SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Sacramento Community Police Review commissioners got together Monday for their first meeting of 2023.
Though they welcomed new commissioners, the police review group continues struggling to reach any agreements with Sacramento police regarding updated policies and practices.
Commission Chair Graciela Castillo-Krings said the group's main goal for 2023 is to:
- Review the about 115 policing policy changes commissioners recommended over the years that have so far gone unanswered by police officials
- Prioritize the top recommendations and organize them into a spreadsheet
- Submit the prioritized recommendation for Sacramento city and police officials to review
Recommendations made by the commission have gone unanswered as far back as 2018.
The commission's interactions with city councilmembers have also been sparse, with one city official calling for a commissioner's firing after a heated exchange during public comment in 2022.
"One of the things we're trying to do is make sure we're organizing ourselves a little more. In the past, there has been a little bit of tension between PD and ourselves about the number of requests that are going to them," Castillo-Krings said Monday.
According to the Sacramento Community Police Review Commission's 2023 work plan, commissioners also want to review police department 2023/24 policies and spending priorities.
Commissioner Mario Guerrero said Monday he wanted to give credit to Sacramento police for adopting a policy for interactions with transgender and gender nonconforming residents in 2021 based on the commission's recommendations.
"We haven't been the best about reporting out those win-win kind of situations—those good policy adoptions," he said.
Commissioner Keyan Bliss mentioned they already spent years putting together the existing about 115 recommendations, and it is now time for Sacramento police to review them.
"The work has been done on our end," he said. "Really the ball is in the police department's courts and we're still waiting for that."
But Guerrero said the opportunity to review their past recommendations will allow them to toss out outdated or null policy proposals.
"So we're trying to kind of turn a new new page—we're trying a new process," said Castillo-Krings.
