Gathering community input on policing in the town of Manlius is the first order of business for the newly formed Manlius Police Citizens Advisory Committee, which held its first meeting last week.
The committee was formed to help the town comply with state Executive Order 203, which requires any municipality that has a police agency to perform a comprehensive review of police policies, procedures and deployments and create action plans to help improve policing, especially in regard to racial bias and “disproportionate policing of communities of color.”
In addition to Manlius Councilor Elaine Denton, Councilor John Deer, and Police Chief Mike Crowell, 12 residents were selected to represent all areas of the town and include a wide diversity in age, race and professional background. Two retired Manlius police officers, Nadine Zesky and Rob Winter, are represented on the group.
As this committee works locally to gain community input and review the TMPD’s policies and procedures, Crowell is also the co-chair of a county-wide committee that will aid all departments across the county in complying with Executive Order 203. The county-wide group will create an overarching plan prior to the April 2021 deadline that will be delivered to each municipality. At that point, the local municipalities can adopt the county-wide plan or make amendments based on local input.
A lot of the discussion at the meeting focused on how to engage with the community and solicit constructive input.
“We need to target the people who feel targeted,” said Dominique Barr, of Fayetteville, who in her introduction said she was on the committee “to bring a young voice – a black voice – to the public.”
Several committee members discussed the need to have a robust social media presence to gain feedback on what residents think about the police department.
DeWitt, which is undertaking a similar endeavor, has opted to have a series public events to gain community input. Although that was mentioned as an option, there are no public listening sessions scheduled at this time in Manlius.
The TMPD already surveys people who have had contact with department on a monthly and an annual basis to gain input on people’s experience with police, Crowell said. He indicated that the surveys have a mix of results and give him the opportunity to either praise officers for commendable work or increase training when problems are identified.
“My intent is to do a lot of listening,” Crowell said of his involvement on the committee. “I very much look forward to the input from this group.”
The TMPD has 38 full-time police officers and eight civilian employees. The department responds to about 22,000 calls for service each year.
The 12 members of the committee are Rev. Alan Rudnick, Bill Harris, Bill Kirchoff, Dominique Barr, Jim Brule, Juliana Smith, Kristine Zettler, Nadine Zesky, Rob Winter, Ryan Drake, Tony Waddell and Sally Lisi.
