Feminist Activists Organize in the Financial District to Call for Police Reform

Activists for police reform continued their push for change on Monday, organizing outside City Hall to call on the city to pass two sidelined policing bills.

The coalition, including 60 organizations and dozens of individuals, appealed to female city officials to pass reforms to “protect women and gender non-conforming people from police abuses,” they wrote in a letter. The letter was sent to officials including council speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito and Vanessa Gibson, the chair of the council’s public safety committee.

“Following the recent election of a president who boasts about sexual assault, touts hyper-aggressive policing, and targets immigrant and undocumented communities, it is imperative for our city to demonstrate leadership by protecting the rights of all women and gender non-conforming people in their interactions with the police,” the letter read.

Organizers penned the letter to call for the passage of the so-called Right to Know Act, which was stagnant in New York City Council for two years before it was abandoned this summer.

The act includes two bills — one that requires police officers to proactively identify themselves and explain the reason behind a stop, and a second that requires officers to get affirmative consent from an individual during a search.

According to a report in the New York Times, the police department agreed to implement reforms internally. Although the department did agree to internal reforms, the changes are not backed by law, and activists on Monday said the changes were not enough.

“The agreement’s exclusion of common police interactions in which officers would be required to proactively identify and explain themselves, as would be required by the Right to Know Act, leaves all New Yorkers without protection, and particularly women,” the letter continues.

“Proactive identification and explanation of the reason for police interactions are critical to preventing and ensuring accountability for police sexual harassment and assault, which often go unreported because women and gender nonconforming people don’t know the identity of the officers responsible.”

Patch has contacted NYPD and Mark-Viverito’s office for comment.

Images courtesy of Communities United for Police Reform