Sacramento City Councilman Allen Warren released details of a plan he's developed to increase police officer accountability and transparency.
Warren said the opinions African-Americans have of the police are generally based on personal, second-hand, and even perceived experiences with law enforcement. He added that those opinions persist because members of the black community in Sacramento know very little about the people who are part of the police force. "African Americans cannot distinguish one officer from another," Warren wrote in a media statement.
"Currently, the African American community feels that policing in America is prone to abuse," he claimed. "Therefore, they distrust the police. All too often, African Americans put all the police in one box labeled ‘the police are generally bad for black people.’ However, not all officers are bad; so, the good officers get painted with the same brush as the bad officers."
The Councilman believes one way to improve relations with the police is to allow the people they serve to evaluate officers. That approach offers residents an opportunity to provide positive or negative feedback and could influence whether someone should remain on the force and who should be promoted.
To that end, Warren suggests an ordinance requiring every officer to give a business card to anyone who is stopped for any reason.
He wants the card to contain the name and badge number of the officer, an 800 number to call with comments, and the question, ‘How's my policing?'
All comments made via the 800 number would be automatically stored with the Sacramento Community Police Review Commission and the Sacramento Police Department.
Mayor Darrell Steinberg previously recommended the creation of an Inspector General to independently investigate officer-related shootings and use-of-force incidents that result in serious bodily injury or death. That person would also report to the CPRC.