Aldermen consider civilian police oversight plan

Council awaiting alternate proposal from Lightfoot

As aldermen wait for Mayor Lori Lightfoot to finally unveil her own civilian police oversight plan, discussion Friday over a grassroots proposal she opposes presaged a likely knockdown, drag-out fight over control of the Chicago Police Department.

The City Council Public Safety Committee took testimony but no vote on the compromise ordinance pushed by two organizations that want an elected board to have broad powers to dictate the Police Department’s policies, leadership and budget.

“This is truly an effort in collaboration and how it should be done,” South Side Ald. Leslie Hairston, 5th, said of the compromise plan. “Everyone did not get what they wanted, but we got to a point where we could agree with something that would be best for the city of Chicago.”

“And for those of my colleagues that are on the fence, and if you feel that your community cannot wrap their arms around this, we’ve got an even bigger problem with race relations here in the city of Chicago,” Hairston said.

But aldermen will soon have an alternate oversight plan to consider.

Lightfoot said this week she would have her ordinance ready in time to get introduced to the City Council next Wednesday. It would then likely get assigned to the Public Safety Committee, where members would need to choose between it and the grassroots alternative.

Public Safety Committee Chairman Ald. Chris Taliaferro said he intends to hold votes on civilian police oversight ordinances in June so the full City Council can consider a proposal that month.

The version designed by the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression and the Grassroots Alliance for Police Accountability calls for Chicagoans to vote on a referendum to create a 11-member civilian board — with nine elected members and two members appointed by the board itself — that would have authority to hire and fire the police superintendent. It also would be able to submit the Police Department budget and negotiate contracts with the Fraternal Order of Police.

Three of the nine elected commissioners would come from the North Side, three from the South Side and three from the West Side.

If the referendum failed, three elected community board members in each of Chicago’s 22 police districts would have the authority to nominate seven board members who would have less regulatory authority over the department.

While Lightfoot’s counterproposal hasn’t been released, she has repeatedly said she is against taking key decision-making on department funding, policy and hiring top officials out of the mayor’s hands.

In the absence of an ordinance from City Hall, council caucuses representing Black aldermen, Latino aldermen and progressive aldermen have endorsed the compromise plan. It remains to be seen whether that aldermanic support is left when the Lightfoot administration starts leaning on council members to back her plan instead.

The two organizations spent years pushing their own, distinct versions of an oversight committee to be run by civilians, which is considered a key part of policing reform.

In February, after more than three years of separate campaigns, the groups announced they had reached compromise and had crafted a joint ordinance. But Lightfoot, who first announced in September that she would offer her own plan, needed more time.

In a rare joint statement issued at the time, the groups accused the mayor of blocking progress on the plan to create more accountability of the Chicago Police Department.

In March, CAARPR and GAPA released the compromise ordinance, which had been drafted with input from aldermen as well. Together, the two coalitions represent some 100 organizations.