DWIHN launches mobile app for accessing services; Board votes to place officer Julio Sinawi on leave without pay.
Good afternoon! Today at 3pm, I’ll be live tweeting the Detroit Board of Police Commissioner meeting for #DETdocumenters @media_outlier @wdet @freep @PlanetDetroit @BridgeDet313 @metrotimes @chalkbeatDET @MichiganRadio
01:44 PM Jan 26, 2023 CST
Follow along here: https://detroit.documenters.org/assignments/board-of-police-commissioners-5486/
Find meeting documents here: https://detroitmi.gov/events/board-police-commissioners-meeting-january-26-2023
The agenda says we’ll be listening to a presentation on Detroit Wayne Integrated Health Network.
It also looks like we’re going to have a closed session. https://t.co/UkL6d2HHkQ
BOPC has posted mental health calls for service again (they didn’t last week): https://t.co/nKh4HFTSCq
Commissioners Willie Bell and Burton are absent. Commissioner Lisa Carter has an excused absence.
Chair Ferguson said he sat in a roundtable about gun violence. He says it was a productive conversation but the problem won’t be solved overnight.
Commissioner Banks asked if Ferguson could share any of the solutions. Ferguson says the conversation was too complex to explain it all in the meeting.
Chair Ferguson is saying if any protests happen in Detroit, he asks they be peaceful and follow police orders. (I’m not sure what he’s anticipating protests around—gun violence maybe?)
We have an officer in place for Chief James White.
18 individuals in the department have tested positive for COVID and are isolating.
He says they set up a mental health “co-response” on Jan 17th from 11am to 7pm (I dont know if this was one day only or several says) and he says they’ve handled about 200 calls for services in the 8 hour span of time
Curious about what this mental health “co-response” is and what it means.
The officer speaking for White also said this gun violence roundtable was productive and “a lot of information came out.”
Found some information on the co-response team: https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/detroit-city/2022/12/14/detroit-police-expand-mental-health-operations/69727035007/ https://t.co/O8UXaugL08
Commissioner Bernard is asking about initiatives they’re taking for juvenile crime. She says she’s seeing an issue of juvenile crime across the country.
Last week, Chief White mentioned a “juvenile crime team” https://twitter.com/mostlikelyalex/status/1616172946313068560
The officer is saying they talked about this issue at that roundtable. He said they’re asking what they can do to help children.
Commissioner Burton is talking about an incident in Memphis where several Black officers killed a Black man, and says that “inhumane policing transcends race.”
He’s asking how they can make sure this doesn’t happen in Detroit.
The officer says they don’t accept these types of attitudes and take measures to identify misconduct behaviors early. It’s called a MAS or MASS team (not sure which).
He’s talking about the system, and how a report is taken and out into a system, then the department generates a report called “Peers” which automatically goes to command officers and supervisors to have intervention with that officer and track it on a regular basis.
Last spring, @violetikon wrote an article about how several DPD police officers with multiple misconduct incidents were let off the hook for years. https://www.deadlinedetroit.com/articles/30418/deeply_broken_how_detroit_lets_bad_cops_off_the_hook
Vice Chair Holt is reminding people that the BOPC has a Youth Advisory Committee, and says they may put on a forum in the near future.
- Person representing the friends of the Bowen Branch, and is talking about the hundreds of thousands of dollars missing from the Detroit Public Library and is asking DPD investigates the theft of money.
More info about the library theft from the @DetDocumenters newsletter: https://us16.campaign-archive.com/?u=238ce89c2891d9ccef2657f3e&id=7ad623b40c
- Minister Eric Blount is bringing up several recent issues in the police department, and the lack of truth, justice, accountability, and transparency in the department.
He mentions Chief White last week, who was talking about why he doesn’t release body camera footage, and Blount says people had to hit the streets to get the footage after police killed Hakim Littleton in 2020.
An entire thread of tweets failed to post and none of them went to my drafts. Awesome
There were a lot of tweets. I won’t be able to summarize it right now while catching this presentation.
The presenter saya partnerships are really important. These are some of those partnerships, including the Wayne County Sheriff’s office, DPD and other police departments, and courts. https://t.co/whfzXU6NoN
Ok the rest of the tweets are in my draft, but twitter wont let me post them because it thinks I already posted everything. So I’m screenshotting the tweets and posting the photos. https://twitter.com/mostlikelyalex/status/1618717890169167873 https://t.co/NOCz4BleEq
He says just because an officer has crisis intervention training, doesn’t mean a situation can’t still get dangerous.
We saw this happen with Porter Burkes who police killed despite having a crisis intervention officer present.
He’s talking about how many kids did not have access to technology when learning went remote. He says kids also didn’t have access to food without school in session. He says they offer food distribution services for people. https://t.co/G0WeTvMBuv
He’s pointing out that anyone can tap into their resources by using their app. He says it was launched last week. https://t.co/QX4CS9BtQw
He skipped a slide about putting children first, saying he needs to save time. He says he wants to be the organization where everyone knows who and were they are. https://t.co/0D8HYQstLB
This slide mentions the co-response team. DPD is partnering with DWIHN for this.
He recognizes that people need access to services before a crisis occurs and wants to do more outreach. https://t.co/kbBPNleCHT
He says the CIT is a tool that, “if used properly”, both people and officers can leave peacefully. He says sometimes bad things happened and claims this isn’t because the officer did anything wrong or because there is anything wrong with the training. https://t.co/y7jha6cWdG
The person managing the slides kept flipping through slides that we already went through while the presenter was talking.
Commissioner Pressley is asking about the CIT program, wondering if there’s a component where community citizens can learn crisis intervention training to help work mitigate issues in their own neighborhoods.
He said yes, then mentioned a Mental Health First Aid training, which is an 8 hour training in how to recognize symptoms of mental illness and substance use disorders.
Vice Chair Holt says she believes they were presented opportunities to take the Crisis Intervention Training.
Another rep, Andrea Smith, says there is an event Monday and Tuesday for CIT that is exclusive to police officers. She says the first aid training +
Commissioner Ferguson says he will be going to the Monday and Tuesday training.
Commissioner Banks asks if there are any “prayer warriors” because he says prayer changes things.
The presenter says they have a faith based committee, are connected with the faith based community, and Smith says they include various faiths.
Commissioner Burton says he’s felt like the community, including business community has training, but also thinks the BOPC should get into the 40 hour Crisis Intervention Training.
The presenter says the more people who know about their sources, the more people who can put the services to good use.
He says they want additional dollars to assist young children. He says he doesn’t currently see opportunities to employ young people. He wants to think about what resources 13-17 year olds need.
Commissioner Bernard is asking how many beds they have for inpatient treatment.
She also asks if they pay for the relationship/partnership with DPD and other police departments.
He says the state will be investing over $100 million into the building of a new mental hospital, not in Detroit.
He says they gave over 3000 residential beds, he also says they have different units with more beds.
Vice Chair Holt is asking if there is a discussion or statistics the Youth Advisory Panel could use because they want to make a forum for young people to participate.
Commissioner Holley says with a budget like what they have, there’s a “target on your back.”
Confused what he means by that.
Presenter data when the Republicans had control of both chambers, they worked very closely with the health plans to take over the delivery system of behavior health.
He’s going back to their services like delivering food, homework, or giving people a ride to receive services. He says people could call their mobile service to provide services they can’t drive to.
Commissioner Holley is asking if they are serving students outside the classroom, including serving children’s parents.
The presenter says they provide services to more than just the person in need, but everyone around them as well.
He says they are also educating mothers before delivering babies. He says they take care of mothers in abusive relationship.
Vice Chair Holt says the budget is available in the Board’s packets. She says they will present the budget next week.
Commissioner Banks is asking if they have any candidates for secretary or Chief Investigator.
He didn’t realize they were starting over in the process.
Chair Ferguson says they have 324 backlog cases, 7 investigators working on the backlog tomorrow (assuming this is referring to citizens complaints)
Commissioner Bernard is asking about the community outreach. She says people giving input to the department applying for a job should not be disqualified for the job. I think she mentioned discrimination.
Commissioner Burton is calling a point of order saying that was not true.
Chair Ferguson is making a correction, about the closed session. Change is: 8a Open Meetings act MCL 15.268 (h) https://t.co/hJIFUqm6r1
We’re going into closed session.
I’ll let you guys know when they come back.
Ok looks like we’re back. Right now they’re chatting amongst themselves, maybe waiting for people to get back in the room or something.
Will update when they get back to meeting business.
We’re reconvening at 6:25, and they’re about to vote.
The chief’s recommendation is to put the officer on unpaid leave with medical benefits.
Ferguson: Yes
Bernard: No
Burton: Yes
Moore: Yes
Hernandez: Yes
Holley: No
Pressley: Yes
5 yes votes, 2 no votes, motion passes.
If you find anything inaccurate, please email documenters@outliermedia.org with the subject “Correction Request”