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Photo By Jymi Bolden
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Rodney Prince, Cincinnati’s assistant safety director,
says more time is needed to ensure that the panel
reflects the city’s diverse makeup.
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Some say the city of Cincinnati's decision to extend the application deadline for the Citizens Police Review Panel is a step in the right direction. But the decision to form the panel at all still is stirring controversy
The application deadline has been extended to April 19, city officials said, in an attempt to get a "more diverse" group of applicants.
"We want to make sure it is a diverse group and to allow an additional opportunity for Cincinnati residents that might have missed the first window," said Assistant Safety Director Rodney Prince, who is handling the applications.
But others argue the extension shows that the public does not consider the panel's formation to be terribly important.
"When you consider that hundreds of thousands of people live in the city, and that only 24 people applied, that proves they are not interested," said Keith Fangman, president of the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), which represents Cincinnati officers.
As of March 19, the city had received 24 applications for a position on the panel. Unlike other city commissions that work mostly as volunteers, members of this panel will be paid $100 a meeting.
Prince said the delay simply showed that the city wanted to be extremely thorough in the application process.
"In the ordinance directive to the city manager, it requires that the panel be a diverse one," he said. "We have interpreted that to mean a panel that mirrors the diversity in the Cincinnati community."
Prince said that this meant diversity in race, gender or even whether the applicant came from the west side or east side of the city.
Fangman said that although he disagreed with the entire concept of another review process for Cincinnati police officers, he believed the extension reflected the city's desire to take the process seriously.
But he said that if city council would have left the decision as to whether to form the panel up to the voters, it would have been defeated.
The review panel, which was approved by council Jan. 21, was spurred by the February 1997 police shooting death of Lorenzo Collins -- an escaped, mentally ill patient who threatened police with a brick.
Investigations by the Internal Investigations Section, the Office of Municipal Investigations, the FBI, the Hamilton County Prosecutor, the Citizen Police Advisory Committee, the city's Homicide Unit and the U.S. Justice Department found that Officer Doug Depodesta, who shot Collins, acted within his training.
The Citizen Police Advisory Committee, which will review the fatal shooting March 19 of Michael Carpenter by two Cincinnati officers if the city manager requests a review, most likely will not be entirely disbanded when the new panel is formed, Prince said.
The new panel was recommended in a report based on meetings between neighborhood groups, African-American leaders and a Justice Department mediator.
"This creates eight layers of review and there's an opinion growing among many police officers that they can't so much as blink at somebody without being criticized," Fangman said. "When is enough review enough? I can just see a year down the line when someone says this panel isn't doing a good enough job they will just create another one."
But Prince said, "A very important concept that is being included in the formulation of a panel is the intent to improve upon community/police relations. It's important to get a panel that is representative of the community."
Whether the panel also will be fair and objective is something Fangman said he would have to wait and see.
"The bottom line is that if this civilian review board turns into a kangaroo court with a mean-spirited atmosphere where people use it as a vehicle to humiliate and intimidate police officers, we will make damn sure the community hears about it," he said.
The city manager is expected to make his decision on the applicants sometime in May. ©
