POLICING FREE SPEECH
Trenton police deployed to school board meeting irks officials >>
TRENTON » The real criminals must be at the Trenton school board meetings.
Or at least it looked that way when two Trenton cops were stationed outside the Board of Education building inside a police SUV during Monday’s meeting.
The officers’ presence perturbed local officials, who claimed the cops could have been dispatched to other areas of need, given Trenton’s rampant crime problem.
“We cannot utilize our resources in that manner,” Councilman Alex Bethea said Thursday. “I do not think it’s the best use of our resources so we will have to have a discussion about that and make sure that if there is no emergent need, I don’t think that police officers should be sitting outside of a board meeting. I think they’re needed more elsewhere.”
Last month, the school board meeting turned rowdy after school board President Gene Bouie tried to shut down the public comment section of the meeting.
“We will not be silenced” chants erupted from the crowd and the meeting was temporarily adjourned.
A district spokesman claimed Thursday that the cops’ presence at Monday’s meeting had to do with “community policing” efforts at the direction of Gary Moore, who is the district’s security director and is a liaison for the Trenton Police Department.
“Gary, who recognizes that ‘community policing is powerful practice, which is instrumental in fortifying the relationships between law enforcement officers and the communities they protect,’ has been advocating for increased opportunities for healthy, positive, interactions with the police,” district spokeswoman Ali Robinson-Rogers said in an email. “Under Gary’s leadership, we are in the process of building on our current relationship with the police, and exploring ways for the police to be informed about the policies affecting the at-risk students attending Trenton Public Schools, and developing a strategy to work together to support and improve our mentoring programs, discipline policies, and response procedures as necessary. Attendance at the board meetings by the Trenton Police Department on a regular basis, is a great start to bolstering this partnership.”
But city police shot down the district’s assertion as to why they were there.
“We were requested there by security from the board of education,” Lt. Rolando Ramos said Thursday. “There was a concern about the meeting that evening. Some of the issues that were being raised were contentious and the board felt that having officers there would ensure of the safety of everyone that’s there in the building.”
The officers’ appearance also came on a night when the school board passed the first reading of a policy that would allow the board president to “request the assistance of law enforcement officers in the removal of a disorderly person when that person’s conduct interferes with the orderly conduct of the meeting.”
The policy also outlines that the board president can “interrupt, warn, or terminate a participant’s statement when the statement is too lengthy, abusive, obscene or irrelevant” and “request any individual to leave the meeting when that person does not observe reasonable decorum.”
The Trenton teachers union boss believes school board President Bouie is trying to silence the public because he doesn’t like to listen to “objections to his decisions.”
“While we’re trying to get more parent and community participation in the school district, they are trying to take away democracy any way that they can,” Trenton Education Association (TEA) President Naomi Johnson-Lafleur said Thursday. “Well, I represent the majority, 80 percent of the employees of Trenton Public Schools. He’s not going to shut up the Trenton Education Association and he’s certainly not going Trenton Board of Education President Gene Bouie to shut up the parents because we’re going to support the parents whenever they have an issue and they need support to come before that board, we’re going to stand with the parent and that’s just the way it is, whether he likes it or not. “
The union leader blasted President Bouie for thinking “he has a lot of power in his own mind.”
“Is Gene Bouie serious?” Johnson-Lafleur asked. “First of all, nobody knows him. Because he does not like our objections to his decisions, he thinks that he’s going to be able to shut people up by having police sit outside. Nobody’s afraid of the police sitting outside of 108 N. Clinton Ave.”
Johnson-Lafleur also criticized Mayor Eric Jackson, who appoints all the school board members. The union leader said Jackson is “disconnected from the city to begin with” and the board members he appoints “have no history of work in the public school system” outside of Addie Daniels-Lane, who is a former district principal.
“The blind are making decisions that are impacting 10,000 students,” TEA’s leader said.
Neither Mayor Jackson nor President Bouie returned messages seeking comment.
Janice Williams, a city resident who is TEA’s grievance chair, also took issue with police at the meeting.
“With all the murders and shootings taken place in the capital city, why would they waste resources in having TPD outside the board building with two police officers for a friendly board of education meeting?” Williams questioned. “And yes, the new public policy calls for police removal of public citizens attending meetings who appear to create a disturbance, yet people are being robbed, murdered and assaulted every day.”
Councilman Bethea, who announced this week that he is running for mayor, said police have also been deployed to city council meetings.
“When we have policemen at the council meetings, I’m not sure what those reasons were,” Bethea said, noting officers were also in cars outside of the building. “But council questioned that and I haven’t seen them there in the last couple of meetings.”
Security guards — not police — are regularly stationed at City Hall and the Board of Education buildings during meetings.
“We have security and we need police at the same time for a meeting that is normally not out of hand?” questioned Bethea, who is a retired district vice principal. “Now, we’re paying twice. We have to question these kinds of things because there are areas where their services are of a greater need.”
When asked if it was the best deployment of resources, Lt. Ramos said, “Absolutely.”
“It’s the safety of citizens regardless of where they’re at,” Ramos said. “In a situation like that, we want to make sure that no one is hurt and that everyone is safe.”