From xxxxxx <[email protected]>
Subject We Urgently Need a Transformative Approach to Public Safety
Date November 11, 2021 5:30 AM
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[ Black Lives Matter demands we upend it and dare to imagine and
build new systems that invest deeply in resources: like youth
programs, good jobs, mental healthcare, housing…resources that
actually make our communities safe.] [[link removed]]

WE URGENTLY NEED A TRANSFORMATIVE APPROACH TO PUBLIC SAFETY  
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Dr. Melina Abdullah
November 5, 2021
Medium
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_ Black Lives Matter demands we upend it and dare to imagine and
build new systems that invest deeply in resources: like youth
programs, good jobs, mental healthcare, housing…resources that
actually make our communities safe. _

A man marches with a child on his shoulders during a Juneteenth
celebration in New York., Frank Franklin II/AP

 

On Tuesday, October 26, Black Lives Matter joined fellow civil rights
leaders to engage with and discuss tangible policy proposals to
transform current approaches to public safety with senior officials
from the White House and the Department of Justice
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While we appreciate the invitation to speak and discuss solutions, we
call on the White House to be courageous as it moves towards Executive
Action to move us towards the kind of transformation that this moment
demands — the kind of transformation that the spirits of George
Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Dijon Kizzee, Wakiesha Wilson, Andrew Joseph
III, and so many others demand. A transformational approach to public
safety requires that we not expend energy tinkering around the edges
of a fundamentally unjust system, but we upend it and dare to imagine
and build new systems that invest deeply in resources: like youth
programs, good jobs, mental healthcare, housing…resources that
actually make our communities safe.

The murders of Jonny Bonta, Andres Guardado, Mona Rodriguez, and so
many others remind us that police violence is not only a Black issue.
Still, police disproportionately target and commit acts of violence
and murder against Black people. We must not confuse the impact that
unjust policing has on society as a whole, with a strategy of
deracialization, which invisibilizes the harm that Black people
experience.

Priorities that we outlined in our recent meeting with the
Biden-Harris Administration include:

END QUALIFIED IMMUNITY
We uplift the name #AndrewJosephIII, a 14-year-old child who was
killed on February 7, 2014 in Tampa, Florida as he attended “Student
Day” at the Hillsborough County Fair. His family has been blocked
from a day in court for more than seven years through police claims of
qualified immunity and sovereign immunity. We call for an end to the
unjust legal doctrine of qualified immunity which allows corrupt
police to evade responsibility.

REQUIRED DATA COLLECTION & REPORTING
Establish a national database to which all law enforcement agencies
are required to report data on stops, searches, arrests, uses of
force, and killings, and make all data and analysis public.

REMOVAL OF POLICE FROM SCHOOLS
We uplift the name #MonaRodriguez, an 18-year-old student and young
mother who was killed by Long Beach school police on September 27,
2021 as she fled an after-school fight. We call for the removal of all
police from school campuses, and are joined in this position by
organizations that include March for Our Lives, Students Deserve, and
ACLU and are supported by research that demonstrates that the presence
of police on campus does not create safer schools; resources like
counseling, librarians, nurses, supportive services, and smaller
classes do.

AUTOMATIC ACCESS TO VICTIMS OF VIOLENCE CRIME RESOURCES
Make families of those killed by police automatically eligible for
victims of violent crime funds.

FAMILY NOTIFICATION REQUIREMENT FOR IN-CUSTODY DEATHS
We uplift the name #WakieshaWilson, a 37-year-old Black mother who was
killed inside Los Angeles Metropolitan Detention Center on March 27,
2016. Her family was never notified and her mother only discovered
that Wakiesha died inside the jail after four days of searching. A
family notification requirement would mean the immediate notification
of families when their loved one is killed or dies in-custody.

PROGRAM ELIMINATIONS/MORATORIUMS

* Eliminate (or place a moratorium on) the Department of Defense 1033
Program;
* Eliminate (or place a moratorium on) the Department of Defense
1122 Program;
* Eliminate (or place a moratorium on) all Community Oriented
Policing Services (COPS) program funding, especially funding that
supports police in schools and the COPS Hiring Program;
* Eliminate the Project Safe Neighborhoods Program, which floods
communities with law enforcement rather than services and encourages
federal prosecutions for offenses carrying harsh mandatory minimums;
* Dissolve the DOJ Denaturalization Section;
* End civil asset forfeiture by DOJ agencies; and
* Eliminate (or place a moratorium on) life in prison or death
sentence for juveniles (under the age of 18).

ADVANCING LIFE-AFFIRMING APPROACHES TO COMMUNITY SAFETY
Incentivize alternatives to police as part of a fundamental
reimagining of public safety in cities and states. Using an Executive
Order, President Biden should establish a Division of Community Safety
within the Department of Health and Human Services, which would focus
on community safety using a non-carceral perspective — one that
treats community safety as a matter of public health.

We call on the Biden-Harris Administration to support passage of the
BREATHE Act, which divests from the systems that harm Black people and
invests in our communities through education, health, housing,
infrastructure, environmental justice, and economic justice. For
years, advocates have asked policymakers to begin making a paradigm
shift — one that invests in communities, not carceral systems, to
keep people safe.

We must continue to uplift the importance of speaking the words
“Black Lives Matter” and confronting the white supremacy embedded
in this nation’s system in policing head on. Black Lives Matter will
continue to fight, both in the streets and in the halls of government,
until we build a world where our people can live and walk freely. We
will continue to work alongside public leaders and remain a force in
our communities throughout the nation to advocate for meaningful
policies that reimagine and reform public safety.

We look forward to continuing to engage the government, to support
transformative change and vigorously challenge elected leaders when
they fall short.

_Dr. Melina Abdullah is Director of Black Lives Matter Grassroots and
LM Los Angeles_

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