In correspondence to the City Council’s Public Safety Committee, some local residents are calling for the reappointment of three community based commissioners to the Police Oversight Commission.
Alexis Abernethy, Juliana Serrano, and Florence Annang, who represent the Altadena/Pasadena chapter of The Links, All Saints Church and the NAACP, respectively, term out on June 30.
The chair of the commission is recommending the three be reappointed.
“On behalf of the Community Police Oversight Commission, I, Chair, Raúl Ibáñez recommend that the Pasadena City Council Public Safety Committee reappoint all community based organization commissioners to a second term,” wrote Raúl Ibáñez. “All commissioners feel that our current community based organization commissioners are invaluable contributors to our body, our current work, and losing them now would be a terrible blow to the commission.”
One resident Tina Williams pulled out of the running after learning of the qualifications of the commissioners.
“I applied for the Community Police Oversight Commission’s nonprofit representative position,” Williams wrote, director of community engagement at Harambee Ministries. “After speaking with a friend about the commission and was informed that all three of the former nonprofit representatives were reapplying for their previously held positions.”
“I was under the impression that they had to take a one-year leave before they could reapply. All three representatives are highly qualified, and I believe they will do an excellent job representing the nonprofit community; therefore I withdraw my application for consideration.”
But one local resident isn’t withdrawing her candidacy.
“What I can bring to the table is being a former officer with the Santa Monica Police Department and thus provide perspective from an officers point of view and also as a long time home owner in Pasadena,” wrote a District 4 resident identified as Kim. “Over the years, I have had several interactions with our police department and usually stay informed on police activity/crime in our city.”
In October 2020, the City Council established a Community Police Oversight Commission (CPOC) by ordinance. The purpose of the commission is to enhance, develop and strengthen community-police relations and review and make recommendations regarding the ongoing operations of the Pasadena Police Department to the chief of police, city manager and/or City Council.
The commission was established after the national outrage in the wake of the officer involved murder of Minnesota motorist George Floyd.
Councilmember John Kennedy pushed for oversight for several years, but could not garner the votes to pass a resolution until after the Floyd incident despite several local incidents.
The meeting begins at 4 p.m. on Wednesday. http://pasadena.granicus.com/
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One thought on “Locals Want Current Commissioners Reappointed to Oversight Commission”
This oversite.comittee does not reflex the northwest community as a whole no one from kings village. No one from community arms the question should be why not