City, Community to Voluntarily 'Refresh' Historic Policing Collaborative Agreement

15-year-old Agreement serves as model for police-community relations

CINCINNATI – The City of Cincinnati and members of the community will come together to revisit and refresh the historic Collaborative Agreement (CA) that has served as a national model for police-community relations for more than a decade.

Cincinnati is a safer city, with less crime and fewer arrests since the signing of the CA nearly 15 years ago. However, since the conclusion of the CA nine years ago and while most of the reforms remain in place, some have been given less priority due to leadership changes and budget challenges.

As a result, the City and community members both recognize the collective need to examine the original details of the CA in order to identify any gaps and barriers, utilize lessons learned, and take successes to the next level.

• READ FYI ON COLLABORATIVE AGREEMENT REFRESH
• WATCH PRESS CONFERENCE BELOW

“Our City’s police community relations and Collaborative Agreement have been heralded by U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch as a national role model,” said Mayor John Cranley. “Fourteen years later I have called for a voluntary refresh to continue this historic accord and address modern issues that our Police officers face today.  I want to thank Saul Green for coming back to Cincinnati to help us accomplish this goal.”

“Given the issues surrounding police-community relations across the nation, it is more important now than ever that Cincinnati remain ahead of the curve,” added City Manager Harry Black. “The strong partnerships and experience we’ve worked to establish over the years has positioned us to move the needle forward.”

Attorney Saul Green, who served as the court-appointed, independent monitor for the five-year period following the commencement of the original Agreement is being enlisted again by the City to help accomplish this refresher. Between now and February 2018, Mr. Green and his team will work with the City, community representatives and other partners on four primary components:

• Evaluation and Accountability. Establishing and implementing a standardized, accountable evaluation process on the plan’s provisions including community problem-oriented policing, biased-free policing, arrests, risk management, training, the Citizens Complain Authority (CCA), and community input.
• Community Engagement. Enhancing the role of the CCA by utilizing them as a neutral party to ensure strong community engagement as an essential component in managing public safety and community problem oriented policing.
• Independent Review. Mr. Green and his team will conduct a CA review and provide the City with a progress report identifying areas for further scrutiny, recommendations and feedback.
• Action Steps. The City will work with Mr. Green, community and CA agreement stakeholders to develop specific action steps and completion timetable to include a reporting template.

Critical to this work will be the Manager’s Advisory Group (MAG), created at the conclusion of the original Agreement to provide the City with critical feedback and oversight of community policing efforts. The MAG will continue to play a key role in CA refresh and beyond.

“Under the Collaborative, policing in Cincinnati has become much more transparent.  I commend the City for voluntarily undertaking this public review,” said Al Gerhardstein, a local civil rights attorney and MAG member. “All the stakeholders who helped establish the Collaborative will learn of our successes and continuing challenges.”

Background

In April 2002, the City entered into the historic CA in order to resolve pending litigation alleging discrimination and excessive force in policing. The agreement was entered into Federal Court and included the City, the U.S. Department of Justice, the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), and various community stakeholders. The focus included the development, implementation and monitoring of:

• A Community Problem-Oriented Policing strategy;
• A mutual accountability evaluation Plan;
• Use of force policies, incident documentation, investigations and reviews;
• Fair, equitable and courteous treatment for all including a commitment to statistically bias-free policing; and
• Independent civilian review process (CCA)

This agreement – and the subsequent work to institutionalize its recommendations – now serves as a best-in-class model for communities throughout the nation.

The City developed a CA Plan in order to ensure sustainability and institutionalization of the recommendations once federal monitoring concluded in 2008.