Westchester County issued the following announcement.
Westchester County Police Reform and Reimagining Task Force, which is among the first in the State, will finalize Police Reform Plans by the close of 2020.
Following the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May of 2020, Westchester County Executive George Latimer acted quickly to establish a working group of various stakeholders to review procedures and policies at the Westchester County Police Academy. In addition to this review, the Task Force is also charged with responding to Governor Cuomo’s Executive Order 203, requiring each local government to develop a police reform plan with community input in order to reinvent and modernize police strategies and programs within the County’s Department of Public Safety.
The 35-member working group, known as the Westchester County Police Reform and Reimagining Task Force, consists of the Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner of the Westchester County Department of Public Safety, individuals with law enforcement and criminal justice backgrounds, the Executive Director and members of the Westchester County Human Rights Commission, as well as black clergy, legal aid, County legislators, nonprofit organizations and criminal justice advocates. Co-chaired by Leroy Frazer and Mayo Bartlett, the Task Force has been charged with performing a comprehensive review of current deployments, strategies and procedures at the County Department of Public Safety, and with public input, developing a more modernized plan to improve the Department.
Westchester County Executive George Latimer said: “In Westchester County, we are committed as a County government to take action that is within our authority and within our jurisdiction. Over the past several months our Task Force has made significant progress, reviewing in great detail our current police policies, and developing ways to make our practices refreshed and new again. We salute the many men and women who put on their uniform each day to protect us and perform the highest level of services. And we will also make sure that every police officer, new or old, understands how we avoid and place racism or any bias behavior while they are on duty.”
The Task Force has been broken up into six working groups to tackle important and specific components of policing and police reform: Transparency, Accountability, Community Engagement, Training and Equipment, Qualification and Recruitment, Policies and Procedures. Since July, the Task Force has met twice, conducted several virtual and in-person public forums, and each Task Force member has participated in ongoing meetings with their corresponding working groups.
The following are available from the Task Force’s first round of in-person and virtual forums conducted in August 2020. This information is readily available and will be updated on Police Reform and Reimagining Task Force.
In-person forums
Mount Kisco
New Rochelle
Yonkers
White Plains
Peekskill
Public On-line Forums
Westchester County Police Reform and Reimagining Task Force Aug. 13, 2020 and Aug. 18, 2020.
In response to an Executive Order signed by Governor Cuomo, the Task Force will finalize a report on police reform by the end of 2020 to be submitted to the County Executive for his review. In return, the County Executive will send the report to the Westchester County Board of Legislators for their review and legislative approval in early 2021.
The next round of in-person public forums will be held on Tuesday, Oct. 27 from 6 to 8 p.m. at the following locations:
Mount Vernon
Dole Center
250 South Sixth Avenue
Mount Vernon, NY 10550
Cortlandt
The Muriel H. Morabito Community Center
29 Westbrook Drive
Cortlandt, NY 10567
White Plains
Eastview Middle School Auditorium
350 Main Street
White Plains, NY 10601
Original source can be found here.
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