Charleston community leaders have partnered with the Charleston Police Department on an ambitious new 8-point collaboration aimed at building upon Charleston Police Department’s role as a national leader in the arenas of race relations, community policing, and youth engagement. The plan includes 8 major advances:
Implementation of De-Escalation training. This includes having sent 5 CPD officers t
o become certified de-escalation trainers through the nationally accredited RITE curriculum, and a May training for every CPD officer that has already happened on de-escalation. Publishing monthly arrest statistics across race, age, gender, and cause of arrest– for the purpose of educating officers and citizens about crime trends and possible causes of racial arrest disparities. Starting in November, plans to implement state of the art body camera technology and national best practices for body camera use policy to make sure the devices are protecting both officers and citizens. The launch, this October, of a Youth Advisory Council, which will plan on-going dialogue and events between youth and officers, and will also make annual recommendations to continue to improve the relationship between youth and The Youth Advisory Council will be made up of at least 10 young people, aged 18-25, across race and religious differences. A department wide series of day-long anti-racism trainings for everyone from the Chief to new recruits, conducted in partnership with the WV Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Race Matters in WV, American Friends Service Committee, and other partners. A series of roll call presentations, where officers get to meet and hear from community leaders across Charleston. A new annual Community Service Award, where community leaders will work with police officers to create community policing standards – and then recognize all officers meeting those standards in a given year. The award is designed to shine a spotlight on the existing community policing efforts (both formal, and informal) already in practice, and encourage officers to continue to improve upon those. Collaboration between Charleston Police Department leadership and community leaders to advocate for state policy changes to address re-entry and recidivism and to offer second chances for ex-offenders. This only the beginning! We are becoming a hub for everything Racial Justice in West Virginia, join us!
