At its latest meeting, Albany's Community Police Review Board discussed several issues, including a request for proposals for investigative services.
The RFP brought in 240 applications, 10 of which have been flagged as finalists to be scheduled for interviews. Board Chair Nairobi Vives spoke during Thursday’s meeting:
"That will allow us to move forward with, you know, conducting our own investigations, and just really bringing to fruition all the new powers that we got from Local Law J," Vives said. "So I think that's really big for us. And I think it's something that the community wants to hear, we have, you know, said that we are going to investigate at least four cases independently. So that is a great update."
Local Law J, passed by the Common Council and signed by Democratic Mayor Kathy Sheehan in 2021, is a ballot measure approved by voters that gave new powers to the nine-member board, including the ability to conduct its own independent investigations into complaints filed against police officers.
But Vives says the board still needs $2.8 million in funding to expand operations and has pressed the Common Council to amend Sheehan's budget.
"We are continuing to work with the Common Council and the administration, hopefully to fight for the budget increase that we've been pushing for," saiud Vives. "We've had some private meetings, we've had a couple of public meetings, we met with the or we met for the public, the budget, public hearing, ...we had a host of community stakeholders that came to support us as well. And hopefully, we do get the increase that we're looking for."
Sheehan’s budget proposal released in early October funded the CPRB at the statutory minimum and the mayor tells WAMC that's not likely to change.
"We certainly continue to look forward to the consultant's report that the Civilian Police Review Board hired to look at their organization and the new local law and come up with recommendations as to structure," Sheehan said. "And so we don't even have that report or a preliminary version of that report yet. So the budget does include an increase in the budget for the CPRB to 1% of the police budget, which is what's reflected in Local Law A, and at this time, I don't anticipate any additional funding, simply because there's just still a lot that remains to be seen with respect to the structure and what those budgetary needs are actually going to be.”
Council President Corey Ellis says the board's request is not without merit.
"If we truly want them to be as effective as they can be, we must figure out a way how to fund them properly, so that they can do the job that the voters have voted for them to do," Ellis said. "So we are going to have to figure this out as a city."
The Common Council typically approves the mayor’s budget by mid-November.
