Vancouver city officials reach agreement with police union over body cameras
After two years of analysis, political discussion, negotiation and a dedicated task force, the Vancouver Police Department receives body cameras.
The city and police union announced an agreement this week on guidelines for the use of the cameras.
These guidelines are usually the hardest part of implementing a body-worn camera program. They set important guidelines, such as: B. when an officer has to activate his camera, when he is allowed to see his own footage and when the public is allowed to see footage.
Washington County’s Assistant Sheriff Jarrod McCreary is seen using the department’s new body camera system in Hillsboro, Oregon on March 8, 2021.
Jonathan Levinson / OPB
Calls for greater law enforcement accountability in southwest Washington have increased in recent years. Vancouver police shot dead four people and killed three of them within two months of 2019. And the Clark County Sheriff’s Office MPs killed two people last year, Jenoah Donald and Kevin Peterson, Jr. Peterson was shot running away from police during a drug downturn, and Donald was shot unarmed and shot during a traffic stop.
Clark County leaders approved a body camera program for the Sheriff’s Office earlier this year.
“What we are seeing is disproportionate policing, disproportionate use of force,” Shareefah Hoover, a member of the city’s Community Task Force on Policing, told the OPB in March. “We have a sample of black men here, a very small percentage of the Clark County’s population, whose lives are taken much more frequently than the general population.”
Hoover said at the time that she was pushing for guidelines that would have significant ramifications if violated. The policy released this week does not cover any disciplinary action or consequences for officers who fail to activate a camera, other than saying that there will be a month or 16-shift amnesty period after the cameras are released.
The Body Camera Guidelines The Vancouver Police Department embraced frustrated supporters of police accountability who hoped the body cameras would result in meaningful surveillance.
Officers involved in an incident involving violence are allowed to view body cameras before making a statement or writing their report, which police unions usually advocate. The policy is in line with the recommendations of the Police Executive Research Forum, an external group mandated by Vancouver to implement the recommendations of the police policy.
This policy contradicts the recommendations made by the US Department of Justice civil rights attorneys regarding body cameras. The federal prosecutors overseeing police reforms in Portland are urging city officials to pass policies banning this practice and requiring officials to write their reports first and then allow them to modify their report if necessary after viewing the footage have viewed.
“This is not your individual subjective memory of what happened,” said Jonas Geissler, a senior litigator with the DOJ’s civil rights division, while discussing recommendations for the Portland Police Department. “It really undermines the objective nature that the constitutional test for use of force is: the threat, severity and resistance that the officer encountered at the time of the use of force.”
Kevin Peterson Sr., gray hoodie, leads a march on December 6, 2020 to protest his son’s death by police weeks ago. Peterson Jr. died after three police officers shot him to death during a botched drug bomb outside Vancouver.
Troy Brynelson / OPB
The guidelines were disappointing to parishioners, who had spent the past year working with city officials as they analyzed the Police Executive Research Forum’s 84 recommendations.
“The goal of putting a body camera on an officer was only part of what we wanted,” said Ed Hamilton Rosales, a member of the Vancouver Community Task Force on Policing and president of the Southwest Washington Council for the League of United Latin American Citizens. “If the police officer is not accountable for his actions beyond these cameras, we have simply spent a lot of money on a device that is not doing us any good.”
Hamilton Rosales said when the task force asked Vancouver Police Chief James McElvain what consequences officers would have if the policy were violated, McElvain told them it was not a problem.
“The police chief’s response was, ‘My officers know if it’s a directive they will,'” said Hamilton Rosales. “What we all know is a lie.”
According to the MoU signed by the city and the police union, footage of Vancouver officials will be made available to the public through requests for admission. There are safeguards in place for the editing of footage in the event of sexual assault, domestic violence and other vulnerable victims, as well as for people living in mental crisis or medical emergencies.
“I feel like I wasted a year of my time hoping for something that will never happen,” said Hamilton Rosales.
Research on body cameras has shown that it has mixed results in reducing negative results with the police. In departments with questionable use of force and other disciplinary problems, body cameras can dramatically reduce the use of force and public complaints.
In less problematic departments, their impact can be negligible.
As part of the agreement for the cameras, officers will also receive a raise “to cope with the impact of implementing the police camera program and the medium-term changes in working conditions”. Before setting these guidelines, officials should receive a 3% raise on January 1, 2022. Now their salary will increase by 5%. Sergeants who originally wanted a 4% increase will now receive a 6% increase.
Vancouver has budgeted $ 3 million for the body camera program and is expected to receive $ 1.5 million in federal funding. The program is scheduled to start in the first quarter of 2022.