Capitol Neighborhorhoods urge police reform

September 27, 2020 9:17 am

I never thought I’d see the day where the large downtown neighborhood consortium would be urging police reform. They call on the city to “reprioritize” the budget.

Capitol Neighborhoods incluldes Bassett, Miffland, James Madison, First Settlement and Mansion Hill neighborhoods. This is the map from their website.

CNI EXECUTIVE COUNCIL POLICE FUNDING RESOLUTION

As downtown residents, each one of us has had significant, impactful, and personal experiences since the onset of the protests surrounding George Floyd’s murder in May. These historic events have produced important, oftentimes heated discussions regarding what can and should be done going forward. A number of our individual neighborhood districts have had ongoing conversations regarding how each of us might turn such talk into action, and how we as a neighborhood might get more involved.

At its most recent meeting, the Capitol Neighborhoods Executive Council discussed and, in a nearly unanimous vote, adopted a resolution which calls on Madison Mayor Rhodes-Conway and the Madison Common Council to examine the Madison Police Department budget and identify possible ways resources devoted to MPD may be reprioritized away from the department and to desperately needed social services. The adopted resolution, which has been submitted to our local elected officials, is attached to this email.

I anticipate this resolution will generate new discussions throughout the neighborhood and at our ongoing monthly district meetings. I will try to attend those meetings over the next month to answer any questions people might have.

Thanks, and have a good rest of your week,

Eli

President@CapitolNeighborhoods.org

RESOLUTION

Resolution Calling for Reprioritization of Madison Police Funding to Desperately-Needed Social Services

WHEREAS, Black people and people in other communities of color have suffered centuries of systemic racism and examples of outright brutality throughout our nation’s history,1 and

WHEREAS, Madison is regularly cited as one of the most segregated and hostile cities in the United States for Black families to live and work,2 and

WHEREAS, generations of students of color have faced a culture and the direct effects of racism from the city of Madison, the University of Wisconsin, and downtown neighbors,3 and

WHEREAS, Madison’s Black residents, while making up roughly 7% of the city’s population, make up over 43% of the city’s arrests and 46% of those imprisoned in our city’s jails,4 and

WHEREAS, the recent murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and countless others, along with the brutal shooting of Jacob Blake in nearby Kenosha, Wisconsin, all at the hands of police officers, have sparked the historic moment our city finds itself in and requires appropriate and bold action to fight the prevalent and systemic racism found in our city, the downtown, and our neighborhood, and

WHEREAS, reviews of national data indicate that up to nine out of ten calls for service to local police departments are for nonviolent encounters,5 and

WHEREAS, police departments, including Madison’s, regularly claim dramatically high
proportions of a city’s budget when compared to applicable social services,6 and

WHEREAS, the Madison police department operating budget has increased by 35% in ten
years,7 and

WHEREAS, national research has suggested that there is “no correlation nationally between
[police] spending and crime rates,”8 and

WHEREAS, national discussions have indicated that public resources designated for police
departments may be reappropriated to chronically underfunded social services that are better suited to address problems that police are currently expected to confront yet are ill-trained or equipped to address,9 and

WHEREAS, organizations both nationally and in Madison have called on local elected officials to begin the process of reprioritizing its operating and capital budgets to reflect needs in social services, policing, and social justice,10 and

WHEREAS, Capitol Neighborhoods has developed a reputation for being an organization that is unwelcoming to members of underrepresented communities, including Black people and people in other communities of color.

NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Capitol Neighborhoods Executive Council holds
that racism in Madison and in our neighborhood is a clear, undeniable danger to the wellbeing of our neighbors and the culture of our city and must be addressed through novel, bold, and decisive action, and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Capitol Neighborhoods Executive Council calls on the
Madison Common Council and the Mayor of Madison to closely review the Madison Police
Department’s operating and capital budgets and identify possible opportunities to reprioritize current resources away from the police department and to existing social programs, local public education, and the Community Development Block Grant with the goal to more effectively serve underrepresented communities in our city and neighborhood with a particular focus on improvements to the Black community’s well-being, and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that, as the Capitol Neighborhood Executive Council wishes that Madison avoid repetitions of recent tragedies that have occured in neighborhoods adjacent to ours, such as the police-involved killings of Tony Robinson and Paul Heenan, 11 12 the Executive Council calls on the Madison Common Council and the Mayor of Madison to either expand or create non-violent services that can address mental health and social crises as an alternative to the present convention of calling for an armed police response in all circumstances.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that Capitol Neighborhoods would like to unequivocally begin to
alter its internal culture through effective action and advocacy for the direct benefit of its
neighbors of color.

Agreed to and adopted by the Capitol Neighborhoods Executive Council on September 22,
2020.