|
Members of LSURJ and other groups will hold a huge “End Police Violence” banner in front of the venue where Mayor Craig Greenberg’s first Mayor’s Night Out to call for an end to police violence, a pledge to oppose a new jail and open contract negotiations for the FOP They will then enter the venue to participate in the event, and hold signs.
With the release of the US Department of Justice report on Louisville policing, people across the community want to make sure that Mayor Craig Greenberg goes beyond lip service to address police violence. “We have been working on these issues of police accountability for decades,” said KA Owens, Co Chair of the KAARPR. “We do not wan this DOJ report ignored”. There is also growing public opposition to the up to half a billion dollar new jail some metro council members are pushing, and a call for the mayor to pledge to oppose it in favor of monies of mental health, affordable housing and other community investments that keep people out of jail. In addition, LSURJ joins the 490 Project and others calling for the mayor to open the negotiations on the police contract, to the public as part of his pledge to grow government transparency. “The mayor says he wants a new direction,” said Anice Chenault, a member of the Louisville SURJ Coordinating Team. “We support that. But so far the mayor seems to be repeating the patterns of past administrations that have not addressed police violence, have continued to arrest and jail people on nonviolent crimes, and have not allowed public access to police contract negotiations. We have good reason to expect more of the same unless there is public pressure.”
0 Comments
The exhaustive report from the United States Department of Justice names a pattern of abuse from Louisville police, who disproportionately target and terrorize Black communities in Louisville. The report further documents LMPD’s abuse in its responses to behavioral health crises, sexual assault, and intimate partner violence.
The results of the DOJ’s investigation echo what Black, disabled, poor, and unhoused Louisvillians have been saying for years. If we had an administration committed to change, this report would land on fertile ground and we could reimagine public safety, divest from an inherently unjust and violent policing system, and invest in what people in Louisville need in order to thrive. Unfortunately, the announcements by the mayor last week about major investments in LMPD, his refusal to publicly oppose the half-billion dollar new jail being pushed by several Metro Council members, and the refusal to open the upcoming negotiation of the police contract to the public, already tell us that this is not a mayor who will make the changes we need without the continued, concerted public pressure that brought about an investigation by the DOJ in the first place. As an organization focused on moving white people into action for racial justice—the racial justice that will benefit every one of us and our community—we must raise our voices to demand change that goes deeper than window dressing. Mayor Craig Greenberg’s initial comments in response to the DOJ report underline the very legitimate concern that, without continued public intervention, nothing will actually be done to address the patterns of abuse and the unconstitutional practices that LMPD is well known for. Racially motivated over-policing, racial profiling, the systemic use of violence, and the arrests of poor or houseless people who pay for our failure to address poverty have been hallmarks of LMPD and mayoral leadership in Louisville for decades. An institution rooted in the capture of runaway enslaved people cannot be reformed with the “few bad apples'' approach the mayor is leading with. What if we got serious about the community safety the mayor says matters to him? What if we began addressing the root causes of crime, like poverty, racism, and lack of opportunity? What if we created community-based mental health services and ended the failed “war on drugs” which only fuels mass incarceration? What if social workers instead of police responded to nonviolent crime, and we instituted a restorative justice process instead of locking people in jail on low level charges? What if there was a REAL commitment to prioritizing affordable housing instead of going into hundreds of millions of dollars in debt for a new jail? Unless we as a community continue to demand that this mayor make changes, we will only keep getting lip service, and the racist abuse and deaths will continue. |
RSS Feed
Resources |
CDN Quick Links |
|