
Executive Development Program.
A couple of other things I'd like to add,
just moving this thing here.
City of Fall River Police Department,
some of the things that that
we know of the department,
that they got 221 sworn officers,
approximately 75,000 calls
for service every year.
In 2019, there was a 2,520
physical arrests in Fall River.
And then 2019 as well, there were 125,
a use of force reports completed.
And chief could probably,
we'll explain that a little
bit more moving forward.
So I'd like to welcome chief of police,
of Florida police, Jeffrey Cardoza.
Chief you are on mute.
(Rob laughs)
Still on mute.
- Rob, can you hear me now?
Can you hear me, Rob?
Okay, hang on I can't hear you.
Can you hear me?
- We can ear you now.
- My apologies I don't know,
I'm not a very tech savvy
guy, so my apologies Rob.
Thank you for giving me
this opportunity to present
and talk and answer some questions
at this very important program.
And I just wanna say before
I get into the next slide,
that it's a, I want to
echo what chief Nataly said
that I also believe that communication
and getting people in the
same room and forums like this
is what's the big thing
that's gonna solve a lot of these issues.
Melissa, could you put up the
first slide for me please?
Rob, can you hear me?
- Yes we can, I'm on mute, so yeah,
we can definitely hear you, so-
- Okay, alright.
I just wanna get into,
talk a little bit about,
some of the good things that we've had
as far as in the past and the present.
And I think it's important
that we mention being CALEA certified.
We've had that distinction since 2009.
And CALEA stands for the,
Committee on Accreditation
for Law Enforcement Agencies.
And it's the next nationally
recognized process
that requires an agency to
follow the best practices.
We are one in 600 that are
certified in the country,
in this 18,000 war enforcement agencies
in the United States,
so that's important to mention.
The next bullet,
I mentioned that we're
also state certified.
That's something that we a lot of agencies
first we'll get state certified
and then they'll move on to
the national certification,
so we have that as well.
I feel comfortable saying
that I don't believe
there's any systemic racism
in the police department.
I shouldn't, we have some
constraints about implicit bias,
but that's something I'll
talk about a little bit later.
Rob and I've talked about
this a couple of times.
We haven't been, we've
been training officers
at our yearly inservice
training, not to use chokeholds.
They've been told not to do that,
not to do any type of
restriction on anyone's neck
or in that area.
And we've also been
talking about intervention
that officers have an
obligation to intervene.
If they see another
officer doing something,
whether it's verbal or it's
physical, that's improper,
or it has a force issue to intervene
and stop that from happening.
We've always required
written use of force reports
whenever an officer uses a force.
And we will always follow
the Massachusetts Police
Training Council Guidelines.
The use of force reports.
When a use of force report is completed,
it goes through Sergeant hands,
it goes through a Lieutenant hands,
it goes to a Captain hands,
it goes to a deputy chief hands,
and then ultimately it goes to me.
And then from there, it
goes to what's called
our Office of Professional Standards.
Now I bring that up because
I just want to stress
that they are thoroughly vetted.
It's something that we take very serious.
Also, complaints against officers
or civilian staff in a building
can be made in numerous ways.
We've had people that call
and they do it over the phone.
You can do it in writing,
you can do it via email.
And I just think it's
important to have that
because some people aren't
comfortable actually
coming in here and may
or may not wanna do that.
Or may wanna meet someone
from professional standards,
in another location,
we certainly would be
okay with doing that.
And then something,
since I became a chief
a couple of months ago,
I think it's important to mention is,
I've been stressing since day one,
because I truly believe this in my heart
that we are guardians
and we're not warriors.
And I think we need to act that way.
And to instill that
mindset in each officer
in this building.
Whether it's the deputy chiefs under me,
or it's the most junior officer,
we are guardians not warriors.
So they've been hearing,
I think they're probably
sick of hearing it from me,
but they've been hearing that from me
every day since I was
able to become chief.
Could I have the next slide, Melissa.
So some of the things that we're doing now
that I think are some pretty good stuff.
I talked about how we train
not to use chokeholds,
we're actually gonna put it in.
We're in the process right now
of putting it in our use of Force Reports.
So I'm sorry I used of Force Policy.
It's gonna specifically
say that chokeholds
and any type of pressure
on the neck is his banned.
We're also going to put in writing
that we require intervention
by any officer at the scene.
And if determination is made
that an officer did not intervene,
doesn't have to be the officer necessarily
that's involved in the incident.
It could be a backup officer
just pulling up on the scene.
It could be a supervisor, it could be me.
If we fail to intervene,
then we're gonna be held
accountable for that
and be disciplined.
Where we had some language in our policy
about not shooting at moving cars,
but we're gonna tighten it up,
where we're gonna completely ban it
unless a firearm is being
shot from the vehicle.
I surely hope that doesn't happen,
but we have a little caveat to that.
And then we're adding in
providing a verbal warning.
If feasible during a
lethal force incident,
there are some circumstances
where an officer
might not be able to do
that, but if they are too,
we're certainly going to
encourage them to do that.
And then we're going to
something I'm pretty proud of,
and Rob and I talked about this at length
and he actually was at the last forum.
We're gonna be
participating in more forums
with what I call officer of panels.
We had a very diverse
panel last week Rob, right?
And we're going to, a lot
of people in the audience
talked about wanting to
be able to ask questions
of a panel that has mostly white officers.
So we're gonna do that.
I'm gonna put together a group
that has some officers who are a young,
new, feeling new to the job.
And I also have some officers
who have been on the job for awhile.
Just to move now, some of my concerns,
some of the things that
I wanna move forward too,
that I think are important for
not only the organization here,
but for the community
and for building these
relationships and these reports,
so we can move on from this.
I want to address and accept
that there's probably some implicit bias
in the organization.
We're gonna have some training with that,
reaching out to different
people to do that.
The big thing that I'm
concerned about is diversity.
I recognize that we don't
have enough diversity
in the building,
and we're gonna put
together a recruitment team
that I hope to be able,
to have to go to the local high schools.
Go to Bristol Community
College, go to UMass Dartmouth,
go to Roger Williams and
walk some of the kids
through what our
organization is all about,
our professionalism, the good stuff,
but also be able to have to take questions
and talk about some of the bad stuff
that comes with policing.
And the one of the key
components to this is
getting some feedback at
some of the demonstrations
and talking to some of the kids who may
or may not be interested
and kind of on the fence,
whether they would want to
come into a career like this.
How does the process work?
How do they get chosen?
And a lot of the kids didn't know,
the young adults didn't know that,
we're a civil service organization.
It's not just a white chief deciding
if he's going to take a black officer.
It's, of course I would if
the person was qualified,
but there's a examination
and there is a list.
And we draw off that list.
And there's not a lot of
room for deviation from that.
So I think it's important that
the kids hear that exactly
how to go through that process.
Improving communication with the public.
We're doing it now, we're
gonna continue to do it.
I'm gonna participate in
every forum that I can,
we're gonna have more
panels than they are.
And I've got one company
at the end of the month,
and I'm certainly looking forward to that
comprehensive deescalation training.
And we do do some deescalation training,
but this is something
that I had the opportunity
to learn a lot about.
There are departments around the country
and around the world, quite frankly,
that are doing it better than
I think we're doing it here.
There's more emphasis
on a tactical retreat,
if you will, or stepping
back for a moment,
slowing down the process
as to what's going on
and using your communication skills,
if it's at all feasible.
So that's something that I wanna work on.
Transparency, we've talked
about this at the panels.
I'm gonna continue to talk about it.
If we make a mistake,
my philosophy is to say
that we made a mistake
and we're going to start putting
some of our policies on the website,
so people can see what that's all about.
And then one of the big
changes that's coming up,
and it's something that Mayor Coogan,
has been working towards,
is he creating a Body
Worn Camera pilot program.
So we're not gonna go into this too fast,
where we're gonna overnight
have the officers,
every officer in the building
start carrying a camera.
Because there are a two
party consent issues
with recording in the State.
And there are privacy issues.
So we're putting together
a policy with a panel
that will involve various
segments of the community.
And we're gonna come up with a policy
that's gonna work.
And we're gonna start having
some of the officers here,
wear those body cameras,
and hopefully in the near
future, we'll be able to outfit
each and every officer with one of those.
The simulator, we, years ago,
we had a simulator where
that puts people through
if you're not familiar with it,
scenarios that you don't know are coming.
So an officer or it could
be anyone from the community
is provided a gun belt, a mock firearm.
And it may just be a
scenario where someone
who's having some type
of a emotional issue,
or it could be a scenario where someone
stepping out of the car
and you gotta use deadly force God forbid.
But no officer wants to do that,
but we're going to bring
the simulator back.
And we're in the process
right now of having
that particular software updated.
And my thoughts are once we get there
to start putting some
people in the public,
or in education or wherever it may be,
maybe Rob go through
some people you recommend
and just get a sense of the stress
that comes with comes along
with simulation training.
A couple of things I want to mention,
that might not be specific to our topic,
but I still think
they're important is that
I'm working on trying to have
a full time recovery coach
actually embedded in
the police department.
I'm really looking forward to this.
We're in the process of trying
to secure some of the funding
and that person will be,
actually having an office
in here in the building
and work some nights work some days
and work with the officers,
go on the street and deal
with some addiction issues
if you will and get
referrals from the officer.
So we're looking forward to that.
And then the next project
on my agenda would be to try
to get some of a social worker.
We respond to about 1200
mental health calls a year.
I think it's an important issue.
And I think the reason I
bring it up today is that
sometimes officers get involved
in use of force incidents with someone
who may be having a mental health issue,
and we don't need to do that.
So we need to get some training.
We need to get some people in here
that can help us with that.
We're gonna attach our,
as I mentioned earlier,
our use of force and our
racial profiling policy
to our website.
We're going to improve
how to make a complaint
against an officer or a civilian.
I mentioned the recruitment unit
and Rob and I talked
about this the other day,
and I'm hoping like I got
his full support on it,
but I love to see the
creation of a Police Academy.
I know what's been talked about it.
The administration at the college
has some interest in that.
And I just think it's a great
way to get everybody involved
with working with those future
police officers for 22 weeks
and molding them and
creating that guardian,
that guardian versus warrior mindset.
Mellisa could you go to the next slide?
Okay.
- That is all I had from you.
- That's okay.
I didn't know a few,
and I'll certainly talk
about it if you don't mind.
I just wanna mention the governor.
I know a lot of people have
been asking me questions
over the last few weeks as to,
where is this gonna
go, as far as law goes,
and I've only seen some material related
to proposed laws in the
state that may come up.
And I think it's just important
to mention that the certification process,
I think as I'm reading
it is extremely strict.
If it's passed, if that's the
direction that it goes in,
I think it's gonna have a
significant impact if you will,
on officer conduct.
So thank you.
- Thank you, chief.
I really appreciate it.
Over the last couple of weeks,
I've attended a few things with the mayor
and one of them was the Police Panel.
And hearing the honesty
from some of the police
officers was a great thing.
And I think it's really kind of framing,
how positive the police department
and this chief is moving forward.
So thank you chief for doing that.
And there will be some
opportunities for questions
a little later on.
Moving to the next piece.
And for the next couple of
speakers are a little different.
There's a little crossover in education.
There's a crossover education and policing
and military and so on and so forth.
So we would like for the next person
who will be Demetrice Phillips,
who is also a friend of mine.
Demetrice is also a
Municipal Police Sergeant
and Adjunct Business Faculty member
at Bristol Community College.
I guess I was speaking so fast.
Demetrice is again currently
with the police department in Fitchburg.
And he's also an Adjunct
Business Faculty member
at Bristol Community College.
Demetrice holds a Bachelor in
Science in Criminal Justice.
A Master's in Administration
with a concentration in Management
and is currently completing
his Doctor of Business
Administration dissertation.
Demetrice has 15 years
of experience in policing
and has worked at a
university police officer
and is currently a
Municipal Police Sergeant.
Additionally, Demetrice has five years
of full time experience of having
been an assistant professor,
in the Business Administration Department
here at Bristol Community
College until this past spring.
Demetrice is a family man
and enjoy spending time
with his wife and four children.
Demetrice seeks to serve and help others,
as his mentors has helped him.
So the floor is yours Demetrice.
- Are you on?
- Everybody hear me okay?
- [Rob] Yes.
- Welcome everybody.
Rob you make me sound really
special in that introduction.
So I appreciate that.
One of the things that I like to do,
is speak from a personal level.
I can't speak from the department level
because that's not not where
I am, that's not my position.
As a police Sergeant, I'm
a middle line management.
So I wanna speak more about who I am
and why I joined this panel.
I think this panel is
incredibly important.
And I like to preference this,
that yes I am a police officer
and I love being a police officer.
But I'm also an African American male
and there's two sides to that.
And I think oftentimes what has to happen
for minority officers
inside police departments,
is for chiefs or whoever are in command
of the police department,
is allow an opportunity for
a space for minority officers
to really talk about their experience.
Because I feel like when
I'm working, I'm in uniform,
I'm being perceived as one way.
But when I take my uniform off,
there's some things I have encountered
that didn't go the way that I
thought it should have went.
And I think race was a factor
in the reason why it did it.
I like to say that for the most part,
all people are good, right.
There's a select few number of officers
in police departments
and society in general,
who do bad things,
but that's just a small number of people
who are doing these things.
But also think about
what's more important,
is for police chiefs to create this forum
for minority officers to get together
and talk about their experiences.
Because it's all about what
I think about perspectives,
I created this class
for, Hanrahan Consulting.
Named Justin Hanrahan,
again, Hanrahan Consulting.
I created a class for him
and he trains police
officers to get promoted.
And I created a class for him
and the class is essentially called
Understanding Cultural Norms.
And we really go to understanding
different people's perspectives.
Because again, I think once
you sit down with people,
you understand who they are,
maybe you are either
up to either judge them
or to do something wrong against them,
because you understand who they are.
So I think the biggest thing
is understanding people's perspectives.
And this is why I think this forum
that we're doing here is awesome.
Because we're doing exactly that,
understanding different
people's perspective.
I wanna add more,
but I wanna add it maybe more at the end.
So again, I want to speak
more from a personal level.
So Rob, that's all I
got from me right now.
- Thank you so much Demetrice.
Next on the agenda is Justin Caverio.
- Yes, hi.
Can you hear me?
- [Rob] Yep.
- Alright.
- Want me to go over your bio?
I know you're ready to go.
- You don't need to, I'll do the intro.
- All right, the bio is up
if everybody wants to read it
and we'll get to Justin.
We are a couple of minutes behind,
so that I'll be able to help
us with some of the time.
- Right, so I'm Justin Caverio,
Director at the Bristol
Community College our
Veterans Center here at
the Fall River Campus.
21 years on active duty military,
U.S. Marine Corps, four years.
And the rest, Massachusetts
Army National Guard.
Three deployments,
happened to be retired in January 2020,
retired for good.
So I'll tell you this, my perspective.
And I'll also start this
with letting you know
that I don't represent
the view of all veterans.
I'm not big on boxes,
so I can tell you my
perspective as a veteran.
And I think I'm more
than qualified to share
that with my time in service.
So, what happened in
Minneapolis, George Floyd,
there's really no debate, it was wrong.
Anyone that seen the video,
I don't know really anyone
that I've talked to,
that could debate that
it was right or wrong.
So that being said,
the current administration
came on television.
And this is where I share
my view as a veteran,
came on television and announced that,
if the governors in different States
didn't do what they were supposed to do,
basically, if they couldn't handle it,
he was going to intervene and
get the military involved.
And I gotta tell you, when I saw that
and a way that it was delivered,
'cause delivery means a lot.
It was just that in everyone I know
that is a veteran like me,
that I've talked to, just winced at that.
And just looked and was like, what,
what is this?
And why would you present it in this way?
It was, I guess you
could say uncomfortable
to say the least and yeah,
I disagree with it whole wholeheartedly.
And then you have,
that's why you have top generals
that also disagreed with it
and came right out and spoke against that.
You don't plot your own people
against your own people.
Most National Guard members,
I can speak, it's pretty
close to home for me.
National Guard, I served
in there from 2001 to 2020
to present day.
And most National Guardsmen,
join that particular
organization to defend our home,
to help people in times of snowstorms
and blizzards and hurricane.
Hurricane Michael, I
went down there during,
down to Alabama and Florida in 2018.
So these are the guys
that are getting called
up to for COVID-19.
We have approximately a little
over 30 students at Bristol
that are National Guard members,
that we call them weekend warriors.
But when it comes down to it,
a good number of them got
called to active duty,
to state active duty by the governor,
to handle this COVID-19 pandemic.
And to be at the test sites,
Gillette Stadium was a
big one and then all over.
And these guys are leaving their families
to actually be there for our citizens.
So these are the guys that
are actually standing up
and helping us.
To put their lives and their
safety on the line like that,
and to utilize them as to
weaponize them is just wrong.
If you could hang on one second for me.
I can't unplug that, I
don't wanna lose power here.
So our own students,
National Guard members,
and they're the ones being called up.
And everybody knows somebody,
if not an immediate family member,
but everyone knows somebody
that is in the National Guard or reserves,
or was in the military, an uncle even,
if it's not immediate family
or hey, if you know me or someone else,
then you know somebody that was in it,
And most of these people are good people.
I echo everything that
Demetrice said earlier,
some great points.
So that's my perspective.
I did this because I wanted
to support and help people.
That's why I did my time in there.
I mean, we have a common struggle.
I have kids, I have sons
that I want to see safe
and nobody likes what's going on.
There is really no debate,
it's a right or wrong.
And anyone that doesn't think that,
I'd have to disagree with them.
I was talking to one
of my closest friends,
a little over a week ago.
And I'm saying, now my friend Brian,
he's eyes from Trinidad a
little over I think 20 years,
in a Boston Police Department.
We deployed three times together,
to various places in the world.
And he said, yeah, what's
going on in Boston?
Are they throwing stuff at you guys?
I know you work in the protest details.
And he says, yeah a little bit,
the other night, not too bad last night,
I'm hoping to get up, get
off tomorrow so I can,
go downtown there's a protest I wanna do.
Go down there and do my civic duty,
I'm gonna be a part of that.
So here you have different people
that are in different
roles and it's so true.
But it's a common struggle
and it's really a common
sense thing, it really is.
And I think that we just have to be there
for each other and support one another.
And if it doesn't make
sense, it doesn't make sense.
That's my quick 2 cents on that.
As from my lens, my perspective,
I'm happy to answer any
questions afterwards
and give you more of what I
think in my point of view.
- Thank you Justin, I appreciate that.
It's very, very important
to get these perspectives.
If you guys are looking, audience looking
how we're connecting, we're going from,
the police component of how policing
and race relations are built.
And so we got it from
high ranking police chiefs
and officers.
And then we look from the
black male perspective
of being a police officer
and navigating through this as well.
And then we have the military component
and educational component of Demetrice,
and also Justin here,
and then that kind of really ties in.
So as we are educators
that are built into this,
we are looking at different ways
that we can impact
change and develop things
that can help us,
especially when speaking
with our students.
A lot of times over the last,
I just did a couple of trainings.
One training I did last week,
we were little,
we feel like we're walking
on eggshells sometimes.
And how can we do that?
Well, these are components
that hopefully will get us to a space
where we're able to have a conversations
that are a little bit
more comfortable for us.
And hopefully we're able to answer
some of those questions today.
So I'm excited about our next guest,
is our special guests
from the city of New York
and it's Ken Kirby.
And he has a LCSW
completed master's degree,
in Social Work from New
York University in 2011.
Also nearly 15 years of
experience in the field,
Mr. Kirby previously worked as Foster Care
and Child Welfare with ACS Administration
for Children's Services,
as well as forensic social worker
throughout the New York
State court system.
Mr. Kirby has worked
as an adjunct lecturer,
with Long Island University
and Brooklyn College,
and has a wide array of
experience providing individual
and group therapy to those with
complex mental health needs
and sex offender, parenting
and drug treatment program.
Currently, Mr. Kirby is
the Director of Practice
at the Center for Court Innovation.
The Center for Court Innovation,
seeks to create a more fair, effective
and humane justice system.
In his previous role
as Director of Clinical
and Trauma Support Services
at Neighbors in Action
and Operating Project of the center.
Mr. Kirby was one of the
founders in developing,
and the implementation of
Make it Happen Program.
Funded through the OVC,
which is the Office of Victims of Crime,
Make it Happen is a revolutionary
and nationally recognized program model,
which provides mentorship,
intensive case management,
clinical interventions
and supportive workshops
to young men of color ages, 16 to 24,
who have been impacted by violence.
Through a trauma informed and
culturally competent approach,
participants are challenged to think about
how their definition of
manhood is intertwined
in trauma and the implications
that has on stereotypical gender roles.
Mr. Kirby has presented at
a number of local, national
and international conferences on success
of Make it Happen Program.
Make it Happen Program's
approach to trauma, healing
and advocacy for victims.
Through expansion and pilots,
Make it Happen is now participating,
in a number of inter agency collaborations
to integrate this model into
other parts of New York City
and across the country,
utilizing the program's trauma toolkit,
which you got the link is there.
Kenton was awarded the
Emerging Leader Award
and National Association
of Social Workers,
in New York City's Chapter.
And was the Community Impact Award
by Urban Justice Center in 2017.
Most reasonably Kenton was awarded
the 2019 Advocate of New York City Award
for the Mayor's Office to end domestic
and gender based violence.
So I would like to welcome
a good friend of mine,
Kenton Kirby.
- Hey everybody, thank you for that Rob.
Rob forgot to mention that
I was one of his teammates
and (laughs)
And he definitely sure
was one of the few guys
that would give me the ball.
So I appreciate you Rob.
(laughs)
So I wanna say, thank you
guys so much for having me
be a part of this really,
really important compensation.
And a number of things like
resonated with me from home.
You guys were talking about,
from really about we're here to listen.
I forgot one of the offices mentioned,
we're trying to be
guardians and not warriors.
These are things that are
really resonated with me,
because in my role,
where I've been working out
for the number of years,
for the past couple of years,
we've been looking at violence and healing
and everything like that
from a preventative lens.
So I want to talk about,
so when I worked at our
project Neighbors in Action,
that was mentioned in the bio,
I was running the Make it Happen program.
But the Neighbors in Action project,
was one of our projects that
wasn't quotes connected.
All of our other projects,
at the Center for Court Innovation,
were all kind of tethered
is within the court system.
This project was one of our only ones
that was community based,
and we were housed in
Crown Heights, Brooklyn.
And we actually opened up a few years
after the three days of unrest or riots,
whatever folks want to
use in Crown Heights,
after the death of Gavin Cato,
a little 11 year old boy was killed.
And let the three days rise
between the two communities,
which is Afro Caribbean community
and the Orthodox Jewish
community in that neighborhood
and that community.
So we thought we were gonna
move into that neighborhood
and just kind of do disaster relief.
Kind of get in there and kind of support,
like kind of mediate conflicts
between the both sides of community.
And we started noticing
that it wasn't that.
there were other things
that were coming up.
School, social workers,
we walk into our doors and say,
we're having issues with some
of the young people here.
We need a program, we
don't have the resources.
So then we would do a
rites of passage program
for the young men in the schools.
We would have people come
through us, door front
and say, you know what,
I'm having this conflict with a neighbor
over medical equipment
that they're renting out.
And it's actually really funny story.
This woman comes in,
she's complaining about
this community member
that she rented a wheelchair out to.
And she needed us to kind
of mediate the conflict
to get her money back.
So we have her and the
person that owes her money,
sit down together and
we're talking through it
and come to find out she
was renting out this seat.
He ordered three weeks of pay,
for the rental of the
wheelchair, it was six bucks.
She was charging him $2 a week.
And so we're like, we'll
just pay you the six bucks.
She goes, no, I want him to pay me.
So we would have like mediations,
like the range from that to say,
one woman coming to our office
and saying that her son,
she lost his son to gun violence.
And she doesn't know what to do.
So with our brain trust
and inside our project,
using the Center of Court Innovation,
that's out like arching
agency doing the research,
we actually found a model
called cure violence.
I'm not sure if many of you
guys are familiar with it,
but it's actually a public health approach
to looking at, to dealing
with gun violence.
It was developed in
Chicago by a epidemiologist
named Gary Slutkin.
And so whether you look at his,
so you look at gun violence
as a disease that can spread.
So one shooting can
relate to the next thing,
lead to the next.
And so What's the medicine for it?
So for us, we hire
folks from the community
who have social currency,
maybe at some point in their lives,
they were the person that was
causing a lot of the harm,
but they have now turned
their lives around.
Maybe they've been caught,
they have cycled through
the system themselves.
Be it by being by being incarcerated,
and now they're back home.
Now their social currency
place has a little more weight
when it comes to speaking
to the young people
who are currently
involved in gun violence.
So what happens?
So I'm gonna try to be
as quick as possible.
'Cause I wanna get folks to like the,
question answer period,
but our, what we call him
a credible messengers.
When we first opened up in
Crown Heights, Brooklyn in 2010,
the shootings in our
catchment area went down 40%.
And so the model worked.
And so now we've expanded to like 23 sites
across New York City.
All five boroughs, have
some upstate New York.
And it's really, it's a
model that really works.
And it's not necessarily
working collectively with law enforcement,
it's just like Baxter says,
we're going into the same room.
We both wanna have the same end result.
We wanna end this and
challenging the community,
but we go going through a different door.
And so our community,
our interaction with the local precinct
is really more just like, okay,
you see our team out there,
they're wearing their jackets to swag.
They may be talking to someone that is,
you know, that you may have your eyes on,
but let them do their job.
But we're also not gonna get
in the way of your job either.
So for years, we were doing this,
work is going well, the
number is coming down.
But what we noticed was,
there were guys we take
the guns out the hands,
and then the guy is telling us,
I haven't slept in three weeks,
I've been drinking
myself until I pass out.
So that's the only way I can get to sleep.
I'm smoking excessively.
So that's where we came in.
We found some funding to
launch a therapeutic program
for boys and men of color
impacted by violence.
And these are young folks that typically
wanna walk in through your
outpatient mental health clinic.
Because a lot of times, historically,
because of systemic racism,
because of the fact that any kind of help
and support for black and brown bodies,
are usually tethered to
some kind of punishment.
Here's this help,
if you don't take this help,
here's the stick that's
gonna come down on you,
if you don't take this help.
So how do you build trust there?
So we were completely voluntary program
working alongside the
trauma interactive program,
providing the mental services,
not necessarily coming to the clinic
and sitting down with us.
We were bringing intervention out to you,
sitting down with our
young people in a park,
walking around a block with a guy.
And let's just having the
conversation in their community.
Trained clinicians,
actually doing this work.
And it really kind of shifted
how mental health really trying to shift
what mental health work looks like.
It doesn't have to be this
ivory tower kind of approach.
It can really be collaborative, right,
and completely voluntary for our folks.
And we've had quite a bit of success.
And some of the things that will come up
for a lot of our young people was,
yeah, the violence that they felt,
was the interpersonal violence
within that communities
and difference like sets and clicks
that they were having challenges with.
But the stuff that really
resonated with them,
was their police interactions.
The site, they say they see an officer
and they don't know whether or not
that interaction is gonna lead to them
being stopped, frisked and detained.
And then, or it's gonna be something
that's the passing in
passing kind of experience.
I mean, I have tons of stories,
where I worked with a young man
who was a victim of gun violence,
and I'm treating him in his house.
He's has serious PTSD in his house,
can't even leave his home.
I'm doing it in his house
every week with him.
And one day he's out
in front of his block,
which is a heavily policed neighborhood.
'Cause obviously some
things cause you know,
it's one of those heavily
policed neighborhoods.
And cops pop out of the car
and pull guns out on folks,
and this is a kid, who
had just had been shot
a number of times.
And no one is considering
the trauma response
that this kid is having to it.
So what did he do?
He runs, right?
'Cause last time he got
shot, he didn't run.
So it doesn't matter who was
pointing a gun out on him.
And if you think about a learning brain
versus a survival brain,
like a trauma brain,
trauma brain can't take in information,
trauma brain is just about
tryin', tryin' survive.
So if I pull a gun out on
you or some kind of weapon
or whatever pose a threat,
I'm out, I'm gonna do what
I need to do to survive.
So there's two, and then I
worked with so many folks
that have kind of had that outlook,
people living with this trauma brain,
but folks have this expectation
that they have this learning brain,
which can take in information.
And I think that has been something
that we've been working
on with our young people,
like kind of helping them understand,
listen, this is a normal thing to have.
This trauma brain is a normal thing
for you to have right now,
because of all the stuff
you've been through.
Let's start working on doing this.
Let's start putting this stuff,
let's start scaffolding
things around yourself
and then do these things.
Okay, how do you physically feel,
when a threat comes?
when you assess a threat?
So this is stuff that
we've been trying to do
on our end with our young people.
Giving them this like the resources
that they can use internally.
But understanding that I can't
guarantee them full safety.
I can tell a guy, you listen,
when you walk down the street,
a young black man with a hoodie,
people may proceed to
make perceptions of you.
So I'm up coming with my
guys on the route one day
we're like, when you walk down
streets pull your pants up,
make sure you make sure you
don't look a certain way.
She was walking down the street,
we're in Bristol, Brooklyn,
coming in a group,
you got to stop and frisk.
He's freaking out on the phone calling me
after he got after the experience.
And he's like, Ken, I'm
not coming to group.
I'm like what happened?
He goes, I got stopped.
And he's like,
they said I looked like
I was tucking a gun.
He's like, I pulled my
pants up like you told me.
And I think in that moment I realized,
I can't guarantee you full safety.
I can only give you the tools you need
to kind of get as best,
to be as safe as possible.
So that's in short,
what we've been doing here in Brooklyn
with the violence prevention work
and the therapeutic we're
kind of tether with it.
And we're also doing, we also
offer technical assistance
nationally around various things.
Through our court based projects
or community based work that we're doing.
We're doing a lot of Placemaking,
in the local public housing
developments here in New York,
like 15 of them.
We're doing like placemaking projects,
where we're like doing
cleanups in neighborhoods,
we're doing, in one of the projects,
in one of the housing
projects were doing coding,
we are run coding classes
for some of the kids.
So now we understand like
now you have something
that like, coding is a
big thing now, right?
Everything is apps and technology.
So we're trying to give
our community members
as many resources as possible.
But at the same time understanding,
there's an unsafe world out there.
And for many of them, for
many of our young people,
the threat is the law
enforcement interactions
that they have.
They can navigate those conflicts
that they have with different,
within the interpersonal
and within different crews on
sets and everything like that.
But the one thing that's been,
this is just their language.
My biggest stressor is
interaction with law enforcement.
So I'll leave it at that.
I know we're kind of behind schedule.
So I'm going to stop there.
- Actually, thank you so much Ken.
Could you explain real quick,
just 'cause I think with some
of the law enforcement officers in this,
the project that's
happening out of Jersey,
that we spoke briefly about
and some of the tactics
that are used in order,
so maybe people can hear
and impact their areas
wherever they may be.
- Oh, the Camden, the
Camden model of policing.
I think someone mentioned
the guardian, not warrior.
Most, I think I can show you
guys are familiar with it.
But one of the things I
found really interesting was,
in Camden, New Jersey,
it's like nine miles long
and it's not very big.
And I was like what they were doing.
They were taking a truck for money
that they would get
from like drug seizures
and like bought ice cream trucks.
And so they want ice cream trucks
and they would go, the
police would go to like areas
that are hot labeled hotspots
and just give out ice cream.
So it wasn't even like
they were like there,
they would, if they were in the area
where things were
happening, but there were,
it was a reframing of
kind of why we're here.
You know, we're here, but
we giving ice cream out.
We're doing this other thing,
but you know, we're here.
So like it was real,
I found that really, really interesting.
I know here in New York we have
our neighborhood community officers
that we work with really closely.
And we're trying to like, you know,
bridge that gap between both sides,
but we're also as service providers,
we have to be humble and say,
it's gonna take a long time
for us to rebuild that trust.
'Cause we did, we call it
we've caused so much harm.
And I can say that as a
licensed social worker,
therapist, person that
worked in child welfare,
I can say I caused harm and I
know I need to rebuild trust
and it doesn't take three months of it.
It takes years.
It may, I may not even
be the work anymore,
before we fully get to that place.
So I think that's really,
it's very important for us as providers
to really just humble ourselves and say,
historically, there's been a
lot of stuff going on here.
So how do we, what do we need to do?
And it's not always just saying,
you tell us what we need to do.
We 'cause a lot of these problems.
So some of it needs to really fall on us,
to really be part of the solution.
- So yeah, thank you so
much, I appreciate that.
So my last message kind of,
I was one person was talking to me
and I was answering that and that.
So if anyone has a question or a comment
that they like to make, as
we're moving into this part now,
please feel free to do so.
And if you just put in
comment or you put in,
you put in a comment
or you put in question,
I will ask you to do that.
And then I will call on you
in order as it comes through.
Some of you, if you
also are not comfortable
with asking a question,
you want me to read,
you can send me either a private
message to ask the question
which will be confidential.
Or you can just write the question in
and I can read it out for you as well.
I know some people are not
as comfortable in doing this.
Thank you again.
I think on Kenton's part is
very valuable as saying like,
these are some of the tactics
of bridging these gaps
that we talk about, right.
So how do we bridge these race relations?
Well, there's a lot of social workers
and therapists and that
dude that does this work.
I do the work as well within the centers
that we have at Bristol
and working with a lot of our populations.
And I think these are all
different little components
that we can start developing solutions
as we move as we move forward.
So let's begin with the comments,
Shanna Howell, actually, Michael Tarr,
if you have a comment.
- [Michael] Hey what's up coach.
- [Rob] Hey, how is it going Michael?
- [Michael] I just had a quick comment
for the chief of the police
department, if I could.
Back when he said that he doesn't believe
that there's any systematic
racism in the city,
because I know even though,
I happen to be a white male,
I grew up in a very mixed family.
So I've seen both sides of that.
And I mean, I have some stories
that I'm not gonna share here,
because I discussed that,
I didn't really wanna comment,
but I just, I don't know.
It's weird because to say
none, but I've, I've seen it.
(Michael laughs)
Like I've seen it.
I'm like, yeah.
- Absolutely.
Now, thank you for that Chief.
- So actually what I mentioned,
I didn't mention the city as a whole.
I mentioned that I didn't think
we had a systemic problem in the FRPD.
I'm not gonna suggest that
issues haven't come up
because they have.
I can tell you that I'm not
aware of any significant issue
in probably the last 25 years.
Now, there may be something
that I'm not aware of.
I'm also a realist.
And all I can tell you is
what I have from my experience
here in this organization.
But I strongly encourage everyone.
I want to know, I need to know.
And if something comes
up, I'm telling you,
I'm here to listen.
I need to, if there's a
problem in my organization,
it needs to be eradicated
or weeded out if you will.
So I wanna hold the officers accountable.
And quite frankly, the feedback
that I've gotten from the
officers that work with me,
they wanna hold, those
who don't honor the oath
that they talk to the community.
They wanna hold them
as accountable as well.
So I'm sure you've experienced it.
I just haven't seen anything
of a significant nature
in our organization for
probably about 25 years.
- Thank you chief, appreciate that.
- You are muted Rob.
- [Rob] I am sorry.
I clicked it twice.
Thank you Chief for that.
And I think that's a
pointed question, Mike,
thank you for that comment and question.
I think what chief is saying is important
because I think systemic racism
or policy issues or
things that might be there
maybe from being viewed
from different eyes.
Especially if we're an employer,
to the employee to a person of color,
there's just different
things that may affect.
And I think what's great
about this space right now.
We're looking at ways to
connect with one another
and be able to kinda solve
some of the problems.
And then chief, that's
powerful that he says,
he may not recognize things,
but please let him know so
he can help his department.
Next comment is from Shanna Howell.
- I put a comment, but
I also have a question.
- Okay.
- First of all,
I wanna, can you hear me?
Okay.
Let me introduce myself.
I'm Shanna Howell, I'm the
Dean of the New Bedford Campus
for Bristol Community College.
I first of all, wanna thank
all of the law enforcement
officers and chiefs
that are here, because
this is very brave of you,
to put yourself out there
and to receive questions and comments,
especially in the environment
that we're currently living in.
So kudos to all of you
for taking this time
to take these questions and these answers,
and be vulnerable and innocent.
So I really appreciate that.
I wanna also want to thank
my colleague, Justin,
you really clarify something with me,
as far as the Army National Guard.
I really didn't know what their job was.
A lot of times when you see them,
it's for these types of events
that there's a quote unquote riot,
and they've been sent out for that.
So it's kind of nice to know,
what their actual responsibilities are.
But my question can be posed
to the law enforcement individuals,
that we have here, as an
African American woman
who was raised in the South,
where I was born in Boston,
I was raised in the South.
And a lot of my knowledge
of police officers
has always been negative.
When I think about learning the history,
for African Americans
especially in the South,
we think about, doing the
civil rights movement,
police dogs and being
sprayed with water hose,
all the way into George Floyd
and even even more recent more deaths.
And what can law
officers, police officers,
departments do?
Or what would you recommend?
Or I really don't know how
to phrase this question,
but what can you do to change the idea
that a lot of people and
I even think about my son,
he's five years old,
what he's gonna learn,
it's not gonna be positive.
I mean, the year that he and
I were stuck at home all day.
We watched these videos and so forth
and I have to have a
conversation with him.
What can we do to change that culture
that so many blacks and African Americans
and people of color have
dealt with for so many years.
Mr. Kirby talked about trauma.
This is trauma, even
though it may not have,
a person may not have
dealt with it personally,
they're watching it.
They're young people watching this.
What can we do to, to
come together and change,
change or rewrite history.
So that, blacks and African
American and people of color,
won't continue to have that stigma of
that police officers are not good.
People get scared.
There's a video of a young
man playing basketball who hid
when a police officer was
driving down the street
because he didn't want him to see him,
even though he was playing
basketball in his yard.
So what can we do to change that?
And anybody can chime in
not just the police officer,
but whomever might wanna
chime in, thank you.
- Can you hear me, okay?
Can you hear me Rob?
- Yes we can.
- Miss Howell, thank you for sharing that.
And I have to echo your sentiments
because my wife is an
African American female
and I have four kids,
two girls and two boys.
And my wife tells me every day
that I need to have the conversation,
the talk with my son,
my nine year old son.
And I'm gonna almost tear
up when I talk about this,
because it is somewhat painful
hearing it from that perspective.
But I also tell her things
that I see every day,
when I go to work.
And I see guys, men and women
who do not act like that.
And I see a police department
who is about discipline.
I see those things.
Although I can't speak what it's like
when you are Minneapolis,
I can speak from what I see.
And I see discipline happening to officers
who are out of line.
But I have to also
speak to my experiences.
I also have to say that I could imagine,
'cause it has happened to me.
I pull over somebody and
this is my third encounter.
Let's say because my first call,
was I went to a domestic violence call
where I arrested her husband
for abusing his wife.
The second call that I go to is,
I go to a bad car accident.
So now my mindset is in that mind,
isn't kinda in that warrior mindset
because of the things that I dealt with.
So now I go over it and I
pull over a car for speeding.
And the first thing
that the guy says to me
is that you pull me
over because of my race.
Oftentimes I say, no, that's
not why I'm pulling you over.
I pulled you over because of what you did,
but here goes the opposite side,
is that now 'cause I've
been in that seat before
being pulled over,
I thought it was because of my race.
So I try to speak from both perspectives
because oftentimes I'm
living both perspectives.
So the class that I created,
Understanding Cultural Norms,
speaks a little of both perspectives.
And I think that the way
that we can solve this,
is people coming together
who look like me,
you look like, different people
and talking about our own experiences.
Because if I tell an
officer that I work with,
who is different from me, his
race is different from me.
If I tell him my perspective,
he should be as equally upset as I am,
'cause I went through that.
Because the world that
we live in and policing,
we're very close, we're very tight.
He should be as equally upset.
So because he's equally
upset now he understands
what it's like to be that
on that receiving end
of somebody who was still
like they're mistreated.
So the only way we're going
to be able to bridge that
is tough conversations
like we're doing right now.
And I have to be honest.
I still haven't had that conversation,
that talk with my son just yet,
because I just haven't had it just yet.
My wife tells me I need to have it,
but I haven't had it just yet.
- [Kenton] Can I, I want
to kind of take you back
on something he just said.
So I'll say this,
I can't imagine how challenging
and scary it must be to even have
that kind of talk with
your nine year old child.
And maybe I just wanna acknowledge that.
I will also just kind of say this,
those interactions, those
individual interactions
with community members,
for the law enforcement
officer on the side,
that could have been the
third or fourth interaction
that they've had for the day.
But that's number one for that
person in that day, right?
It's like, I'm a
therapist, I'm in practice.
I have four or five clients.
And back to back to back,
three of them curse me out.
Another one is hearing voices.
I got to get an ambulance
and get them taken out.
And then my fifth one,
I'm in a horrible mood.
It's not their fault.
So a part of this is like,
the work is so hard and so much.
That's why I was talking about
like as service providers,
we have to lead with humility
and also kind of be checking
it on our own stuff too.
If I curse out my client,
because I had a bad interaction,
two interactions before
them, it is not their fault.
And I think that is something
that we need to focus on.
And even you mentioned warrior,
like kinda go into that warrior mentality.
For me, that's that trauma brain.
'Cause that's a lot of stuff
for all of us to see him.
You have to normalize that,
for me to sit through five sessions
and hear all these horrific things,
I'd be a damn fool if I
said it didn't bother me,
it doesn't impact me.
And if I don't,
then I'm only gonna be doing the service
to the next person that I work with.
So I just want to like
throw that out there.
'Cause our individual, like
I worked in Child Welfare,
I would remove kids out of homes.
And I know every time I did that,
that kid or those children
are gonna remember every
random detail about me.
The glasses I was wearing, how I smelled,
what color shirt I had on
because I had that same
experience as a child.
Many, many years later
I can still describe
the person that removed me from my family.
So like it's so important for us to check
our own stuff when dealing
with folks out here.
- Absolutely, absolutely 100%
- Rob, Rob, if I may.
- [Rob] Yeah.
- I've had a lot of conversations
with officers throughout the building
and lately and about
this particular topic.
Perception is reality,
is the way I see it.
And I've been telling
some of the white officers
that just because you may not think,
or you may not think like
that, or you may not,
if you will think that that
that type of racism exists,
doesn't mean that they
don't feel that way.
And we need to recognize that we need to.
And the best way I think
to do that is through,
what we're doing today.
Just to echo my colleagues
and also communication.
I'm asking officers to
whether it's a car stop,
whether it's getting out of the car
and interacting with the
kids in the neighborhood
or whether it's a barbecue,
we're going on a neighborhood
association meeting
to do a better job with communicating
and having empathy for
the way other people feel.
Thank you.
- No, thank you guys.
Thank you for that as well chief
and thank you Keaton and
thank you Demetrice for that.
Next question that came in
privately, but it's a question.
It's a search.
- Hello everyone.
My question is, Mr. Kirby
brought up a good point
about how throughout
the course of your day,
your interactions can at some
point overwhelm you, right?
And so to all the police
officers in leadership positions,
what methods can we put in
place to support officers
so that they aren't overwhelmed?
Because I know I live in New Bedford
and I don't know the exact statistics,
but we're short on officers.
So you have a lot of officers,
who are put in positions where
there's forced over time.
And so you're constantly
seeing troubling situations
and you're not really getting the break
that you need from it.
And just like in my career as an educator,
we can be a little overwhelmed.
And so sometimes we need a break.
So how do you find ways
to support your officers
so that they're not constantly
mentally overwhelmed?
- If I could speak to that?
I think the biggest
part for that is whoever
that officer responds to for a supervisor,
his or her Sergeant to recognize
what's going on with that officer.
And if you have to,
if it's a situation where the
officer is working too much,
well, the officer goes home.
If a situation where the
opposite did something wrong,
the officer is disciplined.
I think, and this is where
I'm going to have the chief echo me here.
Police departments do a good job I think,
in disciplining their employees.
What doesn't happen is that,
oftentimes the communication doesn't get
articulated to the public.
Because it stays in house.
The officer gets disciplined
and that discipline doesn't
go outside of the department,
stays in house.
So I think at number one,
Sergeants being more watchful
and then the discipline
process, which does happen.
I don't know if you wanna
follow it up there chief.
- Well absolutely,
it's not something that traditionally
that we've shared
outside the organization.
And I'm not sure if we're
gonna quite get to the point
where we share all the details.
But I agree with the Sergeant,
it's very common for
officers to be disciplined
anything from talking
disrespectful to someone to,
to a cruiser accident.
The officers need to be held accountable,
but just to the issue
of perhaps an officer
losing their temper or needing a break,
I think we're coming a long way with that.
When I came on the job 30 years ago,
there was that more of
that blue wall of silence
where I'm not gonna talk about a guy
who may be in crisis
because I don't want him
to be pulled off the street
or have that stigma.
As a chief I can tell you
that it's not uncommon now
for officers to come to me and say,
officer Jones went to a
extremely difficult call,
whether it was a car
accident involving a baby,
and we're not what we do here.
And I'm not sure if they
do that in Fitchburg,
but we actually, I actually
call what's called an order
and they're ordered
to go to the Employee Assistance Program.
And some of the feedback is confidential,
but some of the feedback I get
is that they go to the
program reluctantly,
and at some point they end up embracing it
and they start talking about
a lot of different issues,
whether it's in their professional career
or in their personal career.
So I think we we've come
a long way with that,
but having said that, I still
think there's some roads
that we need to go down to
improve that in that area.
But yes, it's very common for
officers to be disciplined.
- Thank you so much.
We have one of our students as well.
TJ, you have a comment?
- I just wanted to just
sort of take a second
as sort of current party in this,
listening to the policing side.
As a black male I appreciate the effort
that's being put in on their side
to try to sort of redo this.
What really is trauma,
because even though like,
I could leave this meeting today knowing
that police are taking progressive steps
to try to get rid of this problem.
But when I go walk to my studio,
which just half a mile
from my house right now,
and if I see a cop driving by me,
it's still gonna be that
same, like pitted stomach.
And I feel like just praying
to God that nothing happens.
So and I think it definitely
takes work from both sides,
because I know people who
have interactions with police
and just act completely out of line
and then act surprised when
their sort of disrespect
is met with the same type of energy.
So I think, it definitely
takes work from both sides.
And I'm definitely spreading,
doing what I can to
communicate with my friends
and other people of my age
that this really isn't a competition,
we're not really gonna get anywhere from,
continuing this stigma
of this negative stigma
around the police.
Like we need to heal and in
bond to really move forward,
but it takes both sides.
So I just wanted to say, thank you.
And just say that I noticed it,
- Rob, if I can just quickly.
- [Rob] Oh sure.
- It's awesome.
I absolutely love what you've said.
You know to me it comes down
to communication and interactions.
We need to have more positive interactions
with the diverse people.
And that's the only way
we're gonna build trust,
is by having some positive directions.
Thank you.
- Thank you so much for that-
- [TJ] Absolutely, thank you.
- Next question is from Megan,
another one of our students Megan Holden.
Who just graduated (giggles)
- Congratulations
- [Megan] Thank you, thank you.
Can anyone hear me?
- [Rob] Yes.
- [Megan] Perfect.
First off, I wanna thank everyone
for taking the time out
and putting this together
and being involved in this.
Thank you to Multicultural
Center, the heat of Bristol.
This is very important conversations
that need to be need to be done.
Some things I have questions about.
It's just about how please,
I guess how to go about
the business as usual.
One thing, a couple of things.
One is community.
I feel like one of the biggest things
is when people see police,
they kind of feel like they're in trouble.
They get tension.
They're used to being
involved in the community.
I remember growing they had things as PIO.
I know that somethings have,
'cause the funding has
not been around anymore.
But I was wondering if there's
one question I have is,
what are you guys doing
to get more involved in the community,
instead of just showing
up when you called?
And I know you guys are busy too.
Well, maybe how, I guess
you can work around that,
or maybe how somethings you can put place.
Also, I heard some things,
while I was watching interviews
and I was researching,
this one thing that stuck
out to me was quotas.
I don't really understand
why is that a thing?
One of you I watched was saying that,
they have quotas to fill the beds
and they target certain communities.
And I know forever,
I remember I got a hell of news article
that said we have quarters for,
I think its was traffic stops
or some type of speeding
ticket or something like that.
So I just wanna question like,
what's the purpose of quotas?
Why do we need them?
And it isn't a problem?
And lastly, guns and training.
So one thing I wanna point out that
I understand that cops
have a difficult job
and it can be a scary job,
but I also think it's important
for people to know that,
cops are supposed to be
trained to deal with civilians.
Civilians are not trained
to deal with cops.
So I wanted to know like,
you've mentioned something about cops,
(indistinct) shooting at vehicles.
Can we get something that,
I'm not sure if it's
something in place already,
I mean, you can tell me.
From guns being pulled out on people
who are not armed all together.
So I think I can stop a lot of shootings.
And also do something 'cause I think,
is also not only a form
of police brutality,
but also problem accountability.
A lot of police officers
that we see in these cases
and they get off.
So what can we do to make
sure they're held accountable?
And I mean, whether it's a
good training, psych vowels,
or like where's this justice,
can you please (indistinct)
Thank you.
I know it was a lot, I'm sorry.
(laughs)
- Anyone who would like to kinda jump in
- I'll mention Rob, as far
as having a firearm out
when they don't need to,
I think that probably it can be addressed
with better deescalation training.
Where officers feel more comfortable.
I'm gonna be, I have to be honest,
and I'm confident in saying
that some police academies,
I don't control the police academies
and I don't control the training.
That's outside of my purview.
There may be some training scenarios
or a particular person's
training an officer
and kind of instill that
warrior mindset, if you will.
So once I can get my hands
on the officers here,
if you will, then talking
about deescalation
and doing things in a different way.
One of the things I wanna
bring back to the floor,
(indistinct) for a while
is the team Police Academy.
We're gonna run some kids through that,
the high school aged kids.
So they get a little sense of,
do they wanna go into this career?
What's this career all about?
So I'm looking forward to that,
but I'll defer to some of my colleagues,
to talk about what they're doing.
- I think and again I
try not to speak directly
for my department because I think
that'd be very unfair for me to do that.
But what I do see is a lot of departments
have their own community engagement unit.
Because for an officer who works his
or her eight hour shift,
they're responding to calls,
they're doing X, Y and Z,
but oftentimes it's those small encounters
that you really can build
that community policing to an extent.
But for busier departments,
it's hard to do that.
So that's why these departments
have their own community engagement unit,
who specifically goes out there
and engages the community for
different types of events.
But I know for myself,
when I was an officer responding to calls,
working 11 to seven,
I would do everything I can
to engage the community.
Even at 3:30 the morning,
when I'm answering calls
for domestic violence call,
it's those small interactions
that I think really do help.
But again, that's the guardian mindset
that the chief was talking about.
When you can engage the community
and do those types of things.
So I think as officers,
we need to do more of those
types of things with the public.
And I like what you said,
officers are trained to
deal with the public,
but the public is not trained
to deal with officers.
I like that, I think that was powerful.
And I think for me,
that's going to be a
shift in my mentality.
My thinking when I engage my
community members, I like that.
Thank you for pointing that out.
- [Megan] Appreciate it, thank you.
- So the next question we have here,
what are your recommendations
for academic preparation
of tomorrow's criminal
justice professionals?
As we educate them at Bristol.
- I don't want to dominate
the mic here, but (laughs)
I think more of what
we were talking about,
community policing and
understanding the community
that you're policing.
So I'm gonna share a
quick example with you.
I graduated the Academy,
as my class president of the Academy.
And one day an instructor came in,
he was a Sergeant and in Len, Len PD,
we know Len, Len's a pretty busy place.
And he threw out a question.
He said, class I just
responded to a call last night.
'Cause he was still on the job as well.
And he said, I went to a call
and it was a Hispanic lady.
And the lady said she couldn't,
he couldn't handle her problem
because he was a white officer.
He says, you don't know about me,
you can't handle my problem.
So he throws a question out
to the class and he says,
class, are we getting into a point where,
you're gonna press more,
if you call the police,
you gonna press one for
an Hispanic officer,
two for black officer,
three for a white officer,
four for an Asian officer.
He was like, are we getting to this point.
And from my law enforcement
colleagues in here,
you know when you're in Academy,
you don't wanna say
anything, you wanna be quiet
because you just wanna get
through the Academy day.
You wanna go home, you wanna be quiet.
So I didn't say anything.
He looks at me, he said, Mr.
President, what do you think?
So now I've got to say something, right?
So I said, okay, this is what it is.
I think your community
needs to be representative.
I think your police department
needs to be representative
of your community.
I think that was an honest
statement that she said.
However, I don't think
it takes a white officer,
only white officer to
stop a white problem.
I think again, you have
to be more multicultural
in your approach and more understanding,
which is why we're doing
what we're doing today.
But then the only other black officer,
student officer in the class said,
Mr. President, you're wrong.
What needs to happen is officers
need to understand the
community that they police.
So it doesn't take a black person
to have a black person
problem, but it could take,
but it doesn't necessarily
have to be that way.
You just have to understand the community
that you're police.
So it takes police officers
getting out of their cruiser,
interacting with the community
and having those real meaningful dialogues
that really create change
being transformational in your approach.
Not just, hey, how you doing?
But more getting to know the
people that you're around.
I think that's the only way
we're going to be able to solve this.
I'm hoping that more of that comes from
the new curriculums that
are coming out for policing.
- And then I would like to
just add kind of even like,
I mean, I'm not in the
Academy, I'm not a cop clearly.
I'm a social worker therapist.
I'm all-
- Important stuff, important stuff.
- It's all important stuff
more about the feelings and everything.
But I'm really big on like
things like language right.
And reframing them.
So I look at, I always tell folks,
I don't do anger management classes,
I do emotion regulation classes.
'Cause anger is a normal emotion.
It's just, when there's too much of it,
then it's problematic.
Just like there's too much
sadness, that's problematic.
So like the deescalation
is not necessarily,
we already kind of coming
in with this frame of like,
this person is gonna be a problem,
so I have to bring them down.
How about effective
communication with people.
So if you have folks that
come in to the Academy
that are like, fresh and learning,
if we're kind of framing this in a lens of
how to effectively communicate
with the community,
it's not looking at it kind,
it also kind of knock down
some of that warrior mentality
that you guys have been talking about.
If a guardian was like,
Oh, how do I effectively
communicate with folks?
Oh yeah, sometimes there're
highs and their lows.
It's like, it's just a reframing.
And I think that stuff
goes such a long way.
- Absolutely, absolutely.
- Absolutely, thank you
guys for that as well.
We're gonna get a couple more minutes
and we're gonna get into
the next steps and actions.
This is a great conversation.
I just want people to know that in this,
that this is not, today
we're gonna get some tactics.
We're gonna hear some great points
and then there'll be a part two.
We'll continue this conversation
and give the public a
little bit more input
on what we're doing.
We'll have other professionals
to be part of it as well.
Hopefully I get to every question
because there's only seemed
to be a few more in here.
I got a couple of private messages
and then we'll kind of get it going.
Mimi I'm gonna skip
your for a quick second,
because I want to give Bristol Police
an opportunity to speak
and I'm gonna come right back
to yours in a second here.
And so the question was from
Doreen, I believe, right?
And I'm sorry, I'm trying
to balance three different-
- I'll ask the question
- Okay, go ahead.
- So we don't have campus police
regularly on the Attleboro
and Twan campuses
and it would really be an
advantage for the students
to have an opportunity
to build relationships
with the campus police.
Is there a plan to have a larger role
of the campus police on our campuses?
- Thanks Doreen, let me
address that in two parts.
As far as more contact, not
necessarily physical contact.
Once we do have our social
media sites up and running,
we will have more
contact and communication
with all of our students,
faculty and staff.
To answer what I believe is
another part of your question,
the physical presence on those campuses.
We do the best that we
can with our staffing.
We try to get officers up there
on a daily basis to
both of those campuses,
to at least a stop in and
check in with the staff,
the students take a look around
and field any questions or concerns,
just try and stay in contact with them.
It's not ideal, but we do the best with
what we've got right now.
- I appreciate that.
I just wanna make one comment,
that I really appreciated your
fundraiser for breast cancer.
I was going through
breast cancer treatments
right at the time that you did that.
And I was presented with
one of the tee shirts
from the campus police
and I wore it to each of my surgeries
and during my treatments.
So thank you.
- Don't mention it.
Glad to see you doing better.
- I am doing great.
Thank you.
- [Nataly] All right.
- Awesome.
Glad you're doing so much better Doreen.
Thank you for your comment
and question there.
So next question is for Demetrice,
a question for Demetrice.
What are the most important
points that you would make
to Bristol's Criminal Justice students,
in the wake of the George Floyd tragedy?
- Wow, tough question.
I think it goes back to,
it's gonna sound like a funny quote,
but I'm gonna quote John F. Kennedy,
"Ask not what your country can do for you,
but what you can do for your country."
So if you think there's
a problem in policing,
there is a problem.
If you think there's a problem,
then come along and join the job
and change it from the inside.
Have your perspective be that perspective
that leads to change.
Don't sit quietly on the sideline,
complaining about the problem.
If you're gonna be in the field,
let's do something about the problem.
I think that's my overall statement
that wear the uniform
and hold the people that
you work with accountable.
And if you wanna create change,
lead by doing that all right.
And stay away from the,
the media comments,
because oftentimes we know,
the media only tells us a
small part of what's going on.
They show that small clip
and that small clip,
it makes us all upset,
but they don't tell you what
leads up to the clip right.
And I hate to say that,
but that's really what to why
we're so divisive at times.
Because we listen to just one side,
whether it be the Republican
side or the Democratic side.
We just listen to those one side
and we don't really see the
true issue that's happening.
So let's be honest,
and let's look at the entire situation,
not just little snippets of the issue.
And if that's the way you feel
that's changing from the inside,
join the police department
and let's change it.
- Rob.
- Yes.
- I just want to say to Demetrice, bravo,
I absolutely love it.
And that's the message.
One of the primary messages
that I wanted to send
through the recruiting unit
when they have the opportunity to meet
with some of our young adults.
And Rob if I may, I saw a couple of people
about the quota question,
they wanted a kind of a follow up for.
I just forgot to answer
it and my apologies.
But we don't have a quota.
I'm a little perplexed using,
going back in my memory to
think of a time if we ever did.
And I think the only time
that we required officers to come in
with a certain amount of traffic tickets
was many years ago when we have,
what's called the Avenue
here in Fall River.
And we had a lot of complaints
of racing motorcycles
and cars and officers were
hired on an overtime basis.
And one of the things I think happened
where you had some officers
come in with no tickets
on an overtime overtime
basis, which was a problem.
And I think, if I recall correctly,
I think there might've
been, like a four hour
or ticket minimum.
But we, other than that,
and that was quite a long time ago.
Other than that, we've never had
that I'm aware of or familiar with
any type of quota related to any issue
with traffic tickets or
arrests or field stops.
There's never been any type
of requirement in my career.
- Thank you for that chief.
And I think that's very important
as we talk about transparency
and we move forward.
I think getting that
information out to the public,
because of the public
assumes that there's a quota,
I've always thought there was one,
and then I'm sure others
are thinking that.
And then that's something
that is a barrier
that we may already think that,
you're just trying to
harass me for no reason.
So maybe transparency,
as we talk about our
next tactics in a minute.
I just wanna get to one more question.
But as we get to that,
that may be a solution
to kind of put out there
to the public that Fall River police,
Bristol police and
wherever we are working,
don't have those types of things.
And it's being proactive and saying that,
even in asking for it,
but it might be something
that they're thinking.
So that's a great question certainly.
I have one question.
I think this is this one is
gonna be pretty powerful.
And we'll leave it as,
this is the last question
for this for this forum.
So the question here says,
To the officers and everyone on the panel,
thoughts about unions sometimes
handcuffing the city or county,
taking appropriate actions
with their departments
and moving forward.
- Rob, if I may, I'll
make it really quick,
'cause I know, you wanna
get together my other piece,
I just had an interview today
with a Herald news reporter.
And that was her first question.
'Cause we talked about the pilot program
for the body worn cameras
and she she expected me to say
that we have two unions here,
that we have the officers and
we have the superior officer.
She expected me to say
that the answer was no.
A flat out no, when we have to negotiate
that because it's a change
of working conditions.
I'm happy to report that the feedback
that I'm getting from
all the leaders of those
unions and their bodies if you will,
is they wanna listen.
They recognize that there are some issues,
they wanna sit down and they wanna talk.
So I'm really pleased with that.
I don't wanna speak for
any other communities,
but so far fingers crossed,
hopefully it stays that way.
There's a good rapport
going between myself
and the both unions.
- Rob if I've never
been a big union person,
so I can't really speak
to what the union does,
but looking at it from an
objective point of view,
unions are, they protect their workers
and that make sense.
So there's something going on
that is maybe harmful to
the Patrick Badge you wear,
then the union should
step up and say something.
But I can't really, speak
to is a specific situation
where I think the union put
handcuffs on a situation.
'Cause I haven't really observed that.
So I really can't speak
to that specifically yet.
Pretty sure I will over my career,
but I haven't, I can't speak to it now.
- [Rob] Yeah.
Thank you for that.
So as we close here, does
any of the panelists,
before I finish up with
the last slides here,
would like to add anything or say anything
or comment anything.
- I just wanna go back to-
No I'm sorry chief, go ahead chief.
- I just wanted to say
thank you for having this.
I think it's a great thing.
And I'd like to stay involved
and get more officers involved as well.
Thank you.
- [Rob] Thank you.
- I just think the biggest thing
is for that question about,
my advice to Bristol what
they can do for the students.
And TJ I think you gotta
join the conversation.
If you think that that you've been,
that something has happened to you
or you feel like police
should do some differently,
then you gotta wear the uniform.
You have to do it.
And once you do it,
then try to change it
from that perspective.
And really see what
happens day in and day out
with the policing in your community.
'cause again, oftentimes you only get
a small snippet about what happens.
We don't get the full story.
So we gotta be part of the conversation.
- And I would like to say
thanks Rob for facilitating
as usual great job.
Thanks for the officers great insights
and to the other people
that made comments,
Megan and TJ and Shanna, all great points.
Thanks a lot.
- Absolutely, thank you guys.
- Thank you Rob for having me be here
I know I'm the outsider from New York.
But what I would like to say is,
when thinking around kind of
getting involved in criminal Justice,
it doesn't always just have to be
working in law enforcement.
There's a whole field around
criminal justice reform
and advocacy and that's a space too.
There's a lot of organizations nationally
doing really great organizing,
around looking at the
criminal justice system
and trying to figure out
how to best reform it.
So like, I know one, for
example, Just Leadership USA.
They do a lot of national advocacy work,
specifically around the
criminal justice field
and actually use and
turn to a lot of folks,
who have their own lived experiences
within the criminal justice system
to inform their lobbying
and advocacy work.
So they're based out of
here in New York City,
but they do work nationally
and have staff all over the country.
So it's just leadershipusa.org, I believe.
- Good, good, good, good.
- I just wanna say thank you to everyone,
the panelists and the
participants as well.
I look forward to future
forums of this nature.
And to be honest with you,
I look forward to when we can
get together face to face.
The video is good.
We get to meet people
from all over the place,
but I prefer face to face.
It was great meeting all of you.
And I wanna just point
out if I could go back
a little bit to the young man, TJ.
I think he really hit
the nail on the head.
He seems to have the
philosophy that we all need.
No matter what side you're on,
law enforcement, the general public,
you have to be open minded
to other people's thoughts
and feelings and emotions.
That really resonated with me.
So I just wanted to point that out.
It was great meeting you all.
Even the Yankees fan, I guess
(laughs)
- [Kenton] 27 rings baby, 27 rings.
(laughs)
- Remember 2004, that's all I'm gonna say.
- I don't know what you
are talking about, ah.
(laughs)
- Thank you very much.
And Rob, Melissa, thank you very much.
- [Kenton] Great job, Rob and Melissa.
Awesome job.
Thank you.
- Baxter you have anything or?
- Yes, I just wanted to say
that this was excellent
and this is step one.
This is what's going to
create a stronger future
for everyone and I'm just
happy to be a part of it.
- Thank you so much.
Melissa, you would mind
putting up the last slide.
Thank you so much guys as well.
I'm gonna, I'll say my thank
you is in a second here.
I just wanna kind of
get through this stuff
so I can let everybody
and start enjoying their,
some people are off tomorrow
so that they can start
enjoying their weekend,
their long weekend.
So again, as we do these programs,
this is again, this is the beginning phase
of this particular section,
which is race policing
and criminal justice.
And we always wanna come
up with actionable items.
So if you're an educator, a student,
wherever you may lay within this box
that we're creating right now
through the social justice.
We wanna try to,
one thing we've always talked about,
is impacting our circles
no matter where it is,
whether it's just your parents,
whether it's your significant other,
or whether it's, your work area,
however you can influence,
we wanna create those changes.
So what have I done over the
last, since our last meeting?
I've been meeting with,
like I said earlier,
with a ton of professionals
that can really impact change
and really can do things.
And as we see today,
we have our panel who came
today to have conversation
with us and really, and they
showed what they are doing.
They express their feelings
and they also showed us
what their departments are,
what they are looking to do
in the future moving forward.
And that's how I felt I was
able to influence change,
because I don't have
that autonomy or power,
but I know that some of the panelists do
and other individuals who I'm speaking to
in the future or currently,
or in the future may have that as well.
So again, what can you do?
So be aware of your implicit biases
and racial profiling is something
that we've we talked about
in the last panel as well.
So just be aware of things that we have.
We all have biases people.
All right, so just make sure
we have an understanding
that they are there.
Sometimes you may not even
realize that they even exist.
Make sure your response to a situation
is based on a situation and not a bias
that you may have against
the actual individual.
And that's things that
our police departments,
our education departments,
our teachers are,
family members, everybody
can use that for themselves.
Continue the conversation,
that's very, very important.
What happened today, shouldn't just end.
I heard that there was
a little bit of an issue
with our outlook today.
So some people had a problems getting in,
but we had a as high as 97 people
for today's, but we had 143 people RSVP.
So you never know if some
people RSVP and things happen.
However, the conversation continued
because people decided
that they didn't think
that the last one was the end goal.
They went to the second phase
'cause they wanted to see what
we're doing moving forward.
So it's my responsibility
to keep this conversation
and create spaces.
I'll get to what we're doing
in the future in a second.
But this is extremely positive
that we have this many people
that care about a community and
then volunteering their time
to make a change or to hear
what we can do in order to
create this change.
So, and also educate yourself.
Know as you're educating yourself
and educate your personal
circles, do those things.
If you're a part of our newsletter,
if you're signed up for
this, you get our newsletter.
If today's the first time,
you've been in one of our
social justice forums,
you didn't get a newsletter.
You will get a newsletter
with our past newsletter.
So you're gonna get the books,
the readings, the videos,
the things that you can help
to influence those areas,
teach yourself things.
You'll see things that we've done
that I've done over the
last couple of weeks.
You'll see things that others have done
in the history of America
that may, they may not know.
There's also video links
that you may not be aware of,
like one that we included
with the 13th amendment.
Because some people, the 13th,
which some people don't
understand the importance
or the impact of the 13th amendment
and how that has impacted black
and African American men
and women over the years.
Supporting ending policies,
that and laws that promote discrimination
and racial inequality
is very, very important.
We talk, we want people to create change.
So we look at, as you heard
these professionals today,
they're on our side.
They want great things to happen.
However, we sometimes
where we can influence
we don't do it, we just
hope that it happens.
You can't hope, you have to take action.
And that's why these are actual items.
So all police officers
must enforce the law.
We know that there's laws that are there,
that they have to enforce.
If you do not like the laws,
this is where we come
in as members of society
to vote against laws, to
argue against policies
that may affect others.
That because they are the messenger,
same thing as Justin
said about the military.
If anyone remembers that scene,
and again, I tried to stand in the middle,
but if everybody remember that scene,
when the military remove
all the peaceful protesters,
it had, we all had an eerie feeling.
Well, at least I did.
And I'm pretty sure everyone
in here probably did as well.
That's them enforcing the actual policy
or law that our president
took at that moment.
And I think that really got people scared,
and people started
talking about Martial Law
and not really understanding
that Martial Law.
Our military can't invoke Martial Law.
Different military would
come in and you know.
So there's so many different pieces
that we don't know as the
public general public.
So let's educate ourselves on that.
Let's make sure we're
voting against certain laws
and things that we can
affect our day to day.
Next slide please, Melissa.
So where do we stand now?
So today is a check mark.
As you can see Policing
Criminal Justice and Race,
are part of our forums.
The next one is gonna be Race
and Educational Inequity.
We're gonna have individuals from all over
from all of the education
spectrum to speak.
Early intervention is gonna be important.
So we're gonna talk
about early intervention
and what students are just
going into elementary school.
We're gonna have a teacher
that will work with special education.
Speaker as well and we
also have individuals
from maybe early grades,
K through five speak on,
on their perspective.
We are a community college.
So all these things are
important as building,
as we build this social justice pathway.
Next we'll have middle school
teachers speak as well.
And some of the experiences
of the students,
we will also we'll have
high school vocational
and non vocational educators speak.
And we will have educators and professors
from higher learning,
higher education components to speak
about the experiences of
race and education equity.
That's gonna be a very, very powerful,
powerful, powerful step one
for what we're doing here.
And it will tie into the
last two forums that we had.
Next slide, Melissa.
And then, so in closing, if you guys,
if you need to contact myself or Melissa,
our email is here tomorrow,
tomorrow you will receive an email from us
that will we'll have a newsletter for you.
It'll have tactics,
that'll have this PowerPoint
will be attached to it.
It'll have opportunities for you.
Again, the information for that,
people that are on the panels
will have their emails.
If you want to contact them.
If you have a quick question,
I'm sure they are willing to say,
get back to us and make sure
that they are part of this bill.
This is not just it for them,
as we've been speaking, they're all in.
Just like a hope that you guys
that are taking part of
this social justice forums,
are all in it as well,
as we try to create a better community.
My role at Bristol Community College
and Director of Multicultural Affairs,
where I'm looking to engage the community.
That's the only way we're
gonna engage our community.
So that way our students
from various identities
and backgrounds feel
comfortable coming to Bristol.
Understand that they're
gonna get a great education.
They have great people
here who cares about them.
We wanna make sure that
they understand that.
And then the communities that they serve,
because when they leave
Bristol, they're walking.
And to understand that
there's a chief of police
and these different
communities in Bristol County
that care about them,
that really understand that
there needs to be changed.
Imagine how great the synergy
can be between ourselves
and our local community.
This is very, very important.
People that are outside of Bristol County
and Community College.
Hopefully we're able,
this is not, we don't
have all the answers,
but hopefully this is a template
to start creating this in your own areas.
As we continue to fight
against social justice
and making sure that everyone is accepted
and everyone is accepted and
everyone is living the life
that they need to live,
a good one, hopefully.
And that's what we're trying to create.
And then last I'd like
to thank Melissa Rogers
who keeps me in order
because I have a hundred million things
that I'm doing, so she keeps me organized.
So I appreciate that.
I'm gonna thank the panelists
for your time today,
and let's keep this moving.
Our next one is July 30th.
I hope to see everyone there.
Our advertisements will
start on July 15th.
So you'll start seeing the
advertisements for the next one.
Our college communications
department is helping with that,
create that now.
And so again, I thank you.
I'm proud of everybody
that being part of this.
Thank you for your questions.
Thank you for being with
us and we'll connect soon.
Thank you guys.
- Thanks Rob, thanks Melissa.
- Thanks Bob, thank you everybody.
- Have a great worth weekend.
- Yep, everyone enjoy the weekend,
stay safe, stay healthy.
- [Rob] Yes.
- Happy fourth.
- [Mellisa] Happy fourth,
no more fireworks please.
(laughs)
- [Kenton] It's terrible here in New York,
Oh my God. (laughs)
(overlapping)
- [Nataly] Of course it is,
you don't have a decent
baseball team down there.
(laughs)
- [Kenton] 47 rings man.
(laughs)
It's okay you guys, have a good one.
Be well everybody.
