November 10, 2025 — Police Oversight Panel Regular Meeting

Transcript

Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.

[0:02] Okay. Hello everyone and thank you for uh being here tonight. It's November the 10th of 2021. Um so we like to um welcome panel members and members of the public who are joining us. Welcome and thank you for being here. Uh we're going to start with uh calling the meeting to order and with our land acknowledgement. So briefly, we acknowledge that um the Arapaho and Chian tribes, the traditional custodians of the land on which the police oversight panel and Boulder Police Department operates and pay our respect to their elders past and present and we hope that they remind us why we're here tonight. Um so again uh want to welcome the public and uh members of the press that are joining us tonight

[1:01] and um I'm going to remind the panel members to uh have uh the ones that are joining online to have the cameras on people in the room to uh be present and uh also a reminder of our community our community agreements uh and how we um manage ourselves in this meeting tonight. Um for uh awareness of everyone uh we're going to remind that our panel website address is bouldercolor.gov-services- police oversight. Uh panel email is police oversight panel at bouldercolor.gov. Um there you'll see a recording of this meeting agendas and how to file a complaint. So uh we're going to start with the roll call. Um

[2:00] can I to make sure that we're all here? Present >> Alan waving um AB and >> attendees. >> Turner >> here. >> Solid >> here. Milen >> here. Lizzy >> here. >> Kristen >> present. >> Jason >> here. >> Curtis >> present. and Chico. No, Chico. Chico uh let the coachers know earlier today that something came up. It's okay. But he said some thoughts. Yeah. Okay. So, we uh we're going to start we're going to I'm going to switch a couple of things. So, we're going to start with approval of minutes uh of last month meeting. So

[3:02] if I can get a motion >> second thank you vote for approving the minutes please members say I meeting um meeting minutes approved. Uh before we move the agenda, I would like to um request a motion to u adjust the agenda so we can move our um central discussion of tonight to the first topic and then we can go from there. So if someone can make a motion to get that um change in the agenda second uh can we vote to choose the order of items in the agenda please? So I haven't read everyone. All right. Everyone in I didn't see. Okay. Cool. [clears throat] Okay. So let's uh dive in. Um the topic

[4:03] uh most important topic of tonight is um [clears throat] as you know we are all aware of the non-referral policy change. Um Oh sure. Can you let me? Sure. >> So, just to introduce this topic, um what we're hoping to address today is a recent policy change regarding referrals of complaint cases to the panel. Um at our last meeting, we learned that BPD had closed two cases that were still on the monitor panel docket um for potential review. This raised some concerns from both the monitor and the panel. Um, and we were informed that a meeting would be held soon between BPD, the monitor, the city attorney's office, and the city manager to address the issue. Uh, a panel member requested that a representative from the panel be included in that meeting. Um, a few

[5:00] weeks later during our October co-chair meeting, we were informed that the meeting had taken place um, and that the monitor had decided to implement a new policy, which we're going to talk about today. Um so under this new policy PS after PSU's preliminary investigation the monitor to our understanding will now screen cases and decline to refer collect cases to the panel where both the monitor and PSU agree all allegations should be classified as unfounded or exonerated. Um these client cases will instead be closed without any panel review or involvement. Um this marks a departure from the current process in which all cases are referred to the panel. Uh and the panel has the authority to select the cases it would like to review. Um we expressed strong concerns on both the policy and the fact that the decision was made without discussion or input with the panel. Um we received a few different reasons for the policy change

[6:01] um that maybe we can discuss today. Uh we remain very concerned that this policy doesn't align with the ordinance and core mission of the panel and believe it will impact both the panel's independence and the integrity of the independent police oversight process in Boulder. Um so to begin we want to give the monitor Sherry a few minutes to present policy and and whatever else you would like. Um and then Soladad and I are going to share [clears throat] some concerns that we've prepared. Um and then we'll follow that with paneling discussion with the poll panel some time. >> Thank you. >> You did a great job teeing that up. Um so um this agenda item that we're discussing as Lizzie just shared you know involves my my decision to stop referring certain cases to the panel and then subsequent concerns by the panel members. I appreciate this opportunity

[7:02] for us to be here where we can speak directly and respectfully about this about this issue and I appreciate all of your concern as volunteers who've all shown your your dedication to this work. So I appreciate that. Um, also before we even really get into that specific issue, I would also like to just directly acknowledge that my communication about this issue and some previous issues that have come up in the last few months was just not been ideal. And last week at some meetings, uh, some panel members shared concerns about inadequate communication. Um, and I I really hope to take those those concerns seriously. I'm still reflecting on some of that feedback, but I'm committed to working together with you to improve um the communication so that it meets the needs of the of the panel members.

[8:01] as we talk about this this the work of police oversight is is often isolating and it's difficult and I don't want my role to amplify those challenges are that are just inherent in this work um just so everyone has a shared understanding of the complaint process um for these specific uh cases pieces that we're going to be discussing. Um, I'd just like to do a very brief overview. So, BPD's professional standards unit, which we call PSU, they conduct a preliminary investigation into complaints of police misconduct. Um that preliminary investigation typically includes the complaint um VPD reports and bodywn camera footage and after that preliminary investigation is completed

[9:00] the uh the the case comes to me for classification and our our older police oversight ordinance. It provides the monitor with the sole authority to classify those complaints. I after reviewing the the evidence, I first assess whether the incident involves alleged misconduct, meaning if it's found to be true, it would violate one of BPB's 10 rules of conduct. There's other classifications that include inquiries, community feedback, and unspecified incidents. After that, I then draft specific allegations based on both the complaint that was received and then my independent review of the evidence that was available. Often the body horn camera footage provides a neutral and reliable record that allows for a recommendation of unfounded or exonerated at this early stage.

[10:03] In the spring and summer of 2023, BPD and a prior monitor worked together to revise general order 12. They've revised it to allow a triage process which would enable PSU and the monitor to close cases more efficiently when we agreed on those findings of unfounded or exonerated. Reason for developing that triage triage process in 2023 was to ensure that the BPB and oversight resources were being used effectively. And for the past two years since I came on as monitor, I still referred those cases to the panel to vote to review. You'll recognize that for these cases, I shared with the panel in the your confidential summaries not only the fact patterns of the cases, but also my my recommendations and

[11:01] analysis. This practice however only minimally reduced the the resources extended when the panel voted to to review those cases. So then as as Lizzie shared in September of 20ou 2025 [clears throat] uh BPD began closing some of these cases that the panel had voted on but prior to panel review as she shared. agreed with that decision, elevated the issue, and we did have uh we did have a meeting that involved um myself, members of the city attorney's office, uh the chief of police, and the city manager. And in that meeting, the city attorney advised that under the ordinance, BPD may close close cases classified as unfounded or exonerated by both PSU and

[12:02] monitor. The rationale was that those cases according to um BPD's general order were not uh scheduled to go to the chief for review. Um, and based on the ordinance, the panel's authority to review misconduct investigations applies only to cases where the chief will review them. At this meeting, I was advised that the ordinance provides the monitor with discretion to refer paces to the P. Based on that legal advice and with the knowledge of the city manager, I will now begin exercising discretion under the ordinance to not refer cases to the panel when PSU and I agree on unbounded or exonerated findings. At that meeting, we also clarified that when PSU and I do not agree and the

[13:02] expectation is that they would find the cases unbounded and exonerated and that would not be my recommendation. um that those cases cannot be closed and will continue through the full oversight process. So this change in practice is legally supported and beneficial to to operations. It allows us to focus our limited resources on the most serious cases of alleged police misconduct. Those are the cases when the panel's insights and perspectives are most necessary and impactful. It also reduces the delay for officers who may wait months for coaching or resolution and for community members who deserve timely outcomes. Some of our recent cases for review involve incidents that not only occurred but were reported over a year ago. Reducing these delays and increasing

[14:01] timeliness improves oversight not just for those impacted individuals, the officers and the complaining community members, but to the benefit of the entire oversight system. And as I'm thinking about this issue, I want to make sure that it's very clear to members of the panel that the panel remains a cornerstone of Boulder's police oversight system. Your work brings the community voice. It brings independent scrutiny and accountability and that has not changed. And more personally in my two years as monitor the the conversations with panel members that we've had both formal conversations and informal conversations have really helped to broaden my own lens through which I assess cases and I value those conversations and those contributions

[15:00] deeply. that Sherry appreciate you sharing all of that. Um going to go ahead and share some material that Solar Dad and I put together. Do we Does anyone have basic questions on kind of what's in front of us before we go into that? Give everyone a minute. Questions for Sherry at this time? We'll have lots of time later as well, but clarifying questions. >> Great. Um, did you get the PowerPoint version I sent? I sent it again. Okay. >> I have one more clarify question. >> Yeah. Go ahead. >> In this process you're discussing, um, were you and the NPSU were that cases unfounded or exonerated? Will the panel still be able to see those cases? Like >> my intention was

[16:01] >> that I would be that I would advise in in the confidential summaries that I would that I share with you that I would provide the same sort of summarization that I have in the past and then of course the public reporting which doesn't contain as many details. >> Um you go to the next slide please. So, quick overview of what we're going to go through today and we will share this with everyone. We'll put it in the meeting folder if anyone would like to review the deck later, but we'll talk through um our understanding of some of the context. We'll go through this quickly since we've gone over a bit already. Um, Solidad is going to talk us through uh some of the language in the ordinance that we feel pretty strongly inflicts with this policy um and kind of the foundation for most of our concerns. Um, and then we'll go into some complaints and capacity data.

[17:00] Um, capacity was one of the reasons that we've talked about. So, I was curious to understand what is the context that we're working in here. Um, and wanted to share that with you all as well. So we'll talk a bit about that at the end just to the extent that it could inform the conversation. Um all right, next slide please. Uh so this is just a reminder of what we just talked about. Um on November 4th, we received this kind of basic introduction of the new policy uh from the city attorney's office along with the justification that we were provided. So we just wanted to provide that here for context. The justification was in a section of the ordinance that states the police monitor hereafter monitor is the administrative head of monitor's office and shall have the authority to refer incidents of police potential police misconduct of potential concern or other incidents of potential police misconduct

[18:01] to the panel. So, we're going to examine the full a broader section of that area of the ordinance and some other sections that we think are very relevant as well in the coming slides. Um, we wanted to put this in the context of some other recent events as well. Um, we've talked about all of these, but one of the reasons why we've had an especially strong reaction to this is it feels like a pattern is emerging of the panel's role becoming smaller and more limited. Um, with multiple events that we've seen happening lately. So, just a quick overview of some of the headlines. Back in June, um we had a community engagement event blocked for the first time without really clear justification. That was followed up in September with uh a special meeting that we tried to call being blocked. Um and then with a

[19:00] new interpretation new to us or of the ordinance um that led to what we felt was a pretty severe restriction of the panel's ability to meet including many of the meetings that we've been routinely having for many years in my experience. Um the following month we had a notification about this non-referral policy uh which would limit panel access to complaint cases. Um, and then in a follow-up discussion with that, it was also made clear to us that the ordinance was being interpreted to also give BPD authority to unilaterally close some cases um without panel review. So together, we think this is a really concerning trend. Um, we think that many of these decisions have been based on a new interpretation of the ordinance despite it being very recently created and rewritten and uh implemented with lots and lots of engagement with the city attorney's

[20:00] office, review from the city attorney's office. Um, and our understanding of the ordinance at that time is very different from the way it's being u interpreted to us now. Uh and overall we just think these changes disrupt long-standing precedents. They introduce a lot of new uncertainty about our role and the way we do our jobs here. Um and they impact our core purpose as a community panel. Next slide. Um and fundamentally we feel that this non-referral polic policy removes a really important check that was built into the oversight process when it was created. Um the previous system and the current system before this policy was enacted involves three independent sort of branches on this triangle on the right. We have BPD and PSU and their investigations. They manage the investigations. They make all final decisions on disposition and discipline.

[21:00] Um then we have the monitor's office who reviews PSU investigations for completeness, classifies complaints and also gives disposition, discipline and policy recommendations to BPD. And then finally we have the independent community panel which is able to view all complaints, select which cases they would like to review and again give disposition, discipline and policy recommendations to BPD. Um, so we feel like this non-referral policy uh prevents the panel from doing something that was part of its core mission, which was having eyes on all complaints. We cannot force anyone to do anything. We don't have any final decision-making power with discipline or dispositions. But what we can do is be a diverse group of community voices who have eyes on the process and give transparency to the community through that. If we limit a whole selection of complaint cases, regardless of how likely it may be or may not be that we would eventually disagree on the

[22:01] disposition of that case, it's really important for us to have eyes and transparency on those complaints so that we can build trust and policing on behalf of the rest of the community. Um, so previously we had this system where no branch acted unilaterally. This really relegates the panel to sort of an optional advisory body to the monitor. We no longer have the ability to challenge panel or monitor and BPD decisions about their initial thoughts on the disposition of ACE. All right, next slide. Right. >> Okay. Um, so just a reminder that I was part of the group that wrote this, so I'm very familiar with this. I have two copies of the ordinance if anyone needs to uh keep uh an eye on this and and follow through but happy to share share them. So first of all for when we when we wrote the new ordinance uh the group

[23:01] was comprised by five community members uh former panel member two panel members the city attorney uh and the consultant hired by the city uh to guide this process. So um there's a lot of people involved. So and the first uh very important thing that we did was to um talk about the uh purpose and the intention behind this ordinance. And the intention is very clear that uh in order to improve community trust in the police department, the council intends to increase community involvement via the panel. So the community has a voice in the oversight system. Uh can you go to the next one? Okay. So the purpose is to uh provide an effective independent civilian police oversight system and what we uh the city

[24:02] had created a system with three bodies as you know we have already talked about and know. So this is all in the ordinance. Why is this critical is because we're not coming up with this. This ordinance is providing us the guide to interpret itself. So we can't just make things up. The everything the intention of the ordinance, the intention that council had when they approved this ordinance and created the oversight system is here. Uh can we go to the next one please? Um okay. So in this uh purpose section we continue we say specify clearly that the panel shall review the results of investigations conducted by police department and provide recommendations for corrective or punitive action. It doesn't say the panel will review the cases that the monitor referred to them. We uh we can uh review the results of all investigations. So um from the very

[25:03] beginning of the ordinance I I'm having a lot of trouble with this interpretation that allows uh this you bilateral you know uh referral cases. Can we see the other one please? Um okay so in the definition section we [clears throat] have that the ordinance make an effort to define the words that we're going to be using throughout the ordinance. So one of them is complaint. That means an oral or written communication to the office of the police monitor or the police department alleging misconduct on the part of a police employee. So we're defining what we're talking about. Okay, cool. Then it defines um the conclusion of any criminal investigation means that the criminal investigation is deemed concluded. And then we have the critical incident which

[26:00] means a line of duty discharge of a firearm. So we have a definition of a crit what a critical incident is. So this is especially relevant because we we are now starting to differentiate concepts. So one thing is the complaint another thing is a critical incident where most of the time we don't have a complaint. Um can we go to the next one? Okay. So the interpretation that the city attorney is providing that um justifies this change is taken out from uh section uh 2115 which uh say that you know basically establish the powers and duty of the monitor and in number four it says that the monitor have the authority which was we the what was communicated to refer incidents of potential misconduct receive number five and process complaints. So we have two very different things number four and number five and we

[27:00] already have in the prior slide the definition of complaint. So I absolutely 100% agree with the fact that the monitor can refer incidents to the panel at [clears throat] their discretion. Um that's not the same for complaints. So um you know anyway we we we're getting to understand the language here. Okay. So we are clear that the uh monitor effectively have the authority to refer incidents and it has the authority uh to receive and possess complaints concerning police employees. Okay. Can we go to the next one please? Then the ordinance provides a system and a process in how we treat the complaints. It doesn't say this is how we treat insects. It say how we treat complaints. So we're talking about a

[28:01] very distinct um situation here. So there is a complaint intake, there is a complaint investigation and there is furthermore uh in section 9 I mean 21169 that the monitor shall maintain an ongoing status report on the work of the monitor office and case investigations and shall share it with the police oversight part. So we're not an advisory board. We're very much at equal body in the police size system. So the monitor is t tasked as I said with reporting the panel. Uh can we go to the next? Okay. The final scope. So 2117. The panel shall have the authority to review complaints of alleged police misconduct. So concept definition number one review critical incidents number two

[29:02] review incidents involving service body injury. So yes the monitor have the authority to refer incidents of potential police misconduct. The complaints throughout the ordinance are treated separately. So we cannot be um mix and matching complaints, clinical incidence and incidence. So it's very clear that we have three different concepts here. Can we go to the next slide please? Thank you. Panel duties and responsibility is a complaint from member of the publics any person. So again we're talking about complaints. The panel authority is over all complaints filed by members of the public either to the police department or to the office of the police monitor or even the ordinance cover the fact that someone can uh file a complaint with a panel and we have we are mandated

[30:01] by the ordinance to uh redirect that to the office of the doctor. So uh again the ordinance establish a complaint review process and it says that the panel shall decide whether to accept a case for review. There's nowhere in the whole body of the ordinance that said the monitor shall decide which cases to refer to the panel. So it's very clear to me that the intention of the ordinance is to create a very clear and strong process for the panel to have authority to review all complaints. All materials concerning to completed investigations of cases the panel has selected to review shall be made available to the members uh for the confidential review. So even further, we're saying the panel shall have access to all the materials from an

[31:02] investigation. Can we move to the next step, please? Okay. Furthermore, uh, in the disposition recommendation section of the ordinance, number two is that in the event the panel and the chief of police disagree on a disposition of comp of a complaint, the panel may submit a written objection to the ship. Basically here the ordinance is saying if the panel so the ordinance is creating a a process into which if the panel disagree with the chief the monitor has no participation here whatsoever. If the panel and the chief disagree the ordinance is providing a process so we can talk about it. In this section the monitor is excluded. So the the panel shall never be subjected to receiving referral or to

[32:01] the place that we're trying to put the panel as a community advisory body. Um so this I think is again reinforcing the concept that there are three independent bodies that are forming the police oversight system that we the city established in this ordinance. Can we go to the next one, please? Um, again, the panel shall have complete and unrestricted access to complaints. It doesn't say the panel shall have complete and unrestricted access to the complaints referred to them by the monitor. We have access to all of the complaints regardless of classification. investigate investigative records uh the whole investig investigation of a complaint. The panel shall be provided with any other information identified by

[33:00] the monitor that is relevant to a complaint. So yes, the monitor can complement the information that the panel have access to. Can we uh go to the next one? I think there's one. Okay. Then [clears throat] um key 2117 interreationship between the panel and the monitor. The monitor and the panel shall be established and operated as separate complimentary entities with different roles that are and shall remain independent of one another. If we accept this interpretation of of the ordinance in which the monitor will refer cases that the monitor deems worthy of panel review, we are violating this disposition in which the panel should shall remain independent of the monitor. Then the monitor goes even further and

[34:03] say you know all the things that the panel and the monitor should do to have a collaborative relationship maintaining like this is a fair word maintaining independence. The panel and the monitor shall coordinate. The monitor shall assist the panel. The monitor shall assist the panel. It never says the monitor shall refer whatever cases they want to the panel and the panel will say yes or that's not what it said here. Okay. Uh can we go to the next one please? Okay. And finally um and this is really in the very last part of the ordinance uh outside council. So upon request of the monitor or the panel, outside council might be retained by city attorney to provide legal advice in the event that the city attorney determines that the city attorney's office does not have adequate expertise to handle any given matter or there's an actual conflict of interest.

[35:00] I um I think that the interpretation provided by the city attorney it is absolutely against the language of the ordinance. It doesn't solidify the role of the panel. It weakness it weakened it. Is that the word? Yeah. Thank you. So it make it weaker. uh I think that this is a very limited narrow interpretation that doesn't consider the whole body of the ordinance in which the intention that city council had when they created the oversight system was to have three independent bodies and I don't see how the city attorney can now provide counsel for us to make the ordinance prevail. uh confronted with this interpretation and the this bilateral action from BPD and from uh the monitor. So uh maybe

[36:00] this is something that we need to consider that um we might need to ask the the city attorney to provide independent legal counsel to the to the panel given that we are not getting anywhere with these interpretations. Um yeah so that's kind of my piece and now please delay us with the data. I'm happy to answer questions in a minute. All right next slide. So I wanted to get a sense of the environment in which all this is unfolding for multiple reasons. I think capacity is a concern that's been cited to us and I know um many of us are probably also just interested in this data in general and understanding kind of what the flow of complaints and case reviews has looked like. Um so we just have three or four slides here that we'll go through quickly and if you guys are interested in answering any other questions with these data in the future, let me know. We have a lot on hand now

[37:01] from working on the annual report and um just looking at all of our case tracking data. So, um, this is a an overview, the best overview I could sort of come up with in terms of the overall complaint pipeline. We don't have multiple years of data or 2025 data on complaints direct from PSU's tracking systems. We just haven't asked for it yet. I'm sure they would give it to us, but this is from our IPM reports monthly going back to 2023 to get a sense of the overall flow. Um, so we have 2023 in the left. Is it too small? >> We're just getting rid of that. Should be. Yeah, just drag it. Okay. So, on the left is all of our 2023 data. In the middle, 2024, 2025. On the right, um, our bars represent all of the cases that were presented to the panel as case summaries for potential review. That's

[38:02] the blue bars. In red, we have the cases that came and were ultimately classified as something other than complaint cases. So together, those are the total complaint pipeline as best as we can tell. There's probably some What this doesn't capture is anything that doesn't get classified in a given month. Like it might not be exactly distributed the same way in terms of when things are coming into BPD, but it's pretty close. Um, a couple things I'll point out. Uh, 2023 was a very weird year for many reasons. There was a panel moratorum for five months. Um, and I also think we don't didn't have a monitor for much of that time. Um, >> we had an inter >> Yeah. I just not sure how much that affected things. >> Um, and I also don't think that some previous monitors were reporting the same way as maybe our current monitor is. So, I don't know if

[39:00] the red before 2024 is correct. It doesn't seem like the previous monitor was including those. I'm assuming zero is not accurate. They were likely cases, but they were not included in the IPM summaries. Um, so what we can see if we look at total cases, um, 25 in 2023, it was likely higher than that. We're missing other classifications. 2024, we had 121 total. 97 were referred for case review, ultimately classified as complaints, and 24 were classified as other things. I grouped all of those together, feedback, community inquiries, and unident or unclassified uh inquiries. 2025, we have had so far about the same number of complaints. We're at 123. It is November, so of course we still have a few more six, seven weeks of the year. Um, but we did see a sort of shift. We're having more cases classified

[40:01] as other types of cases. So, we actually saw our cases for review come down. That could be a change in behavior for complaintants. We could be getting more other types of inquiries and complaints through the complaint system or it could have to do with a change in how we're classifying. Um but overall we are seeing a slight increase in the total but the number of cases has actually come down so far assuming we don't see 30 cases next month. Uh next slide and we only have one case for this. >> Yeah. >> So that should change. >> Um I think I did put November in there for what I had. Yeah. Um [snorts] what we do see for sure is a very clear increase at least from 2023 of the monitor panel docket. So are these what is that total number that is everything that's just like in the system from start to finish of the pipeline. Do you know what how we define that

[41:01] number? um what I what I've been in however many months calling that using [clears throat] that label. >> So those are cases that either have been classified or are yet to be classified in any stage when that are that are still open. So >> yeah, does it include things that we voted on and are waiting for review or things that were waiting for BPD final closure >> as if it is open at any stage of chain of command review. Yep. Okay. Okay. That's what I assumed. But um we saw after the moratorum which I am really interested in hearing what eventually what happened during that moratorum like how did we treat complaint cases? Did PSU change anything? Did we change anything? I'm just curious why we had such slow numbers on the last slide. I assume that complaints coming in wouldn't

[42:00] necessarily change. I'm curious if the big backlog of complaints that then may have flooded the system since we took time off perhaps led to some of this backlog increasing. But that's something we could look into. So big increase in the backlog consistently throughout 2024 and then it has stayed a little bit more consistent but still clearly very high between 35 and 50 cases on the docket. Uh next slide. Um amidst that the panel has actually been voting to review fewer cases this year than last year. Um the colors are just when that case was classified. Um they were already there for another reason but kind of interesting to see the flow of cases across years. Um so green is cases that were classified in 2025. Where it appears on the chart is when we actually reviewed the case as a full panel. Um, in 2024 we had 33 total

[43:01] full case reviews. So voted to review them and then completed the case review. So far in 2025 through the first week of November we have reviewed 24. And I it's possible there has been one or two that happened after we like you haven't reported them back to us yet. So they are not here. But if they were being reported like if they happened in November and you're going to report them back to us in December, they may not be on here. following. I'm sorry. Is anything that's in an IPM report or that we know about is in here? I don't know. We can check, but this is the best we could do with what I had when I made this. We we did like a case or two in the last week. That's all I'm saying. I don't know when exactly. >> Is this cases that you voted to review or cases? >> These are cases where the panel review occurred. >> The review occurred. >> Yeah. >> And then next slide. Uh oh, no. I'm sorry. I totally messed that up. The last slide. Go back. I confused myself. [snorts] These are cases we voted to review. So that big

[44:01] five spike is last time when we voted to review. >> That makes more sense. That makes more sense. >> I I confused myself there. >> These are cases we voted to review. The next slide is actually review has occurred. So here we see again quite a bit of a slowdown. 23 cases we reviewed in 2024, in 2025. And this is where we may be missing like one from the last couple days. Um, reviewed 17 so far. Next slide. I think that may be it. All right. Um, so with that, we want to open this up to panel discussion. Um, questions. Sure. Go ahead. Can I just There's There's just two important changes that I would like to I think helps uh contextualize some of the data that you showed. >> Okay. which was um when I became monitor

[45:00] or in my first few months of becoming monitor in 2023, I realized that the police department uh had like a shadow docket of cases where if they were keeping it on some sort of I think just like word document or something and they were making the determination of when to like put it in as a complaint when it became a real complaint. complaint is the language that they would use. Um, so that was something that seemed quite inappropriate to me because it was outside of any civilian oversight's purview. So they agreed in and then implemented that in January 2024 they would register complaints even if they were um uh cases a lot of them that that turn now into an unspecified incident. So cases where a person leaves a voicemail over the weekend,

[46:01] you know, I'm going to complain about your officers and when they try calling, they either can't leave a message or they leave a message and no one responds, but they really don't. They know someone's trying to f someone has a complaint, but they don't have any details about it. Um so they that that certainly contributes to some of that that increase um or some of those those cases where we just don't have enough information to move forward. Um and then in um the I'm sorry now I'm not sure about the exact time frames but somewhere in late 2024 and 2025 we identified the need for a an additional classification besides complaints and community inquiries. And for people who don't remember, community inquiries are when someone makes a complaint, but it's more of a complaint

[47:02] about the department's process. Um um I'm trying to think of a a good example. Oh, I was um I was pulled over and an additional officer arrived instead of just the single officer that that pulled me over. So that's, you know, wouldn't be a complaint of misconduct that two officers arrived on on a scene. Um, so that's that's what community inquiry is for when it's more of a a complaint or suggest suggestion about a BPD policy, but not an allegation of misconduct towards a specific officer. Um, but we were finding um cases that that were neither didn't fall under complaints or community inquiries. So that's where we developed um the the community feedbacks and the um unspecified participants. So those are new classifications that had not they definitely weren't available in

[48:00] 2023 and I'm not sure when exactly they were implemented. >> Well, how were those cases labeled before those classifications were created? Would they have >> um there were some of them some of them if you look in the the monitors in the the report from 2024 I I've identified that in 2025 this would be likely be a an unspecified incident. So there were some some of them were complaints even if they have an officer or an allegation. >> Yeah. I I'm just mean would those have been if we didn't have the perfect classification for them, would we have put them in the cases for review bucket or the other classifications bucket or would they not have appeared at all? Like how would the data show those? They would under me um well before and after when this policy was implemented, they more often fell into the

[49:03] Okay. Shall we um move to the panel discussions? >> Wanting to uh provide time for panel members to share thoughts, concerns and also a reminder that uh given the other interpretation that we have not addressing now that we cannot meet this is the only place and opportunity we have in a month [clears throat] to discuss anything related to the panel work. So please feel free to share. We don't have another opportunity to talk about this. I have a question for Sterling actually. Can you address that last uh the last thing that that Cherry talked about the shadow dockets at BPD? Like do you know about that? >> I remember her mentioning it um now that she she brought it up again. she talked about it uh you last year. I remember

[50:01] that's the one thing I already know about it. I'm not part of PSU so I remember talking about it and getting it changed. So >> just curious about that and where that comes from. I I I kind of understand like the thought process from what she explained like that when you have like somebody calls in with like a very general complaint because they're angry about something but there's no specific information about a certain officer you might uh they probably I would imagine that the the people in PSU probably you know documented it somewhere but since they couldn't really make it a complaint at the time without know either specific information from the complaintant or on an officer They didn't put it as a whole complaint, but they still had it documented like kind of on a side system, I guess. But again, that's just a conjecture on my part because I'm not part of the process. >> I think that's part of a normal process

[51:01] rather than a shadow docket. It sounds like you're hiding stuff at the beginning. >> Shadow D is certainly a bad choice language. >> Thank you. that is a a term in fairness in fairness that is used frequently for a tracking process that sits outside of the main system of record. It's called a shadow system. So less like shadowy more [laughter] outside >> I appreciate that. So I was wondering Chris if you could address some of the things brought up between complaint and critical incident. Sure. And if there was any conversation about the bifurcation of those things within this new approach and if so what those conversations were or it didn't happen why and and how how do you see what was shared between the ordinance and the

[52:00] interpretation because I think that's some of the challenge >> that we're having both with movie that was in June and us wanting to meet to do some work together is that there's a real difference in interpretation. And I think that plays a role because that leads to we trust and what is really correct and and is this a prelude in the best of your knowledge to like reworking the soul or seems like this is a step in that direction in terms of not only the ordinance but how it's being interpreted. No, >> that's really good question, Bill. Um, so I really appreciate how prepared Solidadan and Lizzie came with the PowerPoint. I really uh enjoyed watching that. Um, you know, one thing that can kind of explain a little bit of the increased uh

[53:03] focus on the ordinance is the fact that the panel hasn't had consistent uh city attorney office presence um really for a while. um it was Aaron Bow, then it was Roberto Ramirez, and now it's now it's me. And um another point I want to make is that when legal opinions are are talked or spoken about in terms of, you know, city attorney interpretation, for the most part, um it's not just me. I'm running running interpretations past Teresa, the city attorney, who's my boss. and um specifically about you know the the topic for tonight's agenda. She's very familiar with what we're talking about and so it's a collective opinion from the city attorney's office and it's not just Chris Reynolds opinion. Um so I'd say that uh

[54:02] the main kind of point of uh perhaps disagreement is that um we don't see a substantive difference between the definition of complaint in the ordinance and incident of potential police misconduct. We view those two things to mean the same thing. And so when it says that the monitor has the authority to refer refer incidents of potential police misconduct, we read that to mean complaints. And so that's why uh it's our legal opinion that the monitor has that authority that is outlined in the ordinance. And um again, it's not just my opinion, but it's the opinion of the city attorney's office. And um again I really appreciate you know the time that was spent uh you know looking into this u but uh you know it is it is our legal advice that that authority rests with

[55:02] the monitor to refer complaints to the panel for panel review. Um this doesn't mean the complaints are then invisible to the to the panel. There's a difference between uh cases that the panel gets to review and recommend disposition and potential discipline on and also uh for transparency and knowledge purposes. The monitor still has the obligation under under the code to report on all complaints the panel regardless of what the disposition or outcome was for those complaints. And so that's that's how I would respond to those questions. Is did this just come up like last month or is there some historical context to this that we're missing? That's one question. And then the second one is so if we don't agree as we click into that clause where it says we can request conversation with chief police.

[56:00] So let's say Sherry brings back a complaint for his position and we don't agree with that. as it goes back does go back to that clause where now we can appeal directly to the chief. >> So to answer the the two questions the latter question first um I do interpret that should allow the panel to submit written disagreement whenever there's any sort of disposition to any conflict regardless of whether or not the panel got to review it. Um and then the first question was context of this >> come out in the last three months months or is there some history to >> I'm sorry I'm super curious about how how would that process work? It would how in which process would go I'm sorry >> because you're saying that like the real question is is very clear right is so if we don't agree with the chief in any situation we can always request you know but if we didn't see the complaint because it wasn't referred to us

[57:01] >> and we didn't see the evidence so therefore there's no way that we can have an opinion responsible opinion on what the facts are >> and there's an agreement in the recommendation from the panel if there we if we didn't review the case, we can't have a recommendation. So, I don't understand like how are you envisioning these new processes because it it appears to be very clear in the ordinance, but apparently we're not that clear. >> The uh so that the ordinance uh 2116B grants uh the panel access to all all datas with regards to complaints and so regardless of >> Yes. Um, >> so the way the way that I would envision something like that happening would be perhaps let's say that the monitor reports on a case that isn't ripe for panel review that she's not referring to

[58:00] the panel for review, but something in that reporting makes the panel want to look at it more closely can then request access to that specific case. But it's not with the end result of reviewing the case. The case means the same thing using them interchangeably. Um does not mean that that then case slashcomplaint uh would be subject to panel vote for disposition of recommendation or discipline. It'd be more like we disagree with how this case was handled. It should have been misconduct right for the panel's review. Something like that. So for according to what you just say a critical incident would be the same as a complaint >> critical incident has a different >> oh but that doesn't match complaint just in match complaint. >> So you you said that you're using you're using >> complaint and incenient >> as a as synonymous

[59:00] >> potential. Yeah, >> but we're not using the same criteria for critical incident. So that so I'm I'm really having a hard time here with with everything al together because like I don't understand how like maybe we need a dictionary or something so we can align our our concepts. Um when we wrote the ordinance we were talking about three very different things and three very different situations. And I I don't know, maybe Erin Po was just I don't know, super incompetent and she didn't catch any of this. And all the times that this went back to review to the city attorney's office, no one read what we were submitting. Every single chapter of of this ordinance went back to the city attorney's office. Every single one, every week. And you're telling me now that we're using complaint and incident as synonymous? Like it doesn't make any

[60:00] sense to me. >> Complaint and incident of potential police misconduct. Yeah. >> So it's the same. >> It be a substantive difference. >> It it's not the same. But a complaint is an oral or written communication to the office of police monitor or the Boulder Police Department alleging misconduct on the part of a police employee. An incident of potential police misconduct has that same definition. That's the same thing. >> Substantively, I don't see a bit difference. What about any other incident that Sherry or the monitor may become aware of that they want to refer to the panel because it's relevant to our work? What about a critical incident? What about something she comes across in her investigation that was not from a complaint from a community member or an internal member of BPD, but yet is an incident of potential police misconduct that Sherry wants to classify and send to the panel. And again, critical incident is defined,

[61:02] >> right? But what about other incident types? So I guess is it what it sounds like you're saying is that there are two terms clearly defined in this ordinance. There are many terms, but there is complaint and then there is incident. They are used in different places in different ways. Complaint is clearly defined in the definitions. In this same section 2115, we have different sections that are corresponding to authority related to incidents and authority related to complaints. And what you're saying is that the group that wrote this ordinance just for no reason other than maybe lack of clarity or oversight decided to use the term incident in section 4 to 1154 instead of using complaints which they had clearly defined and used distinct from complaints throughout the

[62:02] entire rest of the ordinance. There are sections about complaints. Their section is about critical incidents. There are separate references to incidents of other types. So is that just like why would why would those not why would it not say complaints if this referred to complaints? Is that typical for code language? >> Code language >> vague. >> Oh, very something. >> Yes. >> Like to me a complaint is has community a community member complaining and then can be something that doesn't have a complaint attached to it. So I don't see literally I don't understand how you can think that both are the same. We are we are reviewing all the complaints all the complaints that are coming from our community and now you're telling me that an incident is the same thing. >> How to potential police >> but that is not a complaint from a

[63:01] community member is it? made it very well. >> An incident do not does not have attached the fact that community members I mean the definition is pretty clear. A complaint is a complaint. Someone is writing it >> to us to the PSU to complain about a behavior that they witnessed or uh were submitted to. >> How is an incident the same? An incident of potential police misconduct. >> I don't understand. Explain. What is it? An incident of potential police misconduct. >> Yeah, please. >> Mr. Reynolds is representative of an office. This is his answer today. He will not change it. >> Badgering him will not do anything. >> Okay. Um I'm not trying to say anything about him. I'm going to say that's his job today. Okay. >> Sure. he'll bring our issues back to his

[64:02] office and we'll see what happens with that. Um, but I think point is made well by you guys. Uh, that that there's an issue here. Who should resolve it? I don't know. Could be resolved by the council. It could be resolved through agreement which would probably be the best way of dealing with it. Um, but I think he understands very clearly your argument. I think it's an excellent argument and uh sure that that will be discussed. Talking about it more taking him to answer questions isn't >> going over. Yeah. >> Thanks Jason. >> Thanks Bill. >> I feel like we stepped in with followup questions. >> Sorry. >> I was just wondering about context. Like did this just happen a month ago or two months ago? I know that you had said

[65:00] some of us weren't prepared. I mean is this something that started >> Yeah. years ago >> year ago or is it something that just started in the last two months? >> Either one I don't know if there's a legal answering to that that you're aware of the city attorney's office from your perspective. And the reason I asked that, especially from your perspective, is now I'm curious why you didn't bring those concerns to the co-chairs around either like preparedness or other types of logic that caused you to want to move in this direction. >> Yeah. So the this issue came to a head based on BP's actions in September of closing cases and that was done without my knowledge or advice until after after that the the outcome however um like prior prior to that I believe

[66:03] my recollection about this but I believe even prior to that when Chris came on board uh as the attorney assigned to oversight. You know, he was looking at the ordinance and you know shared his thought that looking at the ordinance he believed that the monitor had the ability to you exercise some discretion when referring cases to the panel. There are several clauses that say things such as the monitor and the panel shall be established or operated as separate complimentary entities with different roles that are and shall remain independent of one another not made but shall. And there you know in section 21.2 also review of complaints of potential violations of department's policies. There are orders including but not limit to allegations of racial profiling, racial abuse of treatment and excessive force. the civilian peace oversight

[67:01] system shall review. So there's not indication there's not the limiting factor. So your interpretation seems to rely on the one clause that involves cases that would only go to the police um chief for review, but that there's there isn't that's one clause versus all the other clauses that give a wider scope of authority to the panel. So, it's just interesting that your interpretation relies on one clause at the expense of all the other clauses that stipulate a shared function. Typically, when there's something in the law that's more specific over a generalized statement of intent, then the more specific thing would govern, which would be the monitor's powers and duties section talking about uh their power to refer incidents of potential. >> Even though there's one clause that in

[68:00] that is that specific, yet several others that give the wider scope. Yeah. >> Yes. >> So, it sounds like there's a difference of um interpretation of the ordinance. So, my question is who who has the final say in how that um or in in what deter in what um and what interpretation is final? Who has the final say in it? The only entity that can give legal advice to the panel or monitor is uh the city terms. >> Um okay, we have several questions in the chat. Uh let's try to address them. Um, so first question is, is there evidence that relegating the community oversight panel to a more background decision-making body will actually speed

[69:01] up the process of reviewing complaints about police misconduct? And is there evidence that if this does speed the process, will this deliver justice to community members who have been wronged by police? >> Um, [clears throat] >> that's a good question. That's a very good question. Um some information to share about that is the we we we haven't really even touched very much on like the details of capacity and resources. Um PSU and my office are are frankly overwhelmed and that is just like Lizz's charts seeing it the increase in cases visually it's it's very accurate. docket, pardon, the docket >> or do you mean >> like the in increase of cases where you show 2023s the classific the misconduct investigations versus other classifications? So when I have uh when the panel chooses

[70:02] to review a case and we all know that there are cases that are much more involved and cases that have less evidence um but on average my estimation is that that takes about 5 hours of work. Um that has been increasing um for few a few different reasons. Um PSU shared with me that BPD estimates that when they have to redact body worn camera footage that for every hour of footage it takes about three hours of human resources to do that redaction. So there's both the resources from the monitor's office, the panel, and then the resources that are used by by DPD in the redaction and then the the review by chain of command including chief of police. >> The redactions only need to happen when the panel votes for panel review because you don't you don't view red. >> Correct. Yes, that is a some direct use

[71:03] of resources. We showed with the data that we've only done 17 case reviews this year. So that's however many hours saved, how many case reviews the panel doing in a year would be within capacity. It feels like we're getting into some very low numbers of 17 is too many. the I mean I think I've established very strongly that I am willing to work lots of hours and work evenings and weekends and try to be very flexible with case review scheduling for panel members. So the I don't know what the answer of what is capacity. I have been working for two years over. >> Um let's address the other. Can we read how does this change to the system reviewing complaints retain the

[72:01] importance efficacy and independence of community oversight panel? Um it doesn't clearly. Um, I'm going to move to the next one. Uh, it is unclear to me what problem the city attorney or monitor say they are trying to solve here. Um, there does not seem to be a basis in ordinance to make this change especially removing the police oversight panel into an advisory body. Um, that that issue is we are trying to we are trying to address the issue of resources to improve timeliness of cases and allow this system to continue to work without the incredible amount of human resources that are used. And one of the things that it sounds like Bill was alluding to is the um panel reviewing the the capacity of the

[73:01] panel to review case prepared to review those cases to review the evidence for is what the ability and capacity of panel members to review evidence for case review thoroughly in advance of meeting for case reviews. Was there any thought in any of this process to bring um this to the panel in a more curious way? I will say that before making this decision and this change that we would have talked about this. Was there any a thought to say, you know what, I'm going to discuss with the panel. We're at capacity here. Let's think together what how can we address this >> as we had a conversation in the co-chair's meeting we have different recollections >> very different very different yes which

[74:03] is one of the other very concerning things that we have seen okay next question is there a dictionary of or definition in terms of uh somewhere to read through we wish thank you um Darren Um, how does independent council get selected to adi advise the poll? I think that would be a question for you. If there's a a conflict of interest, then it's which is determined by city attorney's office, then we would make the determination whether or not we would need to uh select independent counsel. But it's not unusual for an individual or a body to disagree with legal advice and disagreeing with legal advice is not conflict trust. Just to be clear, so the advice here is that we should be okay with just being an advisor board. Is that the advice?

[75:02] >> The advice is the action of the monitors within the scope of >> Okay. The advice for the panel. I'm asking because they're not the same thing. The advice for the panel is the same advice, but you should receive the recommendations. >> The advice is that the actions of the monitor within scope of priority. >> Okay. So if I asked the city attorney what is the city attorney's advice for the panel to execute their authority what that answer will be you don't have any >> to execute their authority in what context >> in all the context of their of the ordinance shall review complaints sh collaborate sh like all the shells that the ordinance have uh regarding the panel I guess I'm not understanding question. >> Okay. Can someone help me with better English? Explain the question.

[76:00] >> I think it was pretty clear. >> Yeah, >> I think it goes back to >> what Jason said. You're right. >> The question has asked and been answered and I think Chris is going to have a lot to take back to have conversations >> with his colleagues and with city manager in terms of what we brought forward. I think the way I'm interpreting it is that this new process is going to move forward and we have to figure out as a panel how do we want to [clears throat] how do we address these cases? have me just a little I don't agree because I'm you're still going to bring them forward and say here's here's here's a complaint that was unfounded or exonerated will we not even hear about >> I'm not sure if there's >> so the complaints where you and the PD agree on yes >> that you're not >> that we don't have a chance to vote on

[77:00] are we still going to hear about >> yes >> okay so so then We had to decide what our steps are, agree with unfounded or exonerated. >> Sorry, I didn't pick up. >> So, so I think I think that's our answer and then we have to kind of see what comes back from this convers because I looked at this as a beginning conversation because we never really talked. >> Yeah. and then I'm sure they'll go back and talk to their colleagues and then we'll have another conversation. So hopefully you you two will be part of that conversation as well. >> My understanding is that your interpretation involves the scope of work of the police monitor and yet it doesn't necessarily involve the scope of work of the panel as outlined by the ordinance um with a specific attention paid to what the panel is is in charge with doing. Um, and so I think what we're asking for, and correct me if I'm

[78:01] wrong, is that an in a review be done of the scope of work of the panel because it seems like that's not been taken into account in this decision, the specific scope of work of the panel. And then um it's still within the attorney's um the city attorney's office, right? Um to retain outside council if there's a conflict of interest. But it seems like there is somewhat of a conflict of interest when the scope of work, the monitor is being privileged over the scope and >> I I hear what you're saying. Uh I'm not sure that is I would agree that that's a first thing conflict of >> Yes. And I I agree that right now there's I'm raising the issue >> for consideration. >> Yeah. Um sorry. >> Um was lost. Um I think there is something that we're missing and we're not talking

[79:01] about. This panel was created because of two serious misconducts of police by community members. Four community members, the NAACP and permit uh and central Amistad and uh other community members were involved in creating this uh panel. This is exactly why we are here. This is what we signed up for is to represent our community. And we are forgetting them in this interpretation that goes against what all the people like our consultants and the city attorney at the time and the the the the uh panel members Soad and Abigail worked hard on creating this ordinance and it was they were congratulated by

[80:01] unanimously by the city council um members and here we are. I'm because of your interpretation and I know that you say Teresa Tate is there but Teresa Tate may not have a choice at this point but support you and I'm just like >> to disagree >> where where are we and how are we serving our community members? How are we doing this? because we're not and we're talking about the ordinance right now and that's great but this is not the only thing that we've had problems with. We were vetoed from showing a movie and engaging with our community. We were um and I it goes before also so and I were going to present at NL and as soon as she said

[81:00] that to Sherry we were not able to present at Nagel but guess what Sherry ended up presenting at NL with Soad. um that there's things like that that has been like dividing and undermining the panel works, the conflict of interest between two of our panelists, undermining the panelist, undermining what we do, getting like if the public is listening, they're probably thinking that what they they illegally wanted to do something and create an event. They are now having a conflict of interest. They're not interpreting the ordinance correctly. Where are we going? What are you trying to do to buy this? I'm I'm just so outraged by your interpretation, Chris, and by the work that has been done like to undermine this panel that I'm I'm just speechless. I I just can't even understand how we can be talking

[82:00] the same language right now. I'm just I'm just curious because since I've been here, I've seen the the like cases be monitor recommends unfounded um and the panel vote on and like take those cases and it seems like to me like removing that um I guess that authority that the panel has. It's just because I think I understand like the case load and stuff, but if it's stuff with um the police department like reviewing the footage, I feel like that it should be a problem that they should it shouldn't be taking away our authority to review cases um or like complaints when it's the police department's like a staffing problem or a resources problem. Like I think there's other solutions to that. On that topic, I would be interested to hear from you, Sherry. The reason I brought up earlier the number of reviews

[83:02] was getting to whether I if we table the question of whether this is something you may do, given your authority for a moment, I want to talk about whether it's something you should do. Um, and I'm curious because I I haven't I don't know that we've we've heard a convincing case that this will alleviate the issue enough to balance what the panel is losing and what the community is losing in oversight. So, do you have an idea of what the impact of this would be? For example, this this year we had 12 we had 60 cases presented to us for potential voting for review. How many would you have like how many would have been declined to refer and how much of a decline in capacity would that have saved or how much of how

[84:00] much capacity would that have saved for you and PSU? What's the benefit of this? My my understanding from as you know it's hard to look through before the data has been actually filed and is that the panel has voted for six cases this in 2025 that I had recommended be be closed in the based on the [clears throat] review of the preliminary investigation. >> Okay. So, so that saves six cases worth of redaction time and the full investigation. Like what is the difference then? So, six cases of not having to complete any work past the preliminary investigation. >> Right. Right. >> Okay. >> And how many [clears throat] hours is that? If I'm estimating, if I'm estimating five hours of and that's solely my time, not the not the work that the police department has to do, that is about 5 hours for a case review. That has

[85:02] increased um recently because of the challenges I've had scheduling. So the administrative function of trying to schedule panel members to get panel members to respond to requests to schedule case reviews and try and conducting audits to see that panel members are actually reviewing materials that have been provided to them. So that has added an extra hour about of administrative [clears throat] burden recently of conducting those audits since there were panel members you know who have found were not opening up the files for case reviews. >> So 6 hours estimate per case of your time. Right. >> So we're doing all of this. We're considering this major change to our understanding of the panel's authority to save 36 hours of time in a year. Well, that's only that's only my time. That is not police department resources. We are looking to try to find ways to

[86:01] make this system more efficient, to use the resources that the city has in the best way possible, and to maintain that the panel uses its resources to address the most impactful cases to members of the community. >> Um, right. So I I I understand and thank you so much um Bill and Jason for grounding me in the discussion. Um and again given that we don't have any other opportunity to talk about these things I want to bring this to our my panel my colleagues um I have a very hard time right now because my trust in in the system is challenged is broken. I have a very hard time re and I I'm very aware and I want to say this I'm responsible for what I'm saying. I'm very aware that we have um number of members of the public that we haven't seen in a lot of time. So that

[87:00] tells me that the community care about what's going on. Um I cannot in good conscious um advise any member of my community to file a complaint right now because I don't have faith in the system. I think that there has been so many events in which um there's lack of judgment and we have been seeing this since since well we have the timeline since the the event that Curtis proposed. We offer we offer um Lizzy and I a apologies to Curtis and Milan for for that very wrong approach which were the only two the only apologies that we saw. Um I was accused

[88:01] of having a conflict of interest with Turner. I have family members uh names and lives exposed in an open meeting. uh I requested an apology that never came in my complaint to city the city manager. So I I am very challenged right now. I think there's at least if if you if I were to agree with all you like all your interpretation and this is legal. I found it at least unethical the approach that you Sherry have taken to communicate with the coaches and with the panel. I found I found it at least unethical. Like what you like and I told you this what you are effectively doing is outrageous. Erasing the voice of the community in the oversight process is outrageous. What we bring the legislative intent of

[89:00] the ordinance was to bring diverse voices. Your voice and PSU voice are not diverse. You don't represent anyone in the community that is highly impacted by police misconduct. The numbers are there. We're not doing this for, you know, the majority of the people that lives live in the city. We're doing this for the minority. So the fact that you're removing that that it took so much work to put in place is just embarrassing. So my invitation to the panel is that let's have that conversation. How do we move forward the legalities of this? You know I whatever I guess we we can I don't know f protection all injunction see how to interact before the panel is removed I have no idea

[90:00] but I think the ethical aspect of what's happening is disturbing you are willing to change the entire oversight system for 36 hours work. I can tell you that between the work that I have in the the the development of the ordinance and the bylaws, I probably have 10 times that in work in my volunteer time. I I didn't get paid. So 36 hours of work for this it doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make any sense. So that's the discussion that I'm inviting the panel to have like how can we move forward from here and again I want to remind the panel that this is the police oversight panel meeting. We

[91:03] don't have any other opportunity to talk about this. This is not the IPM or city attorney's meeting. This is the police oversight panel community members meeting. So let's please have a conversation. How will we address this moving forward? I would I would recommend that we find an outside counsel because at this point there's no conversation that is happening. Um, and so I that would be um I see that Alan is panned up, but I'm gonna um there's been biases that we've complained time and time again. Thank you, Selad, for saying that. That was very, very um you shouldn't have to have to say that. Um I brought cases that were classified, I think, incorrectly. They started as a complaint. We didn't have the opportunity to see them at as complaint. I stated that there are uh clear biases in classifying them as

[92:01] public inquiry or feedback. um we've seen that time and time and time again um both from BPD when we review cases sometimes we might agree and so on on the findings because the rules are so narrow but we see biased behavior and we have at least because we see all the we supposed to see all the complaint we have the opportunity to say there's bias and we this this officer while not breaking the rulings is still biased towards community members and only only panelists with their different experiences, life experiences and knowledge and uh can do that. You cannot do that Sherry. You have no clue sometimes about what's going on in terms of biases and it's not your fault but you can work on it and and we haven't seen you work on your own

[93:00] biases. So, I want to call that out right now. And then um and then I would really like us to discuss that in an outside council. >> Yeah. Um Alan, go ahead. Well, seems to me that we don't we have this five-year ordinance review coming up and rather than kind of shooting from the hip and flying off the handle and getting personal and, you know, letting the rhetoric fly, seems pretty clear to me that uh that this proposal isn't ready for prime time. And I suggest that uh Sherry and Chris go back to go back to the their corners and try to figure something out because it's pretty clear that that uh the city attorney's interpretation is is a little is a little hanky and I

[94:00] think that uh Solidad you know rightly pointed out the differences between uh the definitions of incidents and and complaints is that they're they're not synonymous and they're not interchangeable. And so if they're going to bring something back, I think that would behoove them to take into account the conversation. much of it was personal which I object to but uh but I think that in rhetorical which is doesn't really get anywhere but I think that that may I understand the idea behind the the proposal but the there there has to be some trap doors for example like for example if they do decide to not bring forth exonerated cases or no finding cases there should be a call-up mechanism them so that we have at least have an opportunity to see those. So Sherry produced some information for me that the other day that said that out of the 120 cases or so we just 55 55 of

[95:04] them are found to be exonerated or no findings. And so, you know, there there's I I can understand the the the the premise behind the behind the idea, but I think there that there just need it just needs to be ironed out a bit. I think we're we're getting special counsel. That's a more like a threat than anything practical. And so, um, I I think I think that we that we we just need to send this back and we go where we and apparently we you think we don't have another time to talk about this, but it's not going into effect like tomorrow. This is not ready for prime time in my view. And and if they think if Chris and Cherry think this is ready for prime time, I think they're mistaken. And let's just take this a little bit more methodical. We have this 5-year review of the ordinance coming up

[96:00] and if there are clearly some discrepancies from too many too many people having their pies their fingers on the pie, I think this is a good time to address those. But in the meantime, as you point out, you know, our case loads are going down. I think we're having a little bit showing a little bit more discretion and and discernment when we decide which cases we're going to be bringing forward. So I think we're we're turned as a group in terms of of weighing the weighing each of the cases and not deciding that we need to review in depth every single one of them. >> I I would like to say that I completely disagree with you, Alan. Um we're not taking care of our community if we go less ripped. And that's that's the main thing for me is like how what is our purpose if not our community like representing our community and having their voices heard.

[97:01] All I'm saying is if the status quo carries forth what you're talking about, Milen and uh what if there if [snorts] if we withdraw this proposal for the time being and and see if what can be done to improve it or not, then we should go to the five-year review process and make any changes or or tweaks or major overhauls that we need at that time. >> I don't think we have the time to wait. That's my thing. Like we were doing great and then suddenly we can't even work. So um waiting for a process as long as a fiveyear review is is not serving our community. And I think we have some questions and I think we didn't answer uh Darren about how those independent council get selected to apply the pop.

[98:00] Chris answered that. >> Yeah. Okay. All right. Sorry. So, I think do a check is 810. >> Mhm. And then comments. >> Yes. >> Um I wanted to say something too. >> Um yeah, I wanted to thank you for what you said. I feel like that was a really really strong point of like diversity. the panel supposed to be a diverse, you know, um um board and the the decision-m process of of of cases being being unable to be reviewed by the panel. Um you're right, that doesn't that doesn't um give the fairness of of diverse life experiences to look at situations. Uh, I think it it it it cuts it cuts people's complaints off dangerously early. Um, because there just some things that just may not be seen there in that process. I also agree with me, Lynn, about an outside attorney. Um, I'm

[99:02] seeing a conflict of interest if there's if we have as a panel a different interpretation [clears throat] of the ordinance and the city attorney's office has another one. Um, and if if it's my understanding correctly, the city attorney's position is to advise both the monitor and the panel. If we have conflicting ideas of the ordinance, then that to me sounds like a a a conflict of interest. Um, and yeah, that's all I would like to say. make a motion that the panel vote on um then um that we provide that we um request outside council to be retained by the city to provide legal advice to the panel on this matter. >> Second. >> Okay, everyone, let's vote. Uh all in

[100:01] favor of uh requesting independent council for the panel say I or raise your hands. Okay. Everyone against. Okay. Alert is against. Um okay. So I will So we're running out of time. So um sorry. Yeah. I think we can make a motion to uh table the rest of the agenda for next uh panel meeting and then we can go to uh public motion to um all the uh the rest of the agenda to next meeting. >> A second. Everyone in favor of tableing the rest of the agenda for next month, please say I or Joe hands. Okay. Yes. Um, thank

[101:01] you. Okay. Does anyone need a break? >> We do not take a usual break. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> Let's go to I guess well. >> Yeah. Okay. >> Um, so let's go to open comments then. >> Are we going to raise their hand or are we going? Yeah, let's um we have a lot of members of the public. Please, if you want to make a comment, can you raise your hand so we can name you so we don't take our time? >> You want? >> Yeah, if I may. >> Of course. Uh let us one second so we can organize this. So, >> uh we're going to go to open comment in a minute. Um please raise your hand if you have something to say and um and we will move through. We have two minutes. um for person. So, we're going to set up

[102:01] watch and we can go to I have to move to virtual. I will be right back online. Okay. Go ahead. And we uh Jenna, would you help me with a spotwatch? >> It's right there. >> Oh, we have it right there. >> Okay. Um let's start with I'm sorry, Alex in the room >> and if you have open comment. Yes. Two minutes. >> Thank you. Um I the mostly is clarifying questions is um the pre the original precedent that y'all were operating on was that all of the cases would come to the panel and then y'all would divvy out what actually gets investigated. Is that accurate? >> Reveal by the panel investigated all of them are investigated by PSU but once once the investigation is finished we can review. So we get all the cases referred to us and we decide which one we review. >> Gotcha. And then this new proposal uh with with Sherry um you would be um like a fence. You would be the person who div

[103:02] lets the panel know which ones to choose from. Is that what I'm hearing that you you the initial screening would go through you then of that selection then it would go to the panel and that's what's different. Previously they all went to the panel for the panel to make decisions but now you will be the one that decides which ones go forward. Is that accurate? >> I have when I classify I have the preliminary investigation. So I have the a lot of relevant evidence available and that I would use maybe almost 20 years of professional experience that I have investigating police misconduct. apply that evidence to the the general orders, the rules and regulations of the police department and then make a determination of whether it is complaint investigation, classify it otherwise. Um, and as we talked about tonight, if I make the recommendation, it is unfounded or exonerated

[104:00] that and and the police department agrees with it. >> Yes. The the benefit we have in this modern day is that almost all incidents have body warn camera to be able to view. So, so uh those cases where myself and the police department are in agreement that the allegations are >> that's different is that you would have that preliminary decision-making power before it's the panel that and that's so that's a big difference. I just want to make sure we I know what exactly what's going on here. So the panel has that power to make those distinctions and now it'll just fall on you and then you get emid out which ones you decide to go forward and we already have six five or six examples of you having that uh power uh I'm sorry um you said there was um six cases that that the panel went through that you would have uh rejected. I don't know if that's the right terminology or not. Um, so we already have examples of the panel moving forward with ones that

[105:00] you chose that you [clears throat] wouldn't have wanted to do. >> Yeah. >> Is that accurate? >> Yeah. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um, okay. So, who do we have next? I think is >> nice. Okay. Uh, we have Darren a corner. So, Darren, hello. If you can unmute yourself and um, we have two minutes now. Thank you. >> Yeah. And so I just want to share that being a community member and former NAACP member who motiv who based on you know a couple of community black community members being treated horribly by the police. you know, really challenged the city to have an independent police oversight panel made up of community members. Uh, and and what Soladod shared earlier in this meeting is just so important right in

[106:02] the legislative intent that is captured. And as an attorney, you know, I I know Chris Reynolds. I I like like Chris. I think he does great work for the city, but I am really shocked that the panel has decided that they don't need independent counsel. These are legal questions and legal questions often get decided in front of a judge, right? It's not that one attorney makes a conclusion and you know the adverse party's attorney says, "Oh, well, an attorney said it. It must be right." The adversarial process is how you come to a good conclusion. Chris may very well be right. I disagree with him. But if the city attorney's office is the one making this decision and the POP is disagreeing with it and it goes directly against the legislative intent, I don't see why any

[107:00] of you would stay on this panel. I don't see why as a person who helped found this entire uh pop and monitor, I don't see why the community should even support having it anymore if you're not going to have the opportunity to look at any case that you want. And yeah, with that, I'll close. Thank you. >> Thank you. And just to clarify, the panel voted to request um independent council. So, we'll see how that >> I miss her. Thank you. >> Yeah. Okay. Can we see the So, uh, Marlin, okay, Marlin, uh, you can unmute yourself and we, as soon as you're ready, we can set the clock. Uh, Mlin, you need to unmute yourself. There you go. Okay, go ahead. >> Okay. Good evening, everyone.

[108:02] I am am way way way beyond disappointed. I served on the initial group that started the oversight insight uh oversight uh process, police oversight process for Boulder and I remained there from the initial meeting which was I think May of 2019 through uh last here and for us to be at this point um it it just totally defies everything that we worked so hard to put together. I hope that you will seek the input more input from the community. This was done uh with community

[109:00] involvement, community input and for community and by the community and uh so without the community's voice um I think you will miss a very very critical piece that you will need if this is to continue. I also want to say that my service, my personal service far exceeded 36 hours from May 2019. Uh, and so if that is the the saving portion, if that's what we're going to benefit, then I'd say it's worth it to do. Let's do the right thing in all things. Do the right thing. You know, right from wrong. And I just I plead with you. I appreciate your work. I'm so happy to see you're still at it, but you will not be effective if you're authority is deflated.

[110:01] So, let's do the right thing and all things. Thank you so much. It's good to see you still at work. Good night. >> Good night. Mine. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for being here. >> Okay, we have one more. Can I see? Yeah. Okay. Okay. Judy. Judy. Houston. Um. Okay. Judy, you can unmute and uh you can wait one second. Okay. Judy. Uh we're you can unmute and go ahead. Okay, thank you. Um, yes, I wanted to also um say that I attended the special city council session after Zed Atkinson was held at gunpoint by eight officers for picking up trash in his own yard.

[111:01] And the um unanimous [clears throat] opinion of the uh the public at that point was to create the um over police oversight panel and an independent police monitor. [clears throat] And then I also was involved as an observer at all of the study sessions after that. Um, and that seemed to be a a a process that was done in good faith. Um, and and was uh well-intentioned and quite thorough. Um the and I don't remember the particulars here, but I do remember when I first read the uh the original ordinance, I was kind of shocked because it sounded to me like right away they were limiting the authority of the panel. Um and then since then it seems like the city has completed or or continued to backtrack on what they're willing to allow the panel to do and under what opices. I my sense and I lived for 60 years in

[112:00] Boulder um is that Boulder still considers itself a special place that's just you know really nice and not racist and not sexist and not homophobic and that sort of thing. But I know that that is not correct. The city is as racist as any place can be and all you have to do is talk to any person of color and they will tell you exactly how bad it is in in the city of Boulder. So, um I I believe in you the pop and um really keep on punching away as long as you have the authority to do it. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. [clears throat] >> Uh do we have anyone else? >> Um Tate Harrison, uh you can unmute and we can run the clock. Thank you. Oh, >> hello. Um, >> hi. >> My name is Tate M. I'm a CU student here

[113:01] in Boulder. Um, finishing up my last year. And, um, as someone who's um um somewhat new um to to um um to Boulder, I find it really really concerning that my voice is not being considered in the police department. Um, and my needs may not be met. And that's all I'd like to say. >> Thank you, F. >> Thank you. >> That's it. >> Okay. Can I make a Okay. I think Yes. >> Can I make a last comment? I think that um what we've heard from from our community members and what we know about the history of Boulder

[114:02] um the system works exactly as it's supposed to to be working and we have to recognize that and what we are here for as panelists is to fight that system so that the people who have been historically um abused uh are no longer and we cannot we cannot allow Boulder to continue time and time and time again to be racist, biased in so many ways just so that the city can have people looking like me only. Like we have a rich community of uh with people of color in Boulder. They are [clears throat] absolutely indispensable to this community and they need to have a voice.

[115:01] And you both are upholding the system of racism in Boulder. And this has been going on since the first squatters stayed here too long. And we remove indigenous people. That's what we're doing. We're still operating under that assumption, silencing people who've been silenced for centuries in this country. And that's what we're doing right now. Shame on you. Shame on you. Um, we have one more member. Uh, Lynn, um, we see you, so you can unmute. And we are starting the time now. Thank you. Hi Lynn. >> Yeah, I'm glad my lane brought that up. Did I say it right? >> It's meand. But that's fine. >> Mean. Yeah. Um

[116:02] because this I haven't been at the I've been at a transportation advisory board meeting and then I was at a Boulder area coalition of energy sovereignty meeting and I'm jumping around. But um yeah, I'm I'm also very concerned about um my freedom to speak, my freedoms, to have basic um considerations. Um I had something stolen in the municipal building and that was never resolved properly and it and I'm just so upset about that still. And that was like three years ago. Um, and it was from a city employee and I never got to talk to them and Michael Dowerty just let the person didn't prosecute and I didn't want to prosecute them and there was a huge expensive police investigation and the person that stole

[117:02] the stuff um that I don't never understood wh why what the motivation was and he said it was his boss told him to get it and she didn't she didn't corroborate that. So like it leaves me um um just astounded. I really really like restorative justice and that didn't happen. And right now I three have three harassment charges against me for someone that stole my signs at a candidate form. Then instead of me filing suit against them, which I found my posters in their locked car, instead I'm told that I'm harassing them by following them or shoving them, which is a complete fabrication. >> Thank you, Len. Thank you. >> Okay. Um, so

[118:02] we we do have some comments and I think we can read the comments. I want to be respectful with the members of the public that happened here and as soon as we get those in we can close up. Jason, >> I'd just like to say that um to the extent anything has gotten personal. I think what's important here is at least for the panel that at some point in time each panel member is no longer going to be on this panel. And we while we're here need to make sure that this panel is the best panel could be and has retains its power and has the power that it was intended to have because while we may trust people that are not on the [clears throat] job right now, we don't know they will be future. >> Y >> and we are the community speaking to them. So I really would like to I think echo Allen and saying

[119:02] let's try to remove some of the personal and focus on what this is which is the power of the panel making sure that our panel has the power to do its job >> for some people like you and me uh Jason it is personal >> I understand >> and I think that it's it's worse Okay. Okay. Can someone talk? >> Oh, Lizzy. Yes. Lizzy, you have your hand up, Lizzy. >> Okay, maybe not. Uh, can someone read the I can't read that one or do you want to? >> Yeah, I as a Boulder resident appreciate how the panel and monitor and police have operated in the past and would like to see the meeting focus on how to get back on how to get back to following the original way to working together

[120:01] constructively. I would like to see less legal discussion and less restrictions being placed on the panel. And yes, I would like to see the panel's authority and ability to do their work restored. Thank you. >> Yeah, someone said that's right. Erasing the voice of the community is outrageous. Why is the pop not allowed to meet other than at these official meetings? We answer that. Uh, thank you for saying that, Vinn. It's hard to trust Boulder when we see what you are doing and know what you have done. Thank you for having an honest meeting. >> Someone said, "Agreed." >> Uh, Lucy, >> yes. Can you guys hear me? >> Yes. >> Okay. Sorry about that. I just wanted to make a final comment, but I can wait

[121:00] until after we read through the community comments if that makes more sense. Uh, we read them all. We read them. >> Okay, perfect. Um, I appreciate everyone's comments tonight, Jason. I appreciate your comments. I appreciate everything everyone has shared. I just wanted to say to wrap this up for me, I think we have heard some really strong arguments for reconsidering the interpretation of the ordinance. [clears throat] And I I really do hope that Chris and the city attorney's office got some thoughtful material tonight to take back and consider. So, I do hope this the beginning of an ongoing conversation where we can continue to talk about this. Um, and I also think that we got some really powerful reminders from our panel members and from so many community members who showed up, which I appreciate so much, but really powerful reminders about why we're here and how

[122:01] important and valuable and serious this work really is, which I hope explains to everyone in the room why emotions are high and why, you know, we have folks speaking really passionately about this. It's not necessarily personal, but it is be it is important and folks feel strongly and I I understand why we have emotions in place. So, I I appreciate everyone coming to the table. And finally, I just want to say for Jerry, you know, we talked a lot about how many hours of work we might be saving and capacity. And I just I I hear you that you have felt in the past that we were not sort of available to support you in capacity issues. And if if capacity is really um if it has become a problem for you and for PSU, which it sounds like it has, I want to invite you to come back

[123:00] again to us. I hear you that you did not feel supported and let's open that discussion back up and find a better way to help resolve capacity issues, but not this way. I hope we can find a different way. So, that's my invitation to you. Let's talk about this again. Let's find another way to make this work manageable while also keeping the panel as strong as it can be and serving the needs of the community and our initial mandate. Thanks, I'm seeing another community members that we may have missed. >> Are we ending public comment or we just >> if we miss one we should >> okay because these are hands that are coming up afterwards. So, I'm just trying to >> make sure that we're >> Okay. >> It's already 8:35. So, >> just kind of back to >> Okay. Is that just one?

[124:01] >> Is this one? >> Yeah. Should we So, >> just one >> Dan Williams and with your We're with Dan Williams. We're wrapping up. >> Yeah. L community open comment. So, um, Dan, okay, you can unmute and you are not allowed to talk. Thank you. >> Okay, thank you for hearing me. I think I put my hand up maybe slightly late, but while Len Seagull was talking, I just wanted to comment on one thing that the police monitor said about the amount of time it takes to redact body cam footage. Uh, and this has been a subject that's been examined quite extensively lately. So Boulders's vendor is the same vendor that a lot of police departments around the country use. Um Axen and you've seen their work obviously. They have an AI tool that makes it very easy to do redactions to body cam footage. So if it used to take 3 hours for every hour of video, that is

[125:03] just no longer the case. So, if this whole problem can be solved by the city using the tools that its vendors already have, I mean, if you just Google Axen's um AI technology for um redacting body cam footage, you know, you can find this is a very fast and simple process. So I think I appreciated the point of the panel member who just spoke that you know maybe there is a a need to go back and revisit and say are there other ways to streamline and make the process more efficient. Um clearly using different technology for redacting body cam footage is one way to do that and it apparently the city's doing it you know not using the the tools that its own vendor makes available. So, I would just highly encourage the monitor to go back and look, use the tools you already have in the software that you're subscribing to um and find other ways

[126:01] besides removing the panel's ability to hear these critical cases. Thank you. >> Thank you, Dan. >> And with that, we close open comments and I'm sorry. >> Uh okay. So, uh, I would need a motion to >> adjourn. Sorry. Motion to adjourn. >> Oh, can Jason. >> We're all good. Thank you everyone. Have a good night. >> Oh, we vote in the agenda. Oh, please. Yes. Say yes. Okay. Approved. We're journeying. >> Thank you for everyone who showed up tonight. Thank you. >> Thanks everybody. Good night all. >> Good night.