South Bend’s Community Police Review Board meets tonight, about four years after the city’s common council started working on creating it to review police misconduct complaints. They’re still looking for a few members.
The new board will meet tonight at 6 p.m. in the common council chambers to elect officers and adopt bylaws.
Board Director Charles King says they have two complaints to review and could start working on them at their next meeting March 20.
The ordinance that created it requires the new board to have nine community members, one nominated by each common council member, but King says three have dropped out during the training process. Members must participate in the police department’s 9-week Citizen’s Police Academy and do 12 hours of ride-alongs with an officer.
King says the board can still take action with a majority of members, which is five.
He says they’ll develop a code to protect personal information of officers and citizens during public meetings.
"We'll go through the process of creating what that is," King said. "If it's Citizen 1 or Officer 2, we'll come up with a way to make that information private."
The six board members already seated are Sherria Williams, Komanique Thomas, Kelly Johnson, LuElla Webster, Joseph Adams, and Cheryl Ashe. Council members Oliver Davis, Sheila Niezgodski and Sherry Bolden-Simpson must still each nominate a person to serve on the board.
