New Haven Needs an All-Civilian Review Board & Sanctuary City Ordinance

It’s time for New Haven to establish real protections for our city residents who have been marked and targeted by aggressive law enforcement. This includes redressing a long and devastating history of police brutality against our black and brown communities. It includes implementing measures to protect those at special risk under the Trump regime.

President Trump came into office inheriting a system where 1 in 3 people will be arrested by the age of 23, where nearly 1 in 100 people are currently in jail or prison, and where a black person is killed by law enforcement or a vigilante on average every 28 hours. The failed war on drugs, stop and frisk, and decades of over-policing have devastated black and brown communities.

New Haven must take immediate steps to protect undocumented and other non-citizen residents from harmful immigration enforcement and to reduce the over-policing and criminalization of black people, immigrant communities, and other people of color. Under the current administration, just being suspected of a crime is grounds for incarceration and deportation. The Board of Alders must enact two policies now to safeguard communities of color from police violence, mass incarceration, and deportation:

1. Adopt the Malik Jones All-Civilian Review Board proposal, submitted to the Board of Alders on April 5th, 2017, to create a CRB that:
Is independent of the New Haven Police Department and Police Commission.
Has the power to conduct its own investigations.
Uses the Board of Alder's subpoena power to compel testimony;
Allows for public participation in an open and transparent process to select its members.

2. Adopt the New Haven Sanctuary City Ordinance. In 2006, the New Haven police chief adopted General Order 06-2 to ensure that NHPD would not ask about immigration status. While that measure has improved public safety by building trust between police and immigrant communities, it is ten years out of date. By enacting the Sanctuary City Ordinance now, the Board of Alders will:
Apply the "don't ask, don't tell" policy to all city employees, not just police officers
Bar city employees from enforcing federal programs that require registration of individuals based on race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or national origin
Forbid the city from executing warrantless detentions at the request of ICE
Create accountability by requiring the city to publish and investigate complaints