BY LISA DONOVAN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Before the week is out, Cincinnati City Council is expected to sign off on a plan to form a citizen police review panel, something leaders hope will be as much a watchdog as a symbol of healing.
Two competing plans are before city council to create a panel to review investigations of alleged police misconduct and address questions raised by citizens at the end of those probes. A final vote is expected Thursday.
Councilman Tyrone Yates proposes the city manager appoint a seven-member panel with authority to compel officers to testify about complaints. Councilman Charles Winburn wants a 52-member neighborhood advisory committee to appoint an 11-member panel. Initially, he wanted officers to voluntarily testify, but is rethinking that.
Under the Yates plan, the panel would have no independent authority over discipline of police officers, but its findings on individual cases would be made public. Mr. Winburn's plan does not address the issue.
A poll of council members late last week showed that Mr. Yates' proposal had the most support.
"It appears to me to be a win-win solution to a serious community problem and that is bridging the gap that exists
between the police department and the community at large," said Councilman Paul Booth, who supports Mr. Yates' plan.
Phil Heimlich is the only council member strongly opposing both plans; he said a panel would add another layer of "bureaucratic review."
Allegations of police misconduct are now subject to probes by the police internal investigations unit and the city's investigative arm, the Office of Municipal Investigations, he said.
Mr. Heimlich said there is evidence that the system works "pretty well," as in the police shooting death of Lorenzo Collins in which a series of investigations and reviews cleared the officers of misconduct. The police union -- The Fraternal Order of Police -- has expressed similar sentiment.
The 1997 case of Mr. Collins, an escaped mental patient, sparked closer examination of police-community relations. A Cincinnati police officer and a University of Cincinnati officer fired at Mr. Collins, an African-American, who refused to drop a brick after 15 armed officers surrounded him in a Corryville yard.
His death set off protests by African-Americans and advocates for the mentally ill.
City council called in a U.S. Department of Justice mediator who worked with city officials and six community groups on a plan to improve relations. The so-called mediation team's suggestions, including establishment of a civilian watchdog panel, were part of a report released in February 1998.
In recent months, city council sponsored several public hearings to listen to concerns and questions about the mediation team's report, and to glean ideas about a review panel.
Ishton Morton, representing the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, which was one group on the mediation team, said Mr. Yates' plan is something he can live with.
"In the spirit of negotiation, one seldom gets what they ask for," Mr. Morton said.
"Tyrone's plan has become our (the community's) plan."
