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COMMENTARY - I listened with profound
interest as A.J. Williams shared his concerns with law enforcement. The
34-year-old Durham native is running to serve as the Ward III representative on
the Durham City Council.
I was interested because grown folks need to spend more time
listening to what young people have to say. My ears popped up like a dog upon
hearing an approaching fire truck when Williams shared his views involving the
history of American law enforcement.
His response came after a question about ShotSpotter, gunshot
detection technology rejected by members of the Durham City Council in 2019.
Williams participated in candidate interviews sponsored by the Durham Committee
on the Affairs of Black People.
Williams says he was instrumental in opposing the technology.
He offered two reasons. He noted how the FBI COINTELPRO program was used to
dismantle the work of the Black Panther Party. He also discussed the genesis of
American law enforcement was to track, punish and return runaway slaves.
Williams shared the angst of his generation in witnessing the perpetual murders
of unarmed Black men and women by law enforcement officers.
My ears perked up due to Williams’s interpretation of history.
He’s not wrong. The FBI has used surveillance to attack the reputations of
Black men and women involved in radical movements. They used it against Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, members of the Black Panther Party and
Assata Shakur. The law has not been the friend of Black people – ever. True
that. My spirit felt like an echo of amens followed by the reverberating hallelujah
of a Black gospel choir.
I get the anguish of young people. I do pause when I hear young
people make assumptions implying, they understand more than us old fogies. I’m
reminded of what we experienced firsthand. We not only read about it and
watched movies about it; we lived it. I’m old enough, barely, to remember the
cry to “burn, baby burn” during the 1965 Watts Riots. I grew up as a middle and
high school student shaped by Black Nationalism. I called the police “pigs” and
screamed “say it, loud, I’m Black and I’m proud” inspired by the radicalism of
the Black Panthers.
It could be argued, justifiably, few things have changed.
Granted. What can’t be debated is old folks not understanding what it feels
like to engage in brutal wars with law enforcement. This not being new business
adds credence to the demand to rid our streets of those crooked police. All of
them. Why? Because the entire system is muddied by institutionalized racism.
Still, there is more to the story.
Young people in Durham may remember the turbulent years of
former Police Chief Jose Lopez. There was the pathetically mishandled treatment
of Stephanie Nickerson, a Chapel Hill resident beaten by a Durham police
officer. We should never forget the case of Carlos Antonio Riley, Jr., the
cousin of hip-hop icon Boots Riley, who was charged with shooting a Durham
police officer while wrestling.
The police officer who battered Nickerson was terminated and
Riley was found not guilty. The dreadful end of the Lopez years followed the
sad story of Jesus Huerta, a Riverside High School student, who died in the
back of a Durham police officer’s patrol car. Lopez claimed Huerta died from a
self-inflicted gunshot, something hard to believe given the evidence.
Durham’s has bad apples and miserable days. We’ve also had
leadership that understands and affirms the correlation between root causes and
crime.
I’m reminded, there is more to the story.
Police Chief Jackie McNeil (1992-1997) incorporated the weed
& seed model to infuse input from residents. Police Chief Steve Chalmers (2003-2007)
and Director of Parks & Recreation Carl Washington, along with a group of
community leaders -Jackie Wagstaff, Steve Hopkins, Effie Steele, Lenora Smith,
and numerous others – changed the way Durham managed human service delivery.
Beginning in 1992, the North East Central Durham Reinvestment
Strategy Board worked with the police department to reduce crime within a
96-block focus area. The city council allocated $1.7 million for seed funding.
By 1993, $18 million was leveraged from other entities to support the project.
Chalmers continues his work in tackling root causes with Men
of Vision, a nonprofit organization he started when he was chief of police.
McNeil and Chalmers are both born and raised in Durham. They are among the police
officers who understand the enforcement of law fails when the root causes aren’t
addressed.
Durham history teaches us the focus on root causes of crime
began within the Durham Police Department. The police department helped build a
coalition while pressing an agenda forcing input from residents prior to
approving public policy. It was a bottom-up approach of human service delivery
that made the entire city partners against crime.
Crime will not be solved by blaming it on the police budget.
The answers are in celebrating who we are, owning our responsibility to hear
from all residents and in honoring the lessons from history.
The NECD model proved what it takes to succeed in Durham. It
starts with building trust. Trust can’t be built when more time is invested in
making enemies. It’s not about the budget. It’s about building relationships.
I like to think we should never make decisions based on our
worst mistakes. It also helps to consider the accomplishments of our best days.
Hopefully, this election will be decided after listening to a
variety of stories from old folks and young people.
It helps recognizing old fogies like me remember when Black
Power was more than a slogan on a bumper sticker
