[poll id=”56″]
The New York Times recently published an investigative report on the disparate treatment of black motorists in Greensboro. How should Greensboro police respond?
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The top 3 are absolutely necessary. In implementation of a transparent, independent civilian investigative process is urgent as well. Peace
Two players in this scenario need to be replaced. The person who hired the entrenched decision maker needs to retire to be able to respond to personal matters and the entrenched decision maker (Wayne Scott) needs to leave because he, despite some surface window dressing is showing a totally inadequate ability to perceive what the issues are. Sadly, this issue will impact the table of the residents of this city because the inability to put these issues related to race and bias to bed has to impact the ability of the city to attract the type of economic development and idea people that other areas are attracting. Without that, the burden of maintaining Greensboro’s viability falls on fewer and fewer able people (taxpayers).
Then, a group of citizens need to travel to Richland County, SC and sit with Sheriff Leon Lett. In responding to the crisis there last week, he was able to highlight the critical importance of acknowledging that his community had faced problems and they had made progress in dealing with problems and they had created a citizen-based mechanism that helped them solve problems . The defensive, institutionally-driven, ego based responses will not work. Players with a broader mindset must be employed to resolve these problems. Insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results!!!! Greensboro can choose to not be “insane.”
They also stiff white boys.
The GSO Police Dept. needs to take the NYT article and formulate a new POLICY ASAP that would stop the excessive profiling of black motorists, especially if certain locations are repeatedly being used to “catch” black motorists. Such a POLICY itself should “weed out” those Officers who are aggressively abusing their authority including overusing the “resisting arrest” charge provided the POLICY has the appropriate accountability.
I find the whole thing amusing since it’s often impossible to tell the race of the driver until the officer walks up to the window.
And yet somehow…..
A huge part of this piece is about what happens after a traffic stop has been initiated including the rate of search and the subsequent charges. So even if the officer couldn’t see the driver at all initially, you can’t make that argument about searches/charges.
In some ways, I’m amused (…in a non-funny way…) about all this in Greensboro. Everyone knows this happens everywhere, right? It certainly doesn’t it make it right, but for anyone who is shocked SHOCKED that blacks are getting stopped, searched, arrested, and charged more … goodness, welcome to the world.
We went through LITERALLY this same exact thing in Fayetteville about 3-4 years ago (albeit without the New York Times assistance) — someone posted the numbers about searches and stops, the police dept denied, there was talk about officer review board, talk of instituting written consent forms, etc., etc.
I just don’t know the answer except that the “police culture” seems to be that they can never be wrong (it’s usually the same with the District Attorneys, though I don’t know enough about Guildford Co. DA to say as such, but when was the last time you heard a prosecutor say ‘sorry’?). Until you have police leadership that is dynamic enough to say, “Hey, we get things wrong sometimes just like everyone else. But we need to do better, and we will do better.” Instead we get, “I disagree with the data. You should thank us for what we do.”
It’s not a “support the police” or “[blank] da po-lice” black/white argument. It’s about making law enforcement part of the community, not a military authority over certain parts of the community. I know all this is preaching to the choir, but there’s a divide … how we fix it involves a lot of conversation and, more importantly, listening. I only hope Greensboro leaders and community can do more than, well, every other city in America has done.