Charter Commission vote stalls City Council from getting police reform on ballot
By David Pierini staff reporter
The Minneapolis Charter Commission voted Wednesday to take an additional 90 days to review a Minneapolis City Council amendment that would disband the current police department.
The 10-5 vote keeps the charter amendment proposal off the Nov. 3 ballot.
“These are things that can be done under the current charter that would be significant changes,” said Peter Ginder, the commission’s secretary. “So I think both the City Council and the charter commission needs to do their respective jobs to study this issue. If our goal is to transform a failed system, let's do it thoughtfully and create a system that has the greatest likelihood of being a successful new paradigm for public safety.”
A charter amendment could find its way on a ballot next year.
Charter Commission members had been hinting reluctance over the City Council’s rush to a ballot proposal, which was prompted by the police killing of George Floyd on May 25 and the cry from activists around the world to once and for all to address the racism and brutal force they say is rampant in police culture.
A cell phone video captured the final moments of Floyd’s life. It showed Officer Derek Chauvin pressing his knee down on Floyd’s neck for eight minutes and 46 seconds. Chauvin and three other officers at the scene were later fired and charged in Floyd’s death, which sparked global unrest.
On June 26, the City Council unanimously approved changing the city charter so that it could defund and dismantle the current police force in favor of a new Department of Public Safety and Violence Prevention.
Council members needed to have a decision by Aug. 15, the deadline for the proposal to reach the November ballot.
A poll commissioned by The Fairness Project and the American Civil Liberties Union found 61 percent of Minneapolis voters in support of the charter change. The survey polled 668 people during one week in July.
But many residents have expressed confusion over the idea of “dismantling” and some, including North Minneapolis residents, fear the wave of crime would only grow if police were eliminated.
Lisa Clemons, a retired police officer who funded the violence prevention group A Mother’s Love, favors strong police reform but has been an outspoken critic of the City Council’s move to defund and disband.
“The Minneapolis City Council has put no real time in weighing the danger of dismantling/abolishing the police,” Clemons wrote in a Facebook post last month. “This, no matter what perfume they spray on it, will get people killed.”
Many activists, from Nekima Levy-Armstrong to Al Flowers, were upset, saying the council did not fully engage the community before voting on a ballot language for a charter amendment.
Had the Charter Commission voted outright to not recommend the proposed amendment, the council could have voted to place it on the November ballot anyway.
Commissioners Al-Giraud-Isaacson, Christopher Smith, Andrea Rubenstein, Jan Sandberg and Toni Newborn voted “No” on the issue. Smith and Newborn wanted the voters to decide on the proposed charter amendment.
“We have a right to demand change,” said Newborn, who is Black. “A lot of our black and brown and indigenous and LatinX communities have been abused and have died at the hands of police in this country and in the city for far too long. I think the residents of the city must be at the table to change the system and change how policing is done here in Minneapolis.”
Ginder was joined by Chairman Barry Clegg, Gregory Abbott, Dan Cohen, Jill Garcia, Lyall Schwarzkopf, Andrew Kozak, Barbara Lickness, Jana Metge and Matt Perry in voting to further review the charter request. .
On Twitter, City Council President Lisa Bender called the Commission’s vote disappointing. “(It) creates barriers to change but it will not stop our work to re-imagine public safety in Minneapolis.”