Police Reform
Find an article in your local newspaper about a local policy issue that affects you. For example, an article concerning your county’s decision to privatize your trash collection service. Summarize the article and explain how this issue affects you. Is the article neutral? Why or why not? How might you influence this policy in the future?
In mid-2020, the US experienced an unprecedented move; the people took to the streets to protest police brutality. The anti-racist protests that dominated both the new and old media in the weeks following the murder of George Floyd denounced much more than the violent and racist (indeed murderous) policing in the US and many countries across the globe. The protests that began in Minneapolis began in despair, pain, and rage and quickly spread and evolved into militant force and creative anger. Beyond the violence meted out by police, the protests called out and denounced the many centers of institutional, economic, and political power that trampled black lives while they reinforced white supremacy. An article published in February of 2021 highlights the Rockland Sheriff’s Office police report on police reforms.
Article Highlights
The article chosen for this analysis is from local media written by Lieberman (2021). In the article, the Rockland Sherriff’s Office unleashes its police reform report that recommends a variety of concepts that aim at improving the relations between persons in the non-white bracket and lessening the use of police force via training. The recommendations in the report include the Sherriff’s Department hiring more officers from ethnic backgrounds, equipping the police officers with bodycams, creating a complaint review board that comprises civilians, increasing police training so as to de-escalate interactions between police and civilians, and hiring mental health professionals to be responsive to reports of persons in crisis. The report, according to the article, recommends that the police work with local and state governments to bring about changes in the civil service system by hiring more non-whites, renumerating the Sheriff with a monthly salary that is equivalent to other departments so that more candidates are attracted into applying for the positions; providing community relations training, and funding the bodycams.
The Sheriff’s report came in response to the Governor of New York’s Executive Order 203, referred to as the New York State Police Reform and Reinvention Collaborative. In the order, the Governor asserts that all municipalities that have police departments should appoint a committee that includes civilians that will be tasked with reviewing police issues and procedures for the municipality to get state aid. Other municipalities in Rockland have also embarked on discussing similar diversity issues and escalation of conflict training to limit the use of force and abusive tactics. The article concludes by stating that the final reports from the municipalities should be presented by April 1st, 2021.
How the Policy on Proposed Police Reforms Affects Me
In my opinion, police reforms do not confront police, but instead, they attempt to include the community with rage and animosity toward the police. The reforms seek to resolve the community’s resentment and rage toward the police. The reforms are not motivated by the need to have a world free of police violence; instead, the driving force behind these reforms is the fear of a world free of policing. Reforms aim at restoring police legitimacy through the destruction of the protests against police’s legitimacy. The US policing has inherent violence in its very fabric, and when police argue that there are nice people in the force and a few ‘bad apples,’ it only highlights the obvious fact that it is not a problem of a few bad individuals. It is a problem of an oppressive and corrupt police system built on managing and controlling marginalized people while protecting their own interests.
These reforms affect me and the people of Rockland in that we shall pay more taxes to support the inherent violence. In a few years, we shall be met with more proposals for police policy, which again will mean more of the taxpayer’s money financing the wrong policy.
Neutrality of the Article
The article is not neutral as it talks about police reforms that lock out the public perspective on the same. Police reforms fail to confront the police, and instead, this is another way to get the police more funding to carry on with their animosity against the people they are supposed to protect. When the police suggest reforms on police, there is likely to be a lot of bias. The Sheriff’s office should have included civilians when writing the proposed changes because doing so would bring a different perspective on the solution. If I, for example, had been involved as a civilian in writing the report, I would not have suggested the use of bodycams; the police already have these, and yet brutality still happens. I would instead propose that the municipality channels more funds into community spaces that would help the minority communities to grow in creativity and enhance their skills. Doing so would subsequently minimize the rate of poverty, increase employment, and reduce crime rates. An explanation of how this would be achieved is beyond the scope of this paper.
How I Might Influence This Policy in The Future
Instead of these reforms, I would propose those that advocate for the same. Some of the reforms I would advocate for are victims of police violence reparations requiring police officers to be individually accountable and cover the costs of death and violence claims; divesting and redirecting the funds to finance social programs; disarm the police, and dissolution of the local police department; oversight committees granted the power to investigate discipline and even fire administrators and officers; and greater transparency. Although these reforms will not totally eliminate police brutality, they strip police of power and refuse to accept reforms that only enable the police to become a financially enabled and acceptable brutal force.
Reference
Lieberman, S. (2021, February 26th). Rockland Sheriff’s police reform proposal: More diversity, training, community relations. Lohud. https://www.lohud.com/story/news/local/rockland/2021/02/26/police-reform-rockland-sheriffs-office-report/6817670002/
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Question 
Week 1 Assignment: Current Event – Local Issue
Submit Assignment
Police Reform
- Due Mar 7 by 11:59pm
- Points 100
- Submitting a file upload
Required Resources
Read/review the following resources for this activity:
- Textbook: Chapters 1, 2
- Lesson
- Local newspaper
- APA style manual
- Citation and Writing Assistance: Writing Papers At CU(Links to an external site.)
- Library Overview(Links to an external site.)
- How to Search for Articles – the Everything Tab(Links to an external site.)
Instructions
Find an article in your local newspaper about a local policy issue that affects you. For example, an article concerning your county’s decision to privatize your trash collection service. Summarize the article and explain how this issue affects you. Is the article neutral? Why or why not? How might you influence this policy in the future?
Be sure to include a scanned copy of the article in your submission in addition to citations. There are several free scannable apps on the market such as Scannable. If printing is an obstacle, you may include a hyperlink to the article. However, if the link breaks or can not be accessed the burden falls on you to produce that article or to risk losing points.
I live in Rockland County , New York (example: one of the local news paper is the Rockland Journal News)
Articles may not be more than one month old.
Writing Requirements (APA format)
- Length: 3 full pages (not including title page or references page)
- 1-inch margins
- Double spaced
- 12-point Times New Roman font
- Title page
- References page
Grading
This activity will be graded based on the Current Event Grading Rubric.
Course Outcomes (CO): 1
Due Date: By 11:59 p.m. MT on Sunday
Rubric
POLI330 Week 1 Current Event Gradiing Rubric (100 pts)
| POLI330 Week 1 Current Event Gradiing Rubric (100 pts) | |||||||
| Criteria | Ratings | Pts | |||||
| This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeIdentifies local newspaper article |
|
5 pts | |||||
| This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeSummarization |
|
25 pts | |||||
| This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeIdentifies How Affected |
|
25 pts | |||||
| This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeIdentifies How They Influence issue |
|
25 pts | |||||
| This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeSource Evaluation |
|
10 pts | |||||
| This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeAPA: Citation and Reference Formatting |
|
5 pts | |||||
| This criterion is linked to a Learning OutcomeWriting |
|
5 pts | |||||
| Total Points: 100 | |||||||
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