More muscle needed to police the police
Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
Following the arrest of six Philadelphia police officers on corruption charges, the Committee of Seventy has called for the creation of a powerful and permanent Police Advisory Commission. This permanent commission would replace the current one, which was created by executive order in 1994 by then-Mayor Ed Rendell and has been called “toothless” by critics and “ineffective” by its own commissioners. The Police Advisory Commission investigates allegations of police misconduct and makes recommendations for disciplinary action.
A proposed City Charter amendment to create an independent commission has languished in City Council’s Law and Government Committee since its introduction in March 2012. While that proposal would create a somewhat more powerful commission, the police commissioner would still be able to ignore its disciplinary recommendations. In other cities, such as Chicago, the police oversight boards’ recommendations are more binding.
Philly’s current Police Advisory Commission oversees Philadelphia’s 6,600 police officers with a staff of four and a $283,000 budget. Compared to the police oversight boards in other major cities, the local commission is tiny. In Washington, D.C., the Police Complaints Board has a $2 million budget for overseeing fewer than 4,000 officers. New York’s Civilian Complaint Review Board has a budget of $12.75 million and 167 employees, including about 100 investigators; Philly’s PAC has just two investigators.
As the Committee of Seventy noted in its news release last week, Philadelphia paid almost $14 million in 2013 to settle civil rights lawsuits, up from $8.3 million in 2012. Wednesday’s indictments will likely mean more costly litigation. Could it be that spending a bit more to police the police could end up saving Philadelphia more in the long run?
