Mayor Appoints Tyron Hampton to Public Safety Committee, Names John Kennedy as Chair

Mayor Terry Tornek has appointed newly-elected Councilmember Tyron Hampton to the Public Safety Committee and elevated Councilmember John Kennedy to the Committee’s Chairmanship.

The Public Safety Committee is the City Council’s standing committee charged with oversight of the Pasadena Police and Pasadena Fire Departments.

The two other members of the Committee will be Councilmembers Steve Madison and Gene Masuda, both of whom served on the Committee alongside Kennedy over the past four years.

In his first term on the Committee, Kennedy advanced an initiative to fund a study of police oversight which was never approved or passed up to the full Council for consideration.

Kennedy repeatedly found himself at odds with other Committee members in the past on issues such as police destruction of internal affairs investigation files and the urgency of informing the public about the full range of the Police Department’s use of force policies.

During a City Council presentation by Police Department command staff last March addressing problems uncovered in the detectives bureau by an outside auditor, Kennedy said “there are systemic problems in the Pasadena Police Department” which have led to “egregious conduct.”

Kennedy succeeds former Vice Mayor Jacque Robinson as the Committee Chair. Some local civil rights advocates feel under Robinson’s leadership the Committee shut down their efforts to reform police oversight.

Kris Ockershauser, a Board Member of the Pasadena-Foothills Chapter of the ACLU and a frequent speaker at Public Safety Committee meetings, said she hopes with Kennedy as Chair the Committee “will rise from its lackadaisical nonperformance” and “take seriously its role to provide  the Council’s oversight of the police department.”

Dale Gronemeier, an area civil rights attorney, called the Committee’s past management style “anemic.” Gronemeier said Mayor Tornek’s appointment of Kennedy “gives us hope that at long last the City will have a muscular Public Safety Committee performing meaningful civilian oversight of the police department.”

NAACP Pasadena Branch President Gary L. Moody said Tornek’s “changes in the Public Safety Committee will make a difference… the question is will it change the dynamics?”

Moody said Kennedy’s experience, working in the past with former Pasadena Police Chief Jerry Oliver, coupled with Hampton’s fresh perspectives, can yield different insights “regarding policies and procedures of our police department as well as other safety issues. “

“John and Tyron’s families are residents of Northwest Pasadena,” Moody said in an email. “Therefore giving our community direct contact with their councilmen regarding public safety issues.”

Police Chief Phillip Sanchez did respond to an email requesting his comments on the appointments.

The next regularly scheduled Public Safety Committee meeting, which was to occur this upcoming Monday, June 15, has been cancelled. The first Committee meeting under Kennedy’s leadership is now scheduled for Monday, July 20 at 4:15 p.m. in Council Chambers S249 at Pasadena City Hall, 100 North Garfield Avenue.

Tomorrow:  Pasadena Now talks in-depth with Councilmember John Kennedy about his vision of an expanded role for the Public Safety Committee