On 09/15/16, This Stops Today Harrisburg members attended a City Council Meeting for the Public Safety Committee. During this meeting the Public Safety Committee members (Cornelius Johnson, Westburn Majors, and Ben Allatt), Mayor Eric Papenfuse, Police Chief Thomas Carter, Sergeant Gabriel Olivera, and Police Captain Deric Moody were all in attendance to discuss actions taken/to be taken by the City of Harrisburg and Harrisburg Police Department to better protect our citizens. Some of the TSTH members took the time to jot down their reactions to the meeting. Here’s what some of us had to say:
DISCLAIMER: {We would like to acknowledge that this post is huge. A lot happened at this meeting and the thought of condensing all of these well formed reactions seemed to be a disservice to those who took the time to write them. Happy Reading!}
Anonymous A:
Mayor Papenfuse, Chief Carter, Captain Olivera, and the members of Public Safety Committee of City Council prove once again that they are entirely incapable of acting in the interest of the residents in Harrisburg by citing lack of money and external forces for the abuses of their Harrisburg police force.
As the FOP collective bargaining negotiations are underway, Harrisburg activist collective, This Stops Today Harrisburg, pressed these members of local governance for transparency in the negotiations and specific additions toward transparency in the police complaint records and processing of complaints and functional, holistic and ongoing training for police officers around mental crisis intervention, de-escalation, and emotional self-regulation.
All that was received was a series of excuses.
The Mayor continues to rely on the desire to spend money for excessive equipment as if that were a solution – while also leaning heavily on the lack of money in the budget; City Councilperson Johnson echoes the mayor’s ineptitude around the issues by describing grant writing work for items that are not at all attending to the culture of brutality in HPD’s force. Councilperson Allat echoes the finger pointing by saying Council can do nothing, higher legislative bodies are at work. The Captain skirts the problems with officer training by citing irrelevant stories; while Chief Carter in the deluded and self-martyring tactic we see often, attempts to distract from the systemic issue by taking all the blame.
All these excuses are meant to deflate and distract from the issue at hand – The Mayor, Chief, Captain and Council should be advocating for the simple changes to the FOP collective bargaining agreement that will ensure a long-term culture change and transparency in the HPD. These changes require no extensive work toward raising money, grant writing or buying new equipment. These changes can be sourced from the resources that already exist and already have been offered here in Dauphin County.
But they clearly won’t work for us at the bargaining table, and they will sure as shit tell you it’s not their fault.
Anonymous B:
“We shoot to eliminate the threat not to wound” (stated by member of HPD) This sounds like a direct reflection of the visible militarization of HPD.
Chief Carter calls for ‘call of duty’ style simulation training instead of real de-escalation training. The training places officers in different scenarios where they must decide whether to use their taser, nightclub, or gun to kill.
One of the many problems is officers are not being trained to diffuse situations but instead are just taught what kind of force to use. So basically police officers will be trained in more diverse ways to brutalize the citizens instead of actually learning ways that it can better protect and serve. Chief Carter drew comparisons of HPD to soldiers in a war to defend the trigger happy culture of killer cops, showing how deeply flawed the view HPD has of it’s citizens. Instead of people who they are sworn to protect, we are deemed as participants in a war, meaning if any citizen is deemed to be a threat to the officer the threat is eliminated.
This is not an unfamiliar narrative. In West Virginia, officer Stephen Mader was fired for refusing to shoot a black man with an unloaded gun. Across the country and in Harrisburg officers are not only encouraged, but mandated to use lethal force. A pattern that I not disrupted will lead to more deaths by the hands of police.
Anonymous C:
There was discussion of the utilization of a mobile unit for mental health related calls, we discussed the lack of interagency communication. Police claim to utilize the mobile unit. However, HPD failed to do so for Shaleek Pinckney (black Harrisburg resident recently killed by HPD) (news reported him as having mental health issues and recurring involvement with law enforcement and thus would have been a perfect opportunity to dispatch the mobile unit).
Having a “hard job” is not an acceptable excuse or reasoning for complacency and attempts to stifle social/political change. Harrisburg is a small city that is a shining example of social, political and economic failure and I understand that this didn’t happen overnight and that it won’t be fixed overnight. With that said, remaining inflexible when it comes to implementing new policies and procedures and leaning on systems that are broken will not aid this city in it’s healing. When we appeal on behalf of Harrisburg’s most vulnerable, council, mayor and police are rigid in their belief that the rules are too complicated and impossible to change. However, when the rules need amended/changed/created for those investing in the city, rules are easily changed. Maybe we need to ask how much it costs to get the rules changed?
Police/Council/Mayor want to implement “public safety committee”, Carter stated at one point, that the individuals “chosen” for this committee must be “qualified”. If council/mayor/police are hand selecting the would-be committee members and responsible for defining “qualified”, my concerns are that they will choose people who are complacent and likely to go along with their agendas. How do we equalize the opportunity for appropriate representation in the aforementioned committee?
Concerning the police applying for grant to receive training program that will aid them in deciding what kind of force to use/extent of force to use: Officer Moody stated that when this virtual reality program is obtained by HPD, that officers will be able to access it in their down time (I believe the example was 4am during the winter), so the program won’t even be mandatory. Essentially, officers will be able to play a round of Call of Duty when they’re bored, which we all know is unacceptable in light of how they were just complaining about being so short staffed (unable to maintain records/logs/unable to function entirely because they are so short staffed). I’m concerned about the psychologically implications involved in the usage of such technology, the dehumanization of these interactions (via the simulations) is not going to better prepare an officer for a hostile situation, it will only aid in further detachment and could potentially lead an officer to be more likely use excessive force when responding to a real world call. Also, Officer Moody said they will be able to go back and study an individual officer’s metrics during the simulation and that they will be able to give feedback based on said metrics… wishful thinking for a department that can’t even maintain a cohesive log of complaints.
Anonymous D:
I am appalled that for more than 30 years our city has failed to do anything about police-community relations or use of force policies. In 1987, the city statute regarding police was amended by city council to require a yearly report by the police chief on police complaints. In 2009, city council created a police community relations group. Several months ago, city council required that the police chief make a report to council quarterly on citizen complaints against police. These are not just simple oversights, but rather an appalling miscarriage of justice and the highest abuse of public trust. This is an issue larger than three Mayors and countless city councils and police chief, but rather and illustration of a serious overall structural problem within our city. These proposed changes were created because people died. Clearly, people are continuing to die at the hands of police. This is unacceptable. The Public Safety Committee members seem to think that the 2009 police Advisory Board proposal will soften the police’s image in the community and provide a way to work for trust. More than 450 people signed a petition requesting the development of a citizen complaint review board, not some Advisory board to make the police look good. We are not interested in softening the image of police. We want real reform. We want transparency.
Anonymous E:
I walked out of this meeting feeling that City Council, Mayor Papenfuse, and Chief Carter & Sergeant Olivera made far too many excuses. They were quick to pass the blame down to those before them, and often quick to dismiss any issues that we brought up as symptoms of a broken system that goes beyond any of their control. They seemed far too satisfied to sit there and tell us that they’re operating within a very flawed and broken system, while at the same time, displaying an unwillingness to get off of the fence and help us to work towards changing that flawed system. Eventually, they’re going to have to tell us whether they’re with us or against us, whether they’re happy operating within this system or want to help change it, because simply telling us that there’s nothing that they can do is unacceptable.
Anonymous F:
During the City Council Meeting, Captain Olivera unknowingly pointed out the lack of mental health awareness. While discussing mental health, a TSTH activist pointed out an incident that was witness involving police officers and two men with Autism Spectrum Disorder who are nonverbal. When asked if HPD was prepared and trained on dealing with issues like this, Olivera responded that yes, HPD has experience in this area. He followed up by sharing a story about officers talking a man down on the Walnut Street bridge, alluding to this man being suicidal. THESE ARE NOT THE SAME THINGS. Dealing with someone who is nonverbal is not the same as talking down someone who is suicidal. While Mayor Papenfuse, Chief Carter, and Captain Olivera seemed to be attempting to present answers, this, in turn, pointed to a bigger problem that must be immediately addressed. Not only is there a lack of training on how to deal with mental illness and disabilities, there is a lack of basic understanding that not all mental illnesses or disabilities are the same.
Also, while discussing mental health, Harrisburg City Council provided the phone number for Crisis Intervention Services. Why is this number not on a magnet in the home of every person in Harrisburg? The number is not easily accessible, and not an easy number to remember. In fact, it took me nearly 10 minutes to find the number on the Dauphin County Website. This type of information must be readily available and easily accessible to the population. In an emergency, how is one expected to spend any amount of time searching for a phone number? Get this information in the hands of everyone in the community.
Anonymous G:
Who specifically is doing the negotiation of the FOP contract? What person(s)?
Demands have been presented to FOP and City already, what have they done w/ it?
The lack of a residency requirement for HPD was blamed on receivership. So, then it’s not something we’re bound to and should be easily to changed.
Concerning paid leave for officers who have killed someone, we’re asking that the collective bargaining agreement be changed.
On Training- How much time do you spend learning to “stop the threat”? What tactics are emphasized?(firearms vs. mental health/anti-racism etc)
On Recruiting: The collective bargaining agreement is not a recruiting tool. Low enrollment has many factors, including by your own admission, low pay. The public will not lower our standards because of the city’s failure to recruit adequate/qualified employees.
Where are the reports on citizen complaints against HPD?
We would like to see a report of HPD’s arrest demographics.
this stops today harrisburg 