Dylan Brogan
As the city of Madison gets closer to hiring a new chief, some community members want more involvement in the selection.
UW-Madison law professor Keith Findley co-chaired a city committee that spent four years crafting changes to Madison Police Department policy following the death of 19-year-old Tony Robinson by officer Matt Kenny in 2015. A “lack of trust between the police department and some of the city’s marginalized communities” emerged as one of the big issues facing policing in Madison, Findley, who heads the Wisconsin Innocence Project, tells Isthmus. “It is very important to do all we can to build bridges, to build communication to make sure that all of those groups are being heard and felt that they're being heard.”
But building that trust has already hit a rough patch.
Some community members, including Shadayra Kilfoy-Flores, a member of the newly created Police Civilian Oversight Board, are not happy that the Madison Police and Fire Commission is interviewing the four finalists for police chief in closed session.
“The hiring of the police chief should absolutely be as transparent and involve the community as much as possible,” says Kilfoy-Flores, who emphasizes she's speaking as an individual and not on behalf of the entire Police Civilian Oversight Board. She says that even if the public was not able to provide input at the PFC meeting with candidates, “at least let people bear witness to the interviews.”
The four finalists for the police department’s top spot, announced Dec. 4, are Shon Barnes, director of training and professional development for Chicago’s Civilian Office of Police Accountability; Mesa Police Chief Ramon Batista Jr.; Portland Deputy Chief Christopher Davis; and retired Pittsburgh Assistant Chief Larry Scirotto. Madison has been without a permanent police chief since former chief Mike Koval abruptly retired in 2019.
Jenna Rousseau, attorney for the PFC, says the commission will release “a component” of the interviews with the four finalists via videos on Dec. 9. Individuals will be allowed to give three minutes of testimony at the PFC’s next meeting, also on Dec. 9. This follows multiple community input sessions held this year before the four finalists were chosen.
“The PFC [is] committed to listening to all residents in the city of Madison, including those who have the greatest challenges to providing feedback. For instance, the PFC received oral comments over the course of multiple meetings from various groups and individuals. The PFC also received numerous written comments via e-mail and U.S. mail,” writes Rousseau in a statement provided to Isthmus. “PFC worked with Local Voices Network (LVN) to facilitate small group discussions and received helpful summaries and suggested questions from LVN. Further, the PFC conducted virtual town hall meetings and participated in several radio programs.”
But Kilfoy-Flores says another aspect of the screening process indicates to her that the commission has not been listening to the community: the selection of Deputy Chief Davis from Portland as a finalist.
During a 2001 incident at an Oregon psychiatric hospital, Davis fired beanbag rounds and pepper spray at patient José Santos Victor MejÍa Poot before another officer fatally shot the man. The shooting sparked community outrage and calls for police reform. Despite the controversy, the Portland Police Bureau awarded Davis and another officer “medals of valor” for their actions.
“Davis has an extremely concerning history. In my opinion, he participated in an unjustified shooting,” says Kilfoy-Flores. “Also, the way he has chosen to interact with protesters in Portland would be horrible in Madison,” she adds, referring to the department’s use this year of tear gas, pepper spray and other means of force at rallies and marches. “How did Davis ever get this far in this process?”
Davis did not immediately return an email or phone call requesting comment.
Christopher Davis is currently the deputy chief for the Portland Police Bureau.
One of the 177 recommendations from the final report of the MPD Policy and Procedure Review Ad Hoc committee, which Findley served on, is that “the PFC should find a range of ways to solicit input from the broader Madison community. For example, the interview process can provide one opportunity for meaningful public input and engagement.” This recommendation was adopted from the $400,000 independent review of the Madison Police Department in 2017 by consultants from The OIR Group.
Kilfoy-Flores says the PFC ignored this recommendation when deciding to interview finalists for the chief position in closed session.
“The pushback shouldn’t have come as a surprise. The Police and Fire Commission was specifically told, by multiple bodies, that in order to build trust between the Madison police and its citizens, [the PFC] needed to make the hiring process as transparent as possible,” says Kilfoy-Flores. “I'm disappointed that it feels as though they weren't listening, or they didn't take those recommendations seriously.”
Downtown Ald. Mike Verveer told the Badger Herald that the PFC isn’t required to conduct the hiring interviews in public, but suggested that would have been a good idea.
“The PFC approach seemingly has very poor transparency, or little to no transparency thus far, and I wish there were opportunities for the community to meet the four finalists virtually and ask them questions,” Verveer said.
Maia Pearson, also a member of the Police Civilian Oversight Board, believes a better model would have been to “bring the [chief hiring process] to the neighborhood level, or at least different areas of the city.”
“Due to the history and nature of policing in this city, some are wary of law enforcement,” says Pearson. “That’s a challenge and it’s on [the PFC] to perform the important role of making sure the community feels involved.”
Kilfoy-Flores and Pearson say the PFC should have modeled their hiring process on the way the Madison school district selected its superintendent.
The two finalists for that job — Carlton Jenkins and Carol Kelley — participated in virtual engagement sessions (because of the pandemic) which featured a Q & A from school board members and opportunities for students, staff and community members to ask questions. Jenkins was ultimately chosen to lead the district.
Anthony Cooper, a vice president at the Nehemiah Center for Urban Leadership Development who is also a member of the Civilian Oversight Board, says robust community engagement will be helpful to whichever finalist ultimately lands the job, too.
“We want to make sure that the new chief knows what they're getting themselves into, especially working with our community. It’s different everywhere. It needs to be a good fit for them and they need to feel comfortable with what the community expects,” says Cooper. “I hate to say it but this situation [with the PFC] shows there is a lot more work to be done. Building trust isn’t a part of the current system and we as a community need to change that.”
