The Community Policing Innovations Initiative, supported by three CMF members, has announced the first round of grants to police departments and organizations in Southeast Michigan.

The Community Policing Innovations Initiative which is aimed at addressing issues in police practices, systems and services was established with support from CMF members the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan, Hudson-Webber Foundation and Ballmer Group, as well as Oakland County.

CFSEM announced last week that it granted awards to police departments and other organizations in five Metro Detroit communities through the initiative. 

“To catalyze local investment and respond to local needs, the Community Foundation and the Hudson-Webber Foundation came together to establish the Community Policing Innovations Initiative,” said Mariam Noland, president of CFSEM said in a press release. “We are pleased that Ballmer Group and Oakland County have also made substantial contributions to support this initiative, which provides technical assistance tailored to each community based on their specific needs. Our goal is that the first communities receiving support can serve as examples to others in southeast Michigan and beyond.”

The goal for the initiative is to provide the guidance and support necessary for local communities in partnership with local law enforcement, to develop community-driven, substantive and pragmatic changes in the way that policing and public safety services are provided.

According to a CFSEM press release, the initiative which is in its pilot phase will focus on five areas of police reform. 

“The Hudson-Webber Foundation’s strategic vision and approach has been to focus investments in organizations, programs and initiatives that help achieve sustainable, broad-based prosperity in the city of Detroit,” Melanca Clark, president and CEO of the Hudson-Webber Foundation and CMF trustee said.

Efforts to transform policing include:

1.    Use of Force: Address current use of force policies and directly engage the community so that police policies and practices better represent the needs of the community by their agents of public safety.

2.    Officer Accountability: Re-imagine a police officer contract, adopt new discipline process/matrices, provide training and/or retraining mechanisms that would allow for both accountability from the police after problematic performance and greater trust with the community.

3.    Disparate Enforcement and Treatment: Outline a program for collecting and analyzing data on police stops, search and/ or arrests to determine whether certain types of activities are having an unwanted disparate impact, and/or they may outline the development of policies and training geared toward raising awareness of subconscious or implicit biases.

4.    Re-imagining Public Safety: Develop thoughtful collaboration between police and social service agencies to begin a conversation about how to re-align the response method for calls for service where mental health, trauma, or youth may be involved to include or collaborate with city/community public health or social service programs.

5.    Truth and Reconciliation: Consider police academy or departmental training that offers regional/ community history, implicit bias training, and real-world scenario-based de-escalation training all that include community participation as educators, scenario role players and restorative justice circle participants.
 

The organizations in southeast Michigan selected for the pilot phase include: 

•    Canton Township Police Department and its Canton Coalition for Inclusive Communities.

•    Detroit Police Department.

•    East Downtown Dearborn Development Authority and Black Legacy Advancement Coalition.

•    Inkster Police Department.

•    Beloved Community Initiative and First AME Church of Farmington Hills.

“Addressing racial inequity and structural barriers to opportunity is one of our guiding principles for achieving that objective, which includes a clear focus on addressing the severe and entrenched problems within the criminal justice system that disproportionately affect communities of color,” Clark said.