OPINION: Work must continue after CASA

The Albuquerque Community Policing Councils were created by a city of Albuquerque ordinance in response to the Court Approved Settlement Agreement (CASA) in the U.S. vs Albuquerque et al. case. We are citizen volunteers whose mission is to promote engagement between the community and entities involved in policing, primarily the Albuquerque Police Department.

As such, we have had front row seats to the process of the CASA. It is the consensus view of the chairs of the Community Policing Councils that the current city administration and APD accepted the duties of the CASA, expending difficult extended efforts to improve compliance with the dictates of constitutional policing to uphold rights and freedoms in the performance of their duties. We commend the city and APD for their efforts and achievement.

As we reach this point, we see a pivot toward the upcoming work of law enforcement and the rest of us in the Albuquerque community. The vision and mission of APD are to work together with the Albuquerque communities to build relationships that lead to reduced crime and increased public safety. This has been described at times as “constitutional community policing,” but at this point the confluence of the two concepts, constitutional and community policing, becomes unacceptable.

Community policing involves partnership between the community and many actors in law enforcement, with all parties engaging in problem-solving. It is communicative, cooperative and collaborative. Accountability, which rests on transparency and integrity, should be mutual if the relationships are to thrive. Meeting this standard remains a challenge. Unfortunately, many of us feel the public space remains unsafe, that APD continues to resort to deadly force too often, and that we are not yet adequately addressing the issues. This remains our challenge, and our efforts in this area may be just as complex and difficult as achieving constitutionality.

In January, we met with Mayor Tim Keller. He shared with us that the city worked a National Network for Safer Communities model program of Gun Violence Intervention to reduce violent crime, but that it didn’t fit the pattern of gun violence in Albuquerque. This sounds like a reiteration of the admonition of New Mexico Territorial Governor Lew Wallace, who said “all calculations based on our experience elsewhere fail in New Mexico.” We encourage our local governments and communities instead to see that we need local solutions that fit our experience, not answers based on calculations elsewhere. This could, for instance, utilize the motivations for homicides tabulated by APD data analytics, foremost of which are feelings of personal disrespect and domestic violence. We look forward to this work.