On Thursday, March 25th, the New York City Council passed a package of police reform bills, as well as the mayor’s police reform and reinvention plan. These bills, including one that claims to end qualified immunity, were touted as major steps in reforming policing. But many say these bills will not create meaningful changes to the NYPD.
A letter from Communities United for Police Reform to the council, signed by fifty advocacy groups (including SURJ NYC), calls for the council to reject the mayor’s plan. It states that “[nothing] in the resolution is likely to directly result in a decrease of police violence.” Critics argued that the reform plan was led by the NYPD and railroaded through committee in less than twenty-four hours, leaving little time for review by the council and the public. In reality, it expands police funding and power while failing to address police violence.
Another letter, signed by the families who have lost loved ones to NYPD violence, echoes these concerns and calls on the council to reject the plan, stating that “[they] will not stand for the Mayor, the NYPD, or any councilmember or elected official to invoke our loved ones’ names to serve their own political purposes.”
Qualified immunity makes it difficult for police officers to be sued for violating citizens’ rights, so in theory the bill prohibiting it is a step in the right direction. However NYCLU Senior Policy Counsel Michael Sisitzky clarified that the qualified immunity ban is limited to Fourth Amendment and excessive force claims and ignores misconduct related to protest rights violations, recording of police activity, and racial profiling. In sum, it “doesn’t address the core issue of qualified immunity as an actual doctrine.”
The calls from victims’ families and from SURJ NYC partner organizations Communities United for Police Reform (CPR) and Justice Committee (JC) emphasize the importance of divesting from policing and investing in “services and infrastructure for Black, Latinx, and other communities of color."
Please join us at the next Beyond Policing Working Group meeting (April 21 @ 6:30pm, register here)! We’ll be discussing the mayor’s police reform plan in the context of abolitionist work from Mariame Kaba and Critical Resistance.
In solidarity,
SURJ NYC
P.S. On Thursday of last week we came together as a chapter and collectively decided to pass the proposal for a new base building structure, which created two new teams: Invitation and Cultivation. See the details here. We are now recruiting to get this ship off the ground! If bringing more people into anti-racist organizing is something you’re excited about, please fill out this form and we will reach out to you very soon.
P.P.S.: New to SURJ? Attend an orientation meeting! Next one is on 4/15 from 6:30-7:15pm. Click New SURJ Member Welcome Orientation to sign up.