Well, it's nice to be recognized. Police consultant A.W. Dean's much ballyhooed report on police accountability in Austin came out in mid-March. Most of the 16 "recommendations" were public relations measures dressed up in the rhetoric of "racial reconciliation" so popular among Austin politicos as of late. Among other things, Dean specifically recommended that APD "immediately" set up a web site titled the "APD Hall of Fame" to "counter" this web site!
This web site is not the problem; the lack of accountability for a small minority of "rogue" APD officers is the problem. I challenge the APD, Chief Stan Knee, City Manager Jesus Garza, Mayor Kirk Watson, and the Austin City Council to address the issues I raise in the Hall of Shame, instead of simply attempting to "counter" it with a PR blitz.
The following is an op-ed column submitted to the Austin American Statesman one day following the the release of the A.W. Dean consultant's report concerning the Austin Police Department's Internal Affairs processes. The Statesman deemed this column not "fit to print," though the editorial page gave Dean and Chief Knee ample forums to spin the report. (To its credit, though, the Statesman recently has come out in favor of studying a civilian review board, as well as in support of opening up police records.)
Op-ed submitted to the Statesman March 9, 1999
By Scott Henson
Last summer, as part of the Cedar Avenue litigation settlement, the City of Austin hired consultant A.W. Dean to take "community input" about the Austin Police Department's Internal Affairs Department and disciplinary practices. The contract called for Dean to produce a report, released to the public Monday.
Unfortunately, after accepting this community input, A.W. Dean chose to ignore it. Instead, his report offers platitudes and pat responses, while ignoring completely the recommendations of those whose "input" he was instructed to seek.
Dean offers 16 lightweight recommendations. Indeed, some of them are truly vacuous, such as, "distribute this report widely," or "Deploy sufficient supervisory and command staff to maintain and control all police operations." Did we really need to pay a consultant $100,000 to tell us that?
One recommendation states that APD should "immediately develop an Internet web site titled 'APD Hall of Fame' to counter the 'APD Hall of Shame.'" The APD Hall of Shame is my own personal web site, which documents some of the more extreme cases of brutality, killings and other APD misconduct. While flattered, I wish that Dean's suggested response were to rein in brutal cops, to effectively prosecute officers who abuse their wives, or to bust up the "code of silence" - all issues highlighted on my web page. Instead, he proposes a public relations response, and a lame one at that. Certainly such web hagiography is one of A.W. Dean's own proposals; no citizen, according to Dean's notes in the appendices, suggested that responding to my web site was such a high departmental priority. (You may check out what they're so scared of at http://www.onr.com/user/blackdog/.)
Dean attempts to downplay APD's real problems by passing them off as simply minorities complaining. He opines that "mistrust and alienation" has developed toward APD among blacks and Hispanics, but that "APD enjoys wide community support in predominantly white and affluent sections of the city."
However, this depiction contradicts Dean's notes from the public meetings which indicate that citizens complained of abusive police attitudes and proposed a civilian review board at every meeting citywide, not just at the East Austin forums. Dean doesn't include civilian review in his recommendations, though, noting dryly deep in the document that it would be "beyond the scope" of his inquiry to examine the issue. I thought that accepting "community input" defined the scope of his inquiry.
Buried deep in the report, Dean makes some rather astonishing observations. Perhaps most gravely, "Officer discipline [at APD] is viewed internally and externally as inconsistent, lacking accountability, weak and ineffective." If both cops and critics agree on this point, shouldn't the disciplinary process be strengthened? Dean received "input" on this topic, but he chose not to include it in his report.
Much more interesting than the actual report are the community meeting summaries in the appendices. According to these, citizens across the city "overwhelmingly believe" that APD "glosses over misbehavior on the part of errant officers, failing even to discipline for serious abuses." Citizens also complained about the secrecy of the Internal Affairs process, advocating a "complete study and restructuring of Internal Affairs" and the establishment of an "independent 'Review Commission.'"
Why didn't these issues make it into A.W. Dean's recommendations? Only he could say. But if the City Council intends to use this document as a "blueprint" for police reform, as Mayor Kirk Watson told the TV news on Monday, then it will not satisfy stakeholders outside the department who contributed to the process.
Scott Henson is a partner with Paper Trail Research Services and a boardmember of the Sunshine Project for Police Accountability.