13-Point Police Reform Policy Presented to Joliet

JOLIET, IL — Suzanne Ibarra, of the Will County Progressives, expected to meet Monday morning with Joliet Inspector General Chris Regis and Mayor Bob O’Dekirk. Instead, she, Candice Quinerly and Alonzo Waheed, Lead Organizer for Equity and Transformation, an organization that collaborated with the Will County Progressives, met with Regis alone.

On the agenda was a 13-point police reform proposal submitted by the organization of things they want to see change in the city. Ibarra also co-chairs Revolution Illinois, an organization with 33,000 members who support the policy reforms submitted.

“Basically, I would like to know what the status of this is,” Quinerly said.

Regis spent about and hour and a half with the group and discussed each of the 13 points. “Some of them are simple and some of them are already done,” he said.

The proposal outlines things from body cams to inclusion of a social worker for police response calls to a civilian oversight body. The Joliet Police Department does not have body cams.

“They are very expensive and right now we do not have the money to support that program,” Regis said of the implementation of body cams for each officer.

Quinerly asked if the implementation of body cams is more expensive than the lawsuits the city has settled in recent years, including $450,000 settlement in May 2020 after a lawsuit that accused the Joliet Police Department of unjustly arresting a resident.

Regis said settling the lawsuits the city faced is far less that it is to equip the all Joliet Police Officers with body cams. He added that the cost is not just the individual cameras, but also the computer equipment needed to store data and procedures that need to be in place to handle that data. Regis did tell the group that every Joliet Police Department car should be equipped with a dash camera in 2020.

“All the cars are about to get dash cams,” Regis said. “It should be this year, as far as I know, at least.”

Many of the issues the Will County Progressives outlined were issues that were not necessarily a local issue. Some, like drug testing for officers or the transparency of discipline policy would require changes in the Joliet Police Department union contract or changes in state law.

Regis said that discipline records that are more than four years old are not public record and not to be released.

“If someone wants older disciplinary issues, you have to change the law,” Regis said.

However, discipline records within the last four years are accessible through the Freedom of Information Act. That means that an individual in the community must file a FOIA to get those records. The Will County Progressives proposal requested that instead of having to file a FOIA, that information be kept in a database.

“There should be a database that is kept so we can see how many infractions an individual officer has,” Quinerly said. “When I say publicly accessible, I mean layman’s terms.”

Waheed agreed. “The accessible part is important there,” he said.

The group also wanted to see more specific guidelines for the consequences an officer faces when they violate policy, especially in the case of a use of force violation. Regis told the group that requesting a database with that information was something they could bring to the city council, but to specify consequences for violations or to implement a three-strike policy for officer violations as requested by the group is a slippery slope. He highlighted the three strikes rule for criminals that was created during the Clinton era to explain some of the issues such a policy could create.

The group also wants the Joliet Police Department to examine the kinds of training offered to officers and to make sure that there is a policy on antiracism policing and that it is enforced.
Regis said he did not know if the department currently had such a policy.

“We agree that if there isn’t one, there definitely should be,” he said.

One of the points outlined by the Will County Progressives was changed after the meeting because the group did not want it to be misunderstood. Initially the language was: “End the hiring of those with military experience as their skills are typically not well-suited for civilian interaction. They have been trained to combat an enemy, not for community policing.”

Ibarra said the group absolutely is not anti-military and changed their proposal to the following language:

“Implement greater screening of those with military experience as their skills are typically not suited for civilian interaction. They have been trained to combat an enemy, not for community policing. (Currently, military experience awards the most preference points.)”

Regis explained that the law in Illinois gives 5 preference points for military service. He said the number of points is set by the state and cannot be changed.

The Joliet Police Department also offers additional preference points for things like advanced degrees. Although the JPD currently has a residency requirement for its officers, there was a five-year window where it did not, so officers hired in that time frame are not required to live within city limits. All new hires to the department are required to live in city limits.

During the discussion of ongoing training, Regis verified that officers are required to complete 40 hours of training annually to retain their status. In the state of Illinois, Regis said, officers must be hired by a department before going to police training. With those requirements and policies in place for discipline, Regis did tell the group that firing officers is difficult.

“We all know that it’s really impossible to fire a police officer in the state of Illinois,” he said.
In the 1990s when many police departments were moving towards a community policing model, Joliet did also, although Regis said it was not extreme.

“Community policing should have gone 20 steps farther than it did, but it didn’t because of organizational resistance,” he said. “There are innovative police across the country with mixed results.”

Regis cautioned that while the idea of having a social worker present on mental health and domestic violence calls for example is a good one, there are concerns for safety and budgeting that would have to be discussed.

The Joliet Police Department is currently operating under its outdated union contract until a new contract is finalized.

Regis told the group that they should bring the proposal was going to be discussed at the land use and legislative committee meeting, which includes Councilman Terry Morris, Chairman
Councilman Don Dickinson, Councilwoman Jan Quillman. The committee last met June 25. Regan said the next committee meeting had not been scheduled.

All the committee members appreciated the meeting but were disappointed O’Dekirk did not attend. His secretary said he was in court all day. The group was working on rewording some points and would be presenting at the committee and council level.

Editor's note: This story was edited to correct a person's title.