[Peace-discuss] My letter to the News-Gazette

[John W.]

It's slightly over 250 words, and it's kinda late.  Perhaps someone who 
reads the News-Gazette regularly could let me know if it gets 
printed?  Here it is:


It was a Champaign City Council meeting that will live in infamy.

There was a bit of humor, though: the joke played by Mayor Schweighart on 
certain citizens of Champaign.

Last Tuesday the Champaign City Council, by a vote of 5-4, rejected the 
recommendation of its own Champaign Police Complaint Procedures 
Subcommittee for the establishment of a Citizen Review Board as a means of 
improving police-community relations.  In fact, the City Council even 
rejected any further discussion of the matter.

The Champaign Police Complaint Procedures Subcommittee, a subcommittee of 
the Champaign Police Community Relations Committee, consisted of 
representatives from the police department, the city staff, and the 
community, and met once a month for twelve months.  Its final report, a 
handbook roughly one-half inch thick, and its final recommendation 
reflected a consensus among the representatives of the three constituencies.

But it wasn't the consensus that retired police officer Jerry Schweighart 
wanted.  And so, as he had promised to do, he invalidated the hard work of 
his subcommittee through some deft politicking.  Following almost three 
hours of public input, with all but two speakers in favor of some form of 
citizen police review, he made a motion to ignore the subcommittee's 
recommendation and maintain the status quo without further discussion or 
public input. His own vote was the tie-breaker.

This marks at least the third time in the past nine years that the 
Champaign City Council has disregarded the recommendation of one of its own 
governmental bodies for some form of citizen police review.  At this point 
one has to wonder why any citizen would ever serve in a volunteer capacity 
on a city board or commission.

At least three of the council members who voted with the mayor asserted 
that THEY as elected officials were the Citizen Police Review 
Board.  Perhaps we should put their word to the test.

John Wason