Community and Police Collaboration Group Final Recommendations to CMPD April 2024

After several months the community and police collaboration Group released their report.

Below is the actual CMPD response (in blue) to the group's recommendations.

Today, CMPD responded to 17 recommendations that were made by the Community and Police Collaboration Group across the areas of de-escalation, response to resistance and marijuana use and enforcement. 

The group was formed in November 2023, following a use-of-force incident on Nov.13 outside of a Bojangles’ restaurant on S. Tryon Street. The CMPD will implement recommendations including building a separate focus on de-escalation in the department’s Response to Resistance Policy.

The Community and Police Collaboration Group is comprised of multiple organizations across @CLTgov  including the City’s Community Relations Committee, members of the CMPD, the Citizens Review Board, the NAACP, the Latin American Coalition, Clergy members, CMPD Ambassadors, Action NC and the George Floyd Global Memorial. The group met for several months resulting in constructive conversations between the CMPD and a diverse group of community stakeholders.

De-Escalation Techniques and Training 

1. Improve Early Intervention System (EIS) to add additional factors for a more holistic approach. 

• Example of factors to review: Add call types that officers are responding to, amount of benefit time used, amount of secondary employment hours used (maxing out hours?) 
• There should be more transparency about the factors while maintaining officer privacy. 

The Early Intervention System (EIS) is a data-driven, proactive approach used by CMPD to identify officers who may be at risk of misconduct, public complaints or other negative outcomes. CMPD upgraded its EIS in 2023. The data points identified in the system are confidential as they relay specific personnel information.  

We will consider adding variables.  

We can also work on aggregating EIS data for reports and consider providing public information when we complete the Internal Affairs annual report. 

2. Start police/community interactions with younger children in elementary schools; also include a focus on kids through 12th grade. 

• Develop a better collaboration between the Police Activities League (PAL) and Mecklenburg County to engage elementary aged students, parents and officers. 
• Include other youth programming in addition to PAL such as Kops & Kids and other opportunities to engage parents and kids in K-12 
• Maybe implement an orientation specifically for parents of children who participate in these programs so that these parents can build relationships with officers and transfer knowledge to kids. 

There are School Resource Officers in all middle schools and high schools in Mecklenburg County.   

Our Community Services Division is exploring potential PAL expansion, age expansion for other programming and developing and implementing an orientation for parents participating in these programs. 

CMPD launched a tutoring program with the lowest performing CMS schools in reading and math. We have “reading buddy” groups within Thomasboro, Hidden Valley and Westerly Hills Middle Schools to increase police interactions with youth and reinforce the importance of education and appropriate behaviors. Program expansion is challenging due to staffing constraints.   

We also have our IMPACT (Introducing Meaningful Possibilities and Changing Trajectories) group which is an in-school mentoring group that focuses on providing positive, therapeutic environments within the school day for youth and CMPD employees to discuss making positive decisions, life skills, career opportunities, stress coping techniques to de-escalate conflicts and more. 

We currently have groups in Turning Point Alternative Academies, West Charlotte High School, Thomasboro Middle School, Chambers High School, MLK Middle School, Harding High School, and soon to add Garinger High School.  

3. Slow down, assess situation, start conversation and then proceed. More person-to-person interactions. 

Officer approach is key. Share officer de-escalation training, real-life engagement and more with the community. 

CMPD agrees with this approach when appropriate. This process is practiced during various trainings that are administered at the Police Academy. We will continue to evaluate annually through training assessments.  

4. Implement additional customer service training.

Group is aware of CMPD Serves training, but they expressed interest in additional training options. 

CMPD is already training 10 out of 12 months on customer service training. CMPD is currently on its third installment of customer service training, focusing on the power of mindset. Customer Service continues to be a priority for CMPD, and we are working to incorporate more of these lessons throughout other courses. 

5. There should be an overall external assessment of the current de-escalation process and training.  

Recommend that an assessment of de-escalation techniques takes place during BWC reviews. 

CMPD is considering this recommendation for an external assessment. De-escalation techniques are already assessed during BWC reviews by supervisors and also during response to resistance investigations.   

6. Involve community in de-escalation training. 

Determine how to include community member participation in de-escalation training. 

CMPD is considering this recommendation. However, it is challenging to depend on community members for consistency considering scheduling, logistics, etc.  

7. Implement more regular de-escalation training.  

De-escalation training should be incorporated into as many training opportunities as possible. 

CMPD has implemented updated de-escalation programming into all phases of training to include inservice training for current officers, recruit training for recently hired officers and leadership training for new and current supervisors. This training is disseminated multiple times on an annual basis and is constantly being evaluated for relevance and effectiveness.  

The State of NC (Training and Standards) adds some aspects of annual in-service in addition to updated aspects of de-escalation training in the new BLET pilot program for recruits.   

8. Explore the possibility of utilizing walking beats on a minor scale that are specific to communities.  

Implementation should include community input and determination of using the right officer. 

Walking beats are utilized at the division level depending on staffing, weather, community involvement and other factors. CMPD is considering the logistics involved in obtaining community input for these beats and how that input could impact walking beat executions throughout the jurisdiction. 

9. Develop and implement a separate stand-alone De-Escalation Policy.  

This would be the creation of a new policy separate from the Response to Resistance Policy. 

CMPD is working on developing an addendum to the Response to Resistance Policy focused on de-escalation. 

Use of Force/Response to Resistance Policy 

1. Should incorporate impacted family members with recruit classes during the academy regularly to understand on a personal level how their position is impactful. 

Deputy Chief Bryley has already talked with Paris Stevens (George Floyd’s cousin), and she is interested in participating. 

CMPD agrees with this recommendation and is working on identifying individuals to participate during the academy process. CMPD is already coordinating Paris Stevens (George Floyd’s cousin) to attend and share testimonials. 

2. Request for city council to increase budget so that the CARES team can be extended and expanded. 

• Recommend for the team to grow in number of team members and scale the group to respond to the entire jurisdiction. 
• Recommend for the team to move under a different department so that CMPD does not manage this effort enhancing independence and credibility. 

CMPD agrees with these recommendations for the team to expand and also be relocated under another city department to enhance credibility. CMPD is currently working with the City Manager’s Office on next steps for this program. 

3. Peroneal nerve should not be allowed to be struck repeatedly before reassessment techniques are implemented. 

Add more training around strikes and reassessments. 

CMPD agrees with the recommendation that officers should continuously assess the need for peroneal nerve strikes. Officers are trained to assess if any pain compliance techniques are working or not. Once compliance is achieved, officers are taught to stop using that technique.  

4. Need stronger enforcement of Duty to Intervene policy. 

Create a clear actionable policy that not only requires intervention once excessive force is being used but also in the early stages when deescalation techniques could/should be implemented. 

Duty to Intervene can be complex and looks different based on the situation. Regarding this incident, some of the communications tactics used and the use-of-force reporting were part of Duty to Intervene. 

Marijuana Use and Enforcement 

1. Reassess the effectiveness and curriculum of the implicit bias training for all officers. 

Create an RFP and hire an outside auditor to assess. 

Starting in 2025, CMPD is implementing new implicit bias training.  

2. Not stop to investigate or arrest for the smell or smoking by individual of what appears to be marijuana only. 

Do not stop someone just for the smell of marijuana. 

Marijuana continues to be illegal under both North Carolina and federal law at this time. Officers continue to have the discretion to enforce the legal standard --- either a voluntary contact, investigative detention or make an arrest --- depending on the situation encountered. 

3. CMPD should push for marijuana legalization in NC. 

This recommendation was not unanimous but had majority consent by the committee. 

CMPD will not advocate for the legalization of a product that currently violates the law. 

4. Develop a standardized method of communication to prevent subjectivity of the officers who decide whether to stop and enforce or not.   

• During the initial interaction with the individual, add to training more explanation about maybe not going to jail and potentially getting a citation (assuming the person is cooperative). 
• CMPD should have a SOP outlining that people receive a citation, assuming the person is cooperative and there are no other illegal factors

CMPD encourages the issuance of citations or warning tickets when appropriate for these types of interactions pending cooperation is achieved and there are no other illegal factors involved. 

Cedar's Take: You need to keep in mind the group is made up from segments of Charlotte most likely to be not victims of crime or law abiding citizens but rather of a certain defund the police mindset.

It was nice to see CMPD stand their ground on some items.

The bottom line is while the optics of the Bojangles "dog pile" are not attractive the de-escalation should have come from those being questioned and detained. Stop resisting. Stop carrying concealed weapons unlawfully. There was no reason for the female to resist and the male should not have given the officers a bunch of BS.

Finally the DA dropping the charges of resisting sets a really bad example. He could have very effectively dropped all charges except the resisting and it would have sent a better message than any of this BLM BS.