Five present also present councilwoman Dr.

Jones.

Thank you.

We'll first call our criminal justice coordinating council crisis response team update.

Thank you for being here.

Can you hear me?

Okay.

My name is Andy Minton.

Hi everybody.

And I'm Lieutenant Kelly Russell with the crisis intervention team coordinator for the police department.

And I am the Behavioral Health Criminal Justice Coordinator at the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council.

And we are here today to present on our Toledo co-responder program.

I apologize to everyone in attendance.

I didn't have slides done in time that we could put them on the big screen, but all of you should be able to follow along with the packet in front of you.

But we're gonna go pretty surface level.

So you should all be able to follow along even though you can't see the slides.

So the co-responder has really been developed as a result of community need.

So in 2022, Toledo Police Department reported 611 incidents evolving 632 individuals that require the use of force from officers.

Also beginning in 2022, Toledo Police Department began collecting data to track of an officer perceived an individual was experiencing suspected mental health issues.

So of these 611 incidents evolving 632 individuals that required the use of force from officers, 130 or 21% were suspected to have mental health issues.

So this means that more than one of five cases that require the use of force from officers involved an individual with suspected mental health issues.

The National Alliance of Mental Illness, what we know as NAMI, has found that people with mental illnesses are over 10 times as likely to experience use of forced interactions with law enforcement than those without mental illness across the country.

So this is a mean not just in our community but across the country.

So there was a kind of a new opportunity for Lucas County in 2024.

In 2024, the Mental Health and Recovery Services Board opened the door for a co-responder unit uh in Lucas County through its levy promises.

In their levy endorsement requests to the Toledo Chamber of Commerce, the MHRSB stated that the MHRSB proposed to use a portion of its new levy funds to address behavioral health treatment and support service needs of inmates at the Lucas County Correction Center.

That's the jail that's just around the street, and to support the development of a law enforcement behavioral health co-responder program.

So with this promise, we finally had the momentum we needed to move forward with a co-responder program.

So that's kind of where the CJCC where I work got involved through the Connect and Protect grant, which is on the next slide.

So after reviewing the MHRSB's request, I reached out to the executive director of the MHRSB and asked, you know, where is this project now?

Who have you worked with?

Where is it at?

How can the CJCC get involved in order to actually establish a co-responder program?

This was one of my long-term goals as the BHCJ coordinator because we know that law enforcement is uh the resource in our community that is used to respond to crisis situations, but we also know that law enforcement is responding to situations that they are not trained to respond to.

It's better to have a mental health clinician respond to an incident that revolt that involves mental health issues.

Um I had identified the Connect and Protect grant opportunity through the Bureau of Justice Assistance as a funding source that we could utilize to actually establish a co-responder unit.

So after receiving permission from the mental health board, I reached out to TPD through Kelly and the Zeph Center through Courtney Borough, and we really got to work saying that this was something we actually wanted to establish.

So then I put together the grant application and we were eventually awarded funding in October of 2024.

So that's kind of how we got here.

But I've been saying co-responder unit a lot, and I'm not sure if everyone actually knows what that means.

So the actual definition that the mental health board got from the Colorado Behavioral Health Association defines a co-responder program as a program that pairs law enforcement officers with behavioral health professionals to respond to behavioral health-related calls for police service.

The teams utilize their combined experience to de-escalate situations and help link individuals with behavioral health services.

So the good thing about a co-responder program is when you have an officer responding to a scene, you also have a corresponder with them that are arriving at the same time.

So they're dispatched simultaneously, they arrive at the scene together, and they're able to uh they have different options available to them by having a corresponder there because clinicians are more aware of community resources and are better able to de-escalate crisis situations.

So on our next slide, why a corresponder unit.

I have de-escalation, diversion from the criminal legal system, and connection to appropriate behavioral health services.

So the first one, de-escalation.

When officers are arriving to these situations involving individuals with behavioral health needs, individuals with behavioral health needs might not always be able to comply with officers' orders because they might not always understand them.

They might be in the midst of a behavioral health crisis where they're kind of have symptoms that officers might misinterpret as not following their directions or as acting out or posing a threat.

Whereas clinicians understand different symptoms and different actions and behaviors and are trained to actually de-escalate situations by building trust with the individual they're working with and responding to the crisis that is at hand, which is often not a threat to public safety.

Diversion from the criminal legal system.

This means that we're not taking individuals that are in behavioral health crises to the jail.

We're instead taking them to what is an appropriate response to them, whether that be the ZEF Center's behavioral health diversion site, whether that be another treatment provider, but we're trying to deflect them away from the criminal legal system because we know that if we take individuals to the Lucas County jail, they will be able to access some services there, but that's not the right environment for an individual in crisis, and it's not necessarily a place where they will receive the ongoing care that they need to be a meaningful member of our community.

And that last piece is also kind of connected to that connection to appropriate behavioral health services.

So whether it's an individual that has been using illicit substances, or whether that's an individual that has experiencing their first psychotic episode, we're going to make sure that they are linked to appropriate treatment services.

And then our next slide, I have hang on.

Who is part of the co-responder program?

So we are going to have two co-responder units.

Each unit will have one clinician.

So the two behavioral health clinicians will be hired by the ZEF Center.

They will ride along with Toledo Police Department officers to respond with officers to calls for service.

Something unique that we will be doing with our unit that we didn't realize we needed until we went on a site visit to Denver.

We were planning on having one assigned police officer for each unit.

So it would be one individual that would always be working with the clinician.

We went out to Denver and we were like, this is what we are going to do.

And we rode along with corresponders there.

And what they do is they have their co-responder clinician jump into a different car with different officers every single day.

And they liked this approach because they were building awareness of the co-responder unit across the department because the co-responder was interacting with different officers every day.

And what happened as a result of this was different officers then became aware of all of the crisis services that are available in a county, and they also got to see how effective the co-responder was.

So this build a lot of support within the department for what the co-responder was doing.

So we will have a similar approach where every day the behavioral health clinician will ride along with a different Toledo police department officer.

The TPD officers that the behavioral health clinician ride along with will have CIT training.

CIT stands for crisis intervention team.

It is a 40-hour training that the mental health board provides to officers and also security guards.

It's basically a crash course in how to respond to individuals with behavioral health needs.

It is a great resource that our community has.

We have been at the forefront of CIT training in the state of Ohio.

But 40 hours is not the same as being a behavioral health professional, and that's why we still are pursuing this co-responder program and not just relying on CIT training.

And then another component of the corresponder model will be we will have a case manager who will support the corresponder unit by connecting individuals to service when they are no longer in crisis.

So when the co responder interacts with individuals, they will de-escalate that situation.

They will try to have an appropriate disposition for that individual and will make an attempt to connect the individual to services.

But then let's say 24 hours later, two days later, the case manager will then reach out to that individual and attempt to connect them to services long term.

This can be things like housing, this can be things like food assistance, not just behavioral health needs.

This is a typical case manager that exists in the mental health system already.

And then my last slide, I have how does the corresponder unit work?

So the mental health clinician will be riding along in a car with the TPD officer, and then officers will radio the corresponder unit if a call comes through the CAD that has a mental health component.

When this happens, the corresponder unit will drive to the location of the call.

The TPD officer that's part of the unit will assess the safety of the scene by completing a criminal justice based assessment.

And then after the TPD officer has said that the scene is safe, the behavioral health clinician will assess the client and identify the most appropriate response and or setting for the client, and then 24 hours later, two days later, after a significant time has passed, but still close enough to the encounter, the case manager will follow up with the client to connect the client to the community to any community resources.

So that's all I have for today.

Kelly, do you have anything you want to add?

I just wanted to add that the Toledo Police Department fully endorses this idea.

I think it would be definitely a great opportunity for us to offer services to those that are in acute mental health crisis that they may have called 911 or their caregiver or family or friend.

A lot of these people that are in crisis took years and years to get to this point, and too much expectation is put on the police to solve the problem within five minutes.

So I think this is a wonderful opportunity.

And I'll just briefly add that Kelly has done some ride-alongs with Courtney Burrow from the Zap Center where they've tested out this idea by having both of them in the car responding to calls for service, and they are both have been very successful in connecting individuals to service.

So we're really excited to see what this corresponder unit will be when we have hired people to actually fill the roles and are not just relying on Kelly and Courtney.

Thank you for this presentation.

This is something that is needed so much in the community.

One of the questions I have most of them you answer as you want to be the presentation.

One, what type of training, and I'm sorry before I go any further, I want to thank all our council members for being here.

Our council president Williams is the vice chair of this committee, but she cannot be here because of the previous commitment.

What type of training does a behavioral health responder or clinician have to have to be a part of this program?

Yeah, so this is something that the Zef Center could probably better answer.

I don't know.

Come on down.

If the Zeph Center is here, can answer that.

That's okay.

They may not be here.

But they have to at least have a degree in social work, and then they have to have their independent licensure, and then between TPD and Zeph Center, they will establish a training curriculum.

So the co responder, the mental health clinician, will kind of get a crash course and law enforcement techniques from law enforcement.

And then again, the law enforcement officer will already have that 40 hour CIT training.

They will also receive additional training from the ZEF Center on the mobile crisis unit.

Um you talked about the um with the what's going on with the clinician riding along.

Does it seem to make much of a difference if they're riding with the officer or if they ride arrive independently?

Does that seem to have an effect on what may be taking place?

Will the clinician always ride with the officer or would they always arrive separately in their own car?

So this example of the co-responder unit is one clinician per two parts of the city.

We have a central district and a south district.

So two for the whole city.

Yes, okay.

And they'll be in a different car every day.

Correct.

And when would this program start?

So we have a tentative launch date of July first.

Um for those of you that don't know, we are reliant on the federal government approving a few different components.

Um the federal government has been very interesting in the grants department.

Um they've been a little slow to approve different things, um, as priorities are changing on the federal level and as they're reviewing their um priorities.

Um, so we believe that we will be able to launch on July 1st, but this depends on us having a budget revision for our grant and a few other just like um administrative things that are unfortunately we have to wait for the federal government for.

Um so we're aiming for our July first start date, but we do have some time built in if that doesn't happen, but we're hoping for July.

Um you studied this uh program in Denver, yes.

How did Denver give you any type of timeline as to how long it took for them to start seeing a change in the way the community was responding with mental health issues?

Did it take a year, three years?

Was there any kind of that they keep where this kind of starts seeing the turnaround of this program having effect in in that city?

They would love more co-responder units, behavioral health needs in the community are increasing year after year after year.

So they didn't have any concrete stats to start.

I think you're asking if the co-responder unit made any difference in their calls for service.

Yes, so the behavioral health needs in the community are increasing countrywide just because since uh the era of COVID, um, people are in crisis mode more and more.

And so they would definitely want more co-responder units, so they didn't have any concrete stats to show a decrease in the number of acute mental health crisis.

And I'll add um they kind of started pretty small, like we did with a few co-responder units, and I don't know exactly when and how they expanded, but I know they went they have increased the number of co-responder units they've had over the years.

Um I think that they would say they probably had a pretty immediate impact.

Um the individuals we talked to um were very community focused and really saw the co-responder unit as an opportunity to connect with the community.

Um and we would like to have that model as well where every call for service is an opportunity to um let community members know what the unit is, how it works, and to raise awareness within the community of this resource so that when people are calling 911, um if they know that they're calling for something that could have a behavioral health component, they know to ask for the co-responder unit or they know to ask for a CIT trained officer, Consulman Sarantsu.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um I've attended uh National League of Cities meetings and other cities have embarked on these same programs, and they work very well uh with the police department and social workers.

So my question is to the lieutenant is there a particular uh shift that we have a uh overriding increase in mental health calls for the police department?

Is it daytime?

Is it nighttime?

Believe it or not, most of the calls are around dinner time between 5 p.m.

and 7 p.m.

We did look at targeting the co-responder unit to work within the afternoon shift, um, but unfortunately, the quality of people we are looking for, social worker behavioral health therapists, they really want that day shift job.

So Zef knows that you know our prior are preferably we would like those afternoon hours, but at this point, because there's such a shortage of social work type people in Lucas County that basically we'll take what we can get.

We just want the best to work with us.

So they would work the first shift.

What what hours would those be?

Eight o'clock, nine o'clock?

Probably mimic our roll calls.

So depending on the needs of when we need them would be 6:30 to 2.30 or 7:30 to 3:30.

We have two day shift roll calls that go out.

And and the grant it only allows us two social workers.

That's correct.

Okay, all right.

Thank thank you, Lieutenant.

Thank you.

So wonderful uh program that you're presenting.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilman.

Um Saratsu.

Councilman Meldon.

Thank you, Chair.

Um, yes, I I echo those comments.

I was gonna ask about volume, and but some of those questions were just asked.

I'm curious, you know, I think about behavioral health, and it's a to a layman, right?

Which is a fancy word for someone who doesn't know anything about it, um, it could be kind of broad and maybe even vague.

I am drawn to um some of our residents with autism or on the autism spectrum to sort of like if someone should if someone shows up nonverbal, is that yes.

So um intellectual disabilities are included within the umbrella of behavioral health.

Okay, I'm just I'm just thinking about I don't know this, but I think from maybe from a TPD perspective, I I just can't imagine the complexity of that personally.

And I've seen some different things in policing, whether it's um bracelets, I've seen like different like necklaces with like a particular identification marker essentially.

Um how in the past were you engaging with these residents?

And I mean, this obviously seems better.

I'm just curious.

How did you do it before?

Yeah, absolutely.

So it takes a village, right?

So, like I mentioned, it's not gonna take the police five minutes to resolve the problem.

We just had one actually right down the street on here on.

He's a big guy, and he's not taking his medication.

Uh, so he's out of control, punching holes in the wall, ceilings, punching mom, carry sticks around, carries weapons.

My fear was that many opportunities to get in front of police officers 55 times.

What might happen to him, or what might happen to the police officer?

What might happen to mom, right?

So it needed some interventions, and that's when it takes that village.

I got Lucas County Board of DD involved, CPS involved, and it was seven of us in a constant meeting for a week.

Well, finally, we had some interventions where mom got the help she needs.

She didn't have the intellect capability to understand how important his medications were and how important that if he didn't take those, he was you know, decapitating out here in the environment.

We were afraid for him and someone what he might harm.

Um, so it took all seven of us to come up with a plan and successful interventions, and mom is finally relieved.

And this just happened yesterday.

So I can't give you a statistic how it's gonna work out.

But it I am confident that the plan we have in place is gonna work.

Sure.

I mean, if you think 55 calls in one case, and if there's since February.

Yeah, right.

I mean, so okay.

No, that's interesting.

I I suppose the the most helpful.

I I guess I should have known that people with disabilities is covered under behavioral health.

That makes sense.

I didn't know that.

So you're not alone.

Yeah, interesting.

Okay.

Well, it's a it's fantastic.

It really feels like you know, innovation, right?

Like we we gotta we gotta take new approaches to um emerging uh problem.

So thanks, Chair.

Thank you, Councilwoman McPherson.

Thank you, Councilman House.

Thank you for the presentation and explanation, and I think this is uh a good work.

This co-responder.

Then would that co-responder uh be on call for emergencies that may occur during that 7 p.m.

to 7 a.m.

hour?

So though the corresponders that we're going to be hiring through this grant opportunity would not be on call, but the Zef Center does have a line that law enforcement can call into.

Um they have their own mobile crisis unit, um, and they're always available, I believe 24/7, um, to take calls from officers or to meet officers out in the scene.

Um they do have some staffing concerns, so they're not always fully staffed and able to go out immediately.

But they are always available to answer calls.

And the Zeph Center is who we are partnering with.

So it's not the same resource, but it's pretty similar.

Okay.

And that's what I my next question follow up.

The difference between the Ceph Center who you're using right now and these two persons.

Yeah.

Are is the training the same?

Is it different?

I believe the training will be a little different because they will have more of a background in law enforcement actions because they'll actually be riding along with a law enforcement officer.

So they will probably be called to scenes that are um slightly more potentially dangerous.

I don't want to say dangerous because that is not the case.

But the bar is a little bit higher for what they could handle with a law and officer present than what a mobile crisis unit can do without a law enforcement officer present.

That's my concern.

Because these two are only going to be available during the daytime.

That's a concern because of the intense training that they will have.

And I know we do have nighttime, I don't want to say incidents, but nighttime events of that nature where that co-responder could very well make the difference in that situation.

So being that I yeah, I get it.

It's the grant right now, it's the way it is, but I really uh I would hope that we could look into um expanding the two in the hours so we're not just locked into daytime.

Yeah, in an ideal world in the two years that we'll have with this program, we will be super successful, everything will be fantastic, and then everyone will want to expand the unit so that we can have that nighttime coverage.

So that's definitely something that I see as the next phase of this program, and then um councilman Hobbes had kind of asked the question, but I'm gonna ask you by referral if we could get some of the data from Denver as to um how it started, where they are, um, just to just to have some of the um positives and some of the negatives just from.

Absolutely.

There have been a lot of studies on their program, so I'm happy to send those along.

I also have um CIT statistics from Toledo Police Department that kind of show when activity happens at different times in the day, which I'm also happy to share with them.

I would greatly appreciate it, and I'm sure all the council members would like to have that information.

So I'll put the absolutely referral in, and thank you so very much.

I think this is uh a step in the right direction for the city of Toledo, um, because we have had several um I don't want to use the word incidents, but we've had several where we are dealing with persons in crisis, and a lot of times you you said it, police officers may not be able to read what is actually going on, and at the same time, it could save not only that person, but it could save a police officer also.

So I'm elated, and let's get this started and let's get this training.

Let me ask one more question and then I'll be through.

On the you call it IT training, am I CIT training CIT training?

The CIT training that our police officers receive and the CIT training that these co-responders receive will look the same.

Sorry, so um the officers that are in the corresponder unit will have already had the CIT training.

Okay.

We haven't talked about whether or not we want to put the clinician through CIT training.

I think that's probably redundant.

Um, but they will have officer training from Toledo Police Department.

Okay, and thank you for working so hard to make this happen.

Greatly appreciated.

That's it for me.

Thank you.

Councilwoman Kramer.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you so much for your presentation.

I think this is fantastic.

I have two quick questions.

You said the grant period is two years, is that correct?

So we are actually currently in the grant period now.

It was originally a three-year grant period.

We received a one-year extension.

So that made it a four-year period.

I think I said two.

But so we have one year of planning and then three years of implementation, which is kind of now like one and a half years of planning.

And then we'll have two years of implementation and then we'll have like three extra months.

Okay.

And then how are we going to measure the success of this program?

Cause I'm imagining that you're gonna be the we all will be asking for this grant to be extended if it's successful.

So how do we know if it's successful or not?

Yeah, so we have different metrics.

Um there's the disposition of um where individuals are taken um after they are in contact with law enforcement, um, whether or not they are charged with offenses.

Um we'll be looking probably at recidivism rates.

Um, we'll be looking at connections to services.

So if an individual actually followed up with a behavioral health provider, um, how long they stayed with that behavioral health provider.

Um, can you think of any other metrics that we'll be tracking?

Just generally use of force um by officers in these situations.

No, that's that's great.

I know sometimes it's like every case is different, so how do you but there has to be something we can do to kind of say yes, this is.

Yeah, and one of our strengths as the CJCC is that Norris is a part of the CJCC, that's the Northwest Ohio Regional Information System.

They do all of the programming for the different criminal justice applications in the area.

So for the jail for the computers that are in TPD cars, um, so we'll be able to create new applications and pull data from existing applications pretty seamlessly.

I just want to comment that it's often difficult for law enforcement to see success on these because of my bad friend HIPAA.

HIPAA, I try to see, you know, are they still in their rehab?

Are they yeah, I can't tell you anything.

It's HIPAA.

So it's very frustrating for law enforcement that we're trying to help and make sure they that they don't re-offend, but we have no idea because of HIPAA, if they're successful or not in their treatment plans.

Does that make sense?

It does, yes, completely.

Thank you very much, councilwoman Jones.

Thank you, Chair.

Um, I'll be quick.

I've just most of my questions have been answered from questions from other council people in your presentation.

First of all, I'm very um thankful for this program because that was one of the things that I've noticed, especially with the rise in and you said that officer, as far as with COVID and and you know, mental health and things of that nature, just seeing that rise and the inner and the interactions with uh law enforcement, it is important to have this, and thus why some of the questions that I've uh had was regarding data.

So I know since 2022 um TPD has been collecting that.

I don't know if by way of referral or if you know those questions, what are the stats?

So that's basically now.

Particular statistic that I'm uh included in this presentation is actually no longer tracked.

Um they were using a certain uh data provider at that point in time that they're no longer using.

Um so they have different statistics now for how they track interactions with individuals with behavioral health needs, um, but because it's different, we can't really compare year by year.

Um, but I am looking into how they are currently doing that so we can have more of an analysis.

Um, but that particular statistic is no longer tracked.

When was that when did that stop being tracked?

I'm not sure.

I applied for the grant in 2024, so by that point in time.

Okay, okay, because that's the that was the other question, basically between 2022 and 2024, you know, what was going on.

Okay, so we don't have longitude, no data with that.

So by referral, I think you said to provide the actual metrics and ensuring that it coincides with what TPD is gathering as well.

Um, in regards, did you mention the um amount of the grant?

It is five hundred and fifty thousand dollars.

Okay, and how is that broken up?

So I I'm assuming that's not just the two.

We went on a trip to Denver where we met with individuals that had um established a corresponder program there.

So we spent, I want to say between $7,000 and $9,000 on that.

The remainder will be going to the Zef Center to pay for the salaries for the corresponder collections.

Okay, so remainder of that.

And they're tracked, are they keeping like their own metrics as far as how they're hiring qualifications, demographics as well, and everybody has access to that?

I believe the job has already been posted by the Zeph Center and they've received applications.

Okay, okay.

Yeah, I that's why I was just wondering um what has been going on since the grant to now.

You said about a year and a half of planning, yeah, and that involves of course travel and then the Zeph Center.

So how does that accountability look like when how are often are you checking in with Zef Center?

Yeah, so we um have regular reporting that we have to submit to the Bureau of Justice Assistance, um, so that reporting is done probably quarterly.

Um, so we check metrics then, and then we at the CJCC have a grants manager that tracks compliance.

Um they do all, she does all of our um financial reporting, and we also when we um first have a grantee, we do just some basic um we do a site visit where we monitor kind of all of their financial bookkeeping and making sure that they have processes in place um to make sure that the organization is doing what they say they're doing with the funds that we're giving them, um, as well as just being in compliance with federal requirements.

Um, so we are we're pretty um stringent with our monitoring.

So does that also include um because we're having uh as well as law enforcement going out, um, and then you have the clinician well, the behavior specialist.

Is there any amount of money that's going towards maybe their mental health as part of this grant?

That's a good question.

I believe that we envision the corresponder that's in the car with officers being a resource for the officers while they're driving along to um check in on the wellness of the officer that they're with, and also because they're kind of will be stationed at a certain precinct that they'll establish relationships with different officers there and be a resource for officers.

And is there someone for the behavior specialist?

I don't know about that, but I'm I wish the Zef Center was here to answer that, but I can find out and let you know.

Okay, I think that'll be important because we want them to be in a good state of health while they're out there as well.

And last question in regards to the the partnership.

So they're they'll be in the patrol cars every day.

How are you going to establish that they have a good relationship or how does that selection process look?

Yeah, so I think a lot of that is in the hiring decision.

Um, we kind of saw in Denver, um, that it's a certain kind of person that needs to be able to both mesh with police culture, um, but also stick to their clinical background, and so it's uh it's an interesting mixture of someone that can blend in but also be willing to kind of go against the grain when it's necessary.

Um so during the hiring decision, um, we will be working with TPD to make sure that they're the right candidate.

Um they will have the ability to ask questions during the interview as well, um, because this really is a partnership between both of us.

So we want to make sure we have an individual um that works with both organizations.

I definitely agree with that.

We don't need conflict in the patrol car and then taking them out on the street.

But it will really be on the individual corresponders to be able to work with people from a multitude of different backgrounds.

Okay, perfect.

That's good.

All right, well, thank you very much.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Councilwoman McPherson.

Thank you.

She brought up a good.

So this um interview panel.

The will consist of TPD, Zeph Center, somebody from the community.

I'm I'm asking.

Because we're dealing with.

Yeah, I mean, that's not something that we had discussed, but it's something that we definitely need to do.

So you haven't put your um interview team together yet.

Okay.

Um I'm gonna ask by referral that we find out we know who are those that are on that interview team because not only is it important about the person who you're hire, but also TPD, and that person I'm hoping is from Toledo, maybe not.

So that a community person is also on there to listen and to ask questions also.

Because this person will be out in our community.

Absolutely.

Okay.

Thank you.

You are a part of the criminal justice coordination.

You are part of the criminal justice.

You're the coordinator for that.

Yes.

So what is our your background?

Give me a little bit.

Yeah, so um I went to the University of Michigan where I majored in political science and history.

Um I always had a focus in criminal justice.

Okay.

Um and then I graduated in 2022 and I began working at the behavioral as the B as the office manager at the CJCC in 2023.

Um while I was working there, I learned a lot about the criminal legal system.

Um and then I have my own um history with mental illness.

So um I'm someone with lived experience.

And when the job became available for the BHCJ coordinator, I was promoted to that position, and I've been in that position since 2023.

And background with social work, any background?

I don't have any background with social.

Okay.

Thank you.

I just wanted to make sure.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you all for being here.

Thank you for this.

And we definitely uh would love to keep the updates and um we are really um praying for the success of this program, is extremely needed uh in our community.

So thank you.

Next, we're going to have um Toledo police come and talk about the multi-district substation update and then TPD standard operating guidelines discussions, specifically um update on the officer who dealt with the or slammed the handcuffed girl and the officers involved in uh the comments that were made to the youth um a few weeks ago.

Thank you, Chief Turnley, for being here.

Thank you, Chief Crawl for being here.

All right.

Good afternoon.

Um go ahead and start with the uh police substation or community station as we're calling it updates.

We are currently in the I guess we'll call it the negotiation phase for the lease of the building that we're planning on being inside.

Uh we're very close to signing the lease.

There's a couple things that uh are taking place in the background, and a lot of that has to revolve or revolves around um some expenses that need to be paid for some upgrades to the building and parking lot area there.

So uh our hope is within the next week or two we'll actually have a signed lease and then we'll be able to begin doing some remodeling of this station uh to fit our needs.

And uh that's gonna you know, whether it's uh just the upgrades of the interior, um we need to do some redesign of the entryway uh for officers um while they're there to create a space for our community to come in and uh interact with our officers and then we have some IT requirements that are gonna need to happen there.

So we are progressing on this.

Um hopefully we'll have something signed here shortly, and we can at least start the renovations.

Uh my goal was to try to be signed in sometime before the end of the summer, but depending on uh how long the renovations take, it could be uh fall or even early twenty-seven.

So the latest you're thinking is probably early twenty twenty-seven.

That would be the latest.

I do believe we'll be able to get in this year still.

Um the renovations I don't think will take uh uh extended amount of time, um, but uh we are still uh working towards staffing.

Um we actually are having our uh command staff meeting uh the eighteenth of June that we're reevaluating our department and looking at how we staff our department, the units we have with some of the uh anticipated uh reduction in staff, uh, reduction in officers we're gonna be seeing through retirements and class sizes.

So we are going to look at doing the complete overhaul of our department that would actually uh begin January 1st of 27.

Chief, do you believe we will uh as far as staffing, will we have someone there that will be able to take reports?

Um, will that be a part of the staffing because right now it's either Scott Park or downtown.

Yeah, so that that was part of our goal, and unfortunately we we suffered a little bit of a setback with the uh uh tollot not passing for having somebody take that over because that was going to provide us with some officers that were records um that could be used to take reports at some of our other stations as well.

Um so we are now trying to pivot from that uh thought process and see how we can uh how we can staff that station.

Um we also do envision that to be utilized by some of our community service officers that work those uh adjoining council districts.

Um we also do envision this as a uh station for our district units to be able to come in, complete reports, um, use the you know the facilities and be a presence there in that that neighborhood.

Councilman Meldon.

Yeah, thank you, Chair.

Um the tollat thing it has me wanting to ask a couple questions, but I feel like that might bring me into some interesting like you know, counting FTEs and and doing all that work.

So I'm gonna avoid that for the sake of time.

Um be interesting to get back into it though.

Um what's the it's exciting, right?

We're making progress.

Uh I saw through the referral back to Councilman Saranti, the number looks pretty good too.

Uh, I think that's that seems like a positive.

Um curious about signage, you know, we're zeroing in on a building.

What do we think about signage?

Yep.

So that'll be part of our renovations in uh, you know, making sure that it's you know uh signed that's clearly visible to the public.

Um obviously we will have dedicated spaces for our police cars to be there, so we'll have some patrol cars out front there at all times.

Um, so it will be uh it will be visible.

Uh we don't have a name for it right now.

So we're still working through that.

Um obviously, I'm happy to help.

Happy to help with some.

Councilman Meldon substation.

No, no, no.

No, that's not what I meant.

I've got it down.

Although that was very funny.

That was very well, that was very well done.

Um, that was good.

Um, because it's so funny.

Literally, the next thing on my paper here is name, which is to say I don't want to I will not hold you accountable for our our council agenda here, but it does say substation again.

And I just think that that that's not the word we want to keep using.

You and I have talked about that plenty of times.

And so you said community station or something like that.

I think I trust that you'll find something, but I think to the degree that we can reframe what is happening here is gonna be really really helpful.

Um I could not stress enough prioritizing the signage in the renovation planning anyway, because the second you have a car in the lot and the second you have a sign on the building, to most people, it might as well be open.

You know, so like as you think about moving drywall and electricity and getting a toilet put in where it needs to be inside to 95% of the people that see the building, it might as well be open.

And so I know a lot of the neighborhood would um find that as a positive development, so I just love to see that that prioritized.

Um I certainly think, you know, regardless of timeline, it'd be interesting to kind of see what the day-to-day operations look like.

I'm not gonna get into the nitty-gritty here because I just heard you say you're working on that uh on concepts and kind of who's gonna be in and out of there, what departments make sense.

Um so I'd love to hear more about that.

Um, but overall it's an exciting update.

I'm looking forward to hearing more.

Thanks.

Consulwoman McPherson.

Thank you.

Just one question.

I'm a visual.

You say Jackman and Sylvania.

Are we talking the old Arthur Treatures building?

Which building are we talking?

So we're actually talking um there's a family video there.

There's right next to it, right to the right of it, or I guess would be east of it.

There is a multiplex uh, I guess an office, and there's a restaurant in there right now, so we're gonna occupy the most western um office space there.

Okay, it's across the street.

Okay.

So my barbecue truck can stay where is that?

No, I'm on the I don't I don't want O'Heary to have to relocate.

No, I was just trying to visualize where you actually were because that is a big corner right there, and a lot going on in that area.

Thank you for that visual.

Yes, I am excited also, um, for the community station, or whatever the name, not Meldon station, but whatever the name of it is, um, because I think it solidifies what the community was asking us for, and so and it is actually happening.

I'm not gonna call out one person's name, I'm just gonna look at him over there.

Um, it's happening, and I like the figures.

So we have room to grow and to do some other things in that.

So thank you for being diligent and staying on this and thanks uh Meldon for pushing the button.

Councilman Soratsu.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, this is very good news.

Um, and I would just hope that we can uh the remodeling doesn't seem to be too complex.

Uh so hopefully we can get this done and open soon before the end of the year.

Because the residents have really wanted this and they've waited a long time and we've had the Collins uh station closed.

So I appreciate all the work and whatever council can do.

We've already appropriated the money.

So it's just a matter of of getting the right people in there to make the changes and obviously have the chief and your people uh make decisions as to how you're gonna staff it and so forth.

But I appreciate all the efforts.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Councilman Meldon.

Thank you, Chair.

I forgot something.

Sorry.

Um we're talking about signs so much.

Um given that the number came in a little lower than what we budgeted for.

Um I want to encourage you to be aggressive on the sign.

And I I'm almost guaranteeing that this would be the one exception we all might make to our current sign our sign code that we just changed.

Because that's a that's a real real serious thing.

I mean, we we have a new sign code, and what kind of sign can go on a building and what what all that looks like.

Look, this this is different, and I would be more than happy to defend to every single person that comes through a zoning and planning meeting who's telling me no, don't take my sign away, why this is different.

Does that make sense?

Yes, sir.

I just want I just want to be really clear like let's be creative and ambitious with what that sign looks like.

I'm not trying to like, you know, bring up Seinfeld references to Kenny Rogers' roasters chicken with where Kramer can't go to sleep at night.

I'm not trying to mess with the neighbors, okay.

I'm what I'm saying is visibility, because it's not on the corner, right?

If it were on the corner, I would feel a lot better.

A monument sign gets a lot done.

This is in just a scoche, and so I just want to make sure that we think about that.

And the sign codes are real thing, and if we have to work around that and get creative through that, we should we should do that.

That just hit me.

Thank you, Chair.

Consulwoman McPherson.

Yes, and so you you're speaking about that, Meldon, and so I'm just gonna ask because maybe our community may not understand why you're emphasizing about the sign and codes.

If you would just share, because everybody is not aware of the different signs and how and what we so if you would just share with the citizen, just okay.

Your light is still long.

I take a hand.

Um, so we're not the plan commission director, uh, but you know, we went through a process to really rethink what we think about our signs.

I mean, you drive up and down C core, that's one that comes to mind for me.

It's a pretty wild smattering of every possible sign you can think of from 1930 to today.

Um and the sign code that we changed was to bring them all in line with a unified appearance.

Um it's more appealing visually, it's more it's more modern.

There's a lot of reasons to do it.

Um the irony, of course, is that the old district substation D.

Michael Collins sign would have been conforming.

Because it was a lower monument sign.

What I'm trying to say is if we wanted something a little more visible, maybe on the building, if that's not in line with the code, then we could maybe make an exception.

Um we want to be careful to not we want to throw that needle between visibility and public safety and not being you know an eyesore uh just because the context there is that we changed the sign code to really bring some unification.

Um so hopefully that's clarifying.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Um, Chief, can we have um I know I have I'm not sure about other council members, but I've received numerous emails and phone calls as to what the update is on the officer with the young lady that was slammed while she was handcuffed, and then most recently a couple of weeks ago, the officers who address young people in the community, and we all know what was um said, and um, so do we have updates on those um situations?

Yes, sir.

So I'll start with uh the original incident that occurred where the officer had to use a takedown technique to on the 15-year-old female that was uh involved in uh walking in the streets.

So that has finally been completed by our internal affairs.

They are uh it took a little bit to schedule all of the interviews, a little bit longer than we were hoping, um, but including um the young lady involved and her mother, we brought her in and interviewed with them and the officers.

Um so and there's quite a bit of uh videos and uh audio transcripts that need to be gone through.

So they have it done, they're gonna get it to me here, and uh beginning of next week I will review that and I anticipate us releasing it at uh sometime next week, so we will have a conclusion to that particular case.

Will that release chief just be amongst your officers or will this be with the mayor, our chief of public safety, so right now we're yeah, so uh right now we're envisioning um probably doing some sort of uh news conference, if you will, interviews with media to release it.

Uh we'll have obviously the investigation, the entire file will be released to our media partners that have asked for it, and that way everybody can kind of take a look through the investigation and see where we came to the conclusions that we did come to, and um then there will be opportunities for you know questions from the media as well.

Okay.

Can you give us uh update on the most recent um a couple of weeks ago with the officers Sylvan and that area?

Yes, sir.

So um uh, you know, obviously we're talking about from a policing standpoint two completely different types of situations.

Um, you know, the first incident involves policing, um, the second incident involves something that does not belong in policing or any form of um you know government community relations.

Um so it's, you know, reprehensible what was said.

Um some of the actions that were taken immediately, the the main offender from that officer was immediately removed um from his specialty assignments and reassigned.

There's an investigation that is going on to the officers involved's credit.

Basically, they have submitted their reports, admitting to what they did and admitting that there is no absolutely no possible explanation for where this would even be tolerable.

So those things are happening right now.

I'm actually hoping to conclude that investigation next week too, so we can kind of put these out and get our community informed of the discipline that's going to happen in that case.

Um there are some certain things that we have to do because anytime we're gonna have an investigation that results in discipline, we have to make sure that we're, you know, crossing our T's dotting all our I's because this will be subject to you know the union's involvement and a lot of times there'll be um you know grievances on it, arbitrations on it, depending on the level of discipline.

So that is something that we're doing right now.

Um, also what we've done as a department.

You know, we've had a lot of internal meetings and command staff and talking and looking inward to make sure that as a department we're not putting anything out there or any of our training or anything along those lines that would actually lead to believe that this kind of behavior would be tolerable.

And I'm happy to say that no, it's not, and as a matter of fact, it goes against everything we do train, everything we do stand for as a police department, as a you know, as a city.

So it's a very unfortunate incident.

Um, you know, there will be consequences when you violate our policies and procedures, and so that type of uh discipline will be coming forth.

Thank you, Councilman Melton.

Thank you so much.

Um I know we have a lot of community members who want to speak.

So I'm gonna keep my questions brief.

I have several.

Um I'm gonna try to narrow it down to one.

You know, Chief, it's encouraging to hear you say that everything you said, it's reprehensible, it's against everything we stand for.

You said many, many things.

There's a an idea that I think is really I try to stick to it a lot because it takes the people out of it sometimes, and it says every system is perfectly designed to get the results it's getting.

Sure.

So I mean it violates all of our community relations training.

It violates um our communications training on how we uh how we communicate with community.

Um it violated a bunch of different policies that we have as well and procedures.

Um we are looking at different training as a result of this incident.

Um I don't I don't truly believe this is a training failure.

Um this is something that they were never trained to do.

Um, so I I think this is something where the officer is either caught up in his own emotions, um, caught up in a little bit of back and forth with some kids that I will tell you.

Watching that video, I would I commend the young man that actually tried to step in and say, hey, whoa, whoa, don't s don't say that, don't go there.

Um I thought that was, you know, a situation for us to actually build on our relationship with the community, not degrade and actually take three more steps backwards for everything we do to positively engage our community, positively interact with our community.

Um it just takes one of these incidents because unfortunately in our world, our social media, our regular media, the good things that happen on a day-to-day basis are not covered as much or shared as much as when something bad happens or when there's something negative that happens.

That seems to be our society right now.

Yeah, I no, I hear that.

And and I think all of that the second half of your answer is is true.

It that is true of everything.

Yes.

That's true.

Every that's true of every profession.

It's true of health care, behavioral mental health, it's true of education, it's true of everything.

Um one bad thing caught on camera can ruin all the wonderful things that happen.

I understand that.

I'm asking, and you kind of answered it a couple different ways, but the training piece is what I'm really after.

And so um I am because the thing that the other the inverse of what you're saying is that one instance caught on camera can really spoil all the good stuff that's happening.

There is another there's another side to that one thing caught on camera, which is well, if this one thing was caught on camera, how many times did it happen when there was no camera?

So I mean, just from a community perception standpoint, no, that's just how it is.

Yep.

And so my question about training is about um how do we, and I'll be more specific.

Is there particular training that our officers understand interacting with young people is different than with, say, it was me.

A 42-year-old.

Whew, that number's getting higher and higher.

A 42-year-old not looking like I want to in interact with people, yeah.

Versus a 15, 16 year old young person.

What does the training do to say we're gonna treat these people differently?

Yeah, so that is part of our curriculum in our basic academies.

Um, so whether it's our juvenile justice portions, it's our procedural justice portions of it, our communications portions of it, um, those are all things that happen during the academy to talk about the different levels, whether juveniles um or somebody that with special needs, um those are all different avenues that are covered in our training.

Um through this last couple processes, um, last couple incidents, if you will, um we started looking at some additional training that we're gonna be looking to give to our officers, and you know uh we, you know, whether it be cultural competence training, um, we're looking at some uh different.

There's one training that uh so I had our training commander start putting together a a program basically for us to look at our 2027 training in service training.

So we we do a lot of in-service training during the year.

Unfortunately, with an organization the way we are, our training is set in January for the entire year because it takes a long time to get 600 officers through all of the training.

So we can do some one-off trainings right now that we will be doing here shortly with some of these officers that are involved in some of these incidents, but as a whole department, we're looking at a a completely comprehensive training plan for next year that's gonna uh specifically address some of these incidents and some of the professionalism, customer service.

Um there's a training that's called sit D, which is really interesting in the fact that it goes into you've been trained in communications, you've been trained in how to do all these things, but this takes it from a different um a different avenue of what happens when you're in a situation where your emotions and everything else is happening that now flips that switch a little bit where you're not falling back on your training necessarily, there's a disconnect there.

Um so we're looking into that as well.

Um we have, you know, our ICAT training that we started for the entire department this year.

Um not everybody's been a chance to go through it yet because like I said, it takes from January through December to get all of our officers through.

Um but that that is a communications and tactics training that has helped to reduce um use of force um to help uh downplay some of these incidents and have a step back and kind of you know slow things down a little bit.

It strikes me that maybe another update could be future uh uh training changes to training within the department.

I I'm not trying to make your agenda chair, but that just could be a future topic for discussion.

I only have one more question, which is it, and this is gonna sound maybe like a dumb question, so um hopefully I'm sure no one's surprised.

Um is it against the law to walk in the street?

Yes.

So no, that's good.

Yes, it's fine, actually.

Because it used to be against Toledo Municipal Code to play basketball in the street, and a few of us changed that um for exactly this reason.

Um the thing that's interesting to me is that I think it's I think it's uh unfortunately a bad idea to walk in the street personally.

I think it's unsafe in some ways, which is why I wish I had sidewalks in my neighborhood, but I don't this morning at 6 a.m.

I went for a walk in the street because that's what everyone does in my neighborhood, they all walk in the street because there's no other place to go for a walk.

And if I could just clarify a little bit, so in the in that situation, so what the code is really says is it's illegal to walk in the street where sidewalks are provided.

So if there's no sidewalk provided, like in your neighborhood you're talking about, then it is not illegal to be walking in the street.

No, there are certain guidelines on how you're supposed to walk in the street and against traffic and against you know, as close as you can to the curb, all those things for traffic safety, pedestrian safety reasons.

That makes sense.

That's a good distinction.

It strikes me that maybe we should refine it to say where sidewalks that have been paved in the last 10 years and the grass has been mowed, are provided.

Because not all sidewalks are provided the same in different neighborhoods, and so just here's the here's all I'm saying.

We we recently ran into a situation.

Recently, is my my time on council where I had a parent who got caught, you know, said my the police got called on my children, they were playing basketball in the street, and then we changed that rule to try to stop that from happening.

I'm just curious.

Again, I'm all about systems change.

I appreciate the training and all the innovations, and that's important stuff.

But I'm just like, what system can we change to get a better result than we're getting?

So that's the nature of my questions, and we can maybe brainstorm about what we do.

Thank you.

And so, Councilman Melden, I did um do a whole um piece that I was going to present to council about changing all of that, but in uh presented it to uh law director Dale Imps last week.

He went through it, called me yesterday, and the reason why we can't change those things because uh that's a state, and we can't supersede state law, so it would take a change at the state level then for us to be able to change it on the local level.

What we had changed and what you were doing with was city Toledo, that type of thing, and that's why that was able to be changed.

Because I did do that, talk to him.

Yes, sir.

Just one quick thing.

I hear that.

I think the thing that's interesting or tough, that reminds me of changing speed limits.

Um, it's very similar.

There are some that were allowed to change at a local level and some that are guided by ORC.

And I think that where's where our ORC is out of step with our community safety priorities, we might need to fight the state on it.

You know, so I'm just saying I understand that distinction.

I think sometimes it's worth passing a law change locally that's in violation of the state and letting that work itself out.

Because that tension, that dissonance could be creative and help us all find a better solution.

I appreciate everything you're saying, and I don't disagree.

I just think maybe that's where we have to say, let's do it anyway.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilwoman McPherson.

Thank you, Councilman Hobbes.

Thank you, Chief, for coming in presenting about the substation and giving us updates on the two.

Um in our community.

Um I am glad to hear about the investigation being completed and on the investigation of the others and the police officer that was dealt with um quickly with the kids over by red and white.

My concern is for, and I get you're looking at retraining and that kind of thing, um, but cultural competency is a big issue for our police department, and I say that because we have a lot of police officers that come from Delta and Pimberville, and those little communities out there with the cornfields, and they don't deal with too many of us on a growing up basis.

And so when they come to our community as adults and put on a badge, they deem themselves better than some of us, that's the real problem, and that incident over tragedy over at um red and white, that was one that deemed himself better than those kids that were over there.

You cannot train a person that has lived a life and that has been taught and it's been embedded in them that they are better than somebody else, they'll go through the training, but it's just like my mother taught me to respect adults, it's always in my head because I was trained, I was brought up like that for a man or woman that has been brought up and raised that they are better than a black person or a poor person, you cannot retrain.

So my concern is how then do we deal with these police officers, because it's gonna happen again, the saving grace is that they wear the watchdog badge right now, the whatever you want to call it, the microphone that records everything.

Thank you, that's our saving grace, because it's been going on for a long time, and if we look at some of the police officers that have now come forth with their truth, their years in service has not been long, they're young, and when councilman Sam said that about being 40 something, and what you okay, I'm 66.

Not according to age, so far.

I talk to them out of respect, whether it's a 15-year-old, a five-year-old, or 60-year-old, because that's what I was taught, so my concern is trying to retrain because that's what you're talking about.

Retraining police officers that have been trained for life to behave in the manner that they behave in.

See, that was nothing, that was nothing new for that police officer.

He's probably said that in worse many a times before.

He just got caught this time, and I don't know, and I'm gonna say Chief Crawl, I don't know if we've ever did something when we've had officers that behaved in this manner, because what I would love to see is those officers to come and hang out in our community, not as a punishment, but as a living learning experience, because that's how you make them better, not training, letting them live the experience.

Because he said in the ghetto, you don't even use that word no more.

Come on, I think, and I don't know, and you, you, if we've ever done that, and I we see thinking out of the box.

Because see, if you think that is so bad, and y'all moved him someplace else, no, he needs to come back to you.

Because he needs to walk with those kids that he insulted, he needs to walk with those kids.

He needs to learn and have a conversation with those kids.

He needs to come to the schools that are in that area and hang out with those kids, because their living wherever they live is not based upon them.

That's family.

You live where your mom and your daddy go.

They didn't choose that.

But because they are there.

How do we really retrain bad behavior that they've grown up with?

Because it's been said by the mom and daddy that it's okay.

And because mom and daddy said it's okay, it's still it's okay now.

Even in my work, it's okay.

Because see, when I come to work, mama told me to respect you.

And I will respect you, even if I don't like you.

I'll respect you because that's what my mom and my daddy has taught me.

So you know what I'm saying.

You understand what I'm saying?

It carries over, and it just don't change because you didn't put me in a class and you showed me some of the stuff.

You don't.

Thank you.

Councilwoman Dr.

Jones.

Thank you, Chair.

Um, I'll have to leave in a little bit, so I'm just gonna say this, but for the record, diddle to what councilwoman McPherson had said, but I've also put in a referral to provide some data, cross-referencing the police officers who utilize the Toledo Police Next Door program to relocate, and those involved in hostile interactions.

I'm wondering, because especially with this last incident, for that comment to come out talking about the neighborhood, that gives me a sense that he's probably not from Toledo or from a part of Toledo where he doesn't have to deal with this.

So then also looking at that, Chief Crawl, myself, and President Williams did request the details of the training curriculum that the officers go through.

So we would still like that as well, because there needs to be some rethought of what training is, and I'm thinking some ride-alongs kind of like training day, not in the essence of a crooked cop, but to really have somebody that is trusted in the neighborhood, bringing on a rookie to ride through the neighborhood to thus build that trust, and then it goes on from there because you can only learn so much from a book, it's the real life interactions and being within the environment in which you are supposed to patrol and protect.

So I will put in that referral, but also to reevaluate those recruits through the Toledo police next door, because if we are because of cuts, if we're bringing in people from outside of the city, then there needs to be some strenuous looking into as far as their background, of course, the mental health training, where references anything of that nature, because this will keep happening, especially if there's no due diligence and when it comes to this recruitment.

So I again just really thinking about what does that look like moving forward because summer is here and we're gonna have many more summers as well as many more days, and if this keeps continuing, it will come to a point where there's just no trust and no regard, and it's going to keep repeating, we're gonna see the same thing every day.

So it has to start somewhere, but first with that data point, I will be very interested in the curriculum as far as details about what that involves with it when it comes to this training, and then really just breaking down from there after that.

Thank you, Chair, uh Council President Williams.

Thank you.

Um, definitely want to apologize, share.

Share I did have another obligation um with partners in education to teach uh to help kids learn to read.

Thank you, Chief, and thank you, Chief, for being here.

Um, one thing that I wanted to ask, Chief Chief Trendley and Chief Crawl, you guys can't answer this together because I don't know when it happened.

Um, the provider that we use to do, and I'll go quick because I know you guys want to speak.

The user that we have for our psychological tests changed.

When did that what year did that happen for recruits?

Yeah, we I believe it was just a year ago that happened because uh the psychologists we were using retired and no longer wanted to do it.

We had no one bid for it.

So we use the NTN platform now.

Okay.

Is that like a person or how how does that work?

How does the psychological test work for recruits to come in and be um going through a psychological exam?

Yeah, so it it involves and this is more of an HR question, but I can just tell you from past experience and how it works.

So it involves taking a written examination, um, and those are scored and looked at for a variety of different whether you want to call them red flags or inconsistencies, um, and then it does culminate with an in-person interview um that goes over those results and asks questions further just along, you know, trying to probe into your background, your mentality, or how you are seen or fit to be in the profession.

Okay, and um this was you said you went out for bid for that.

Uh HR went out for bid.

HR went okay.

So I'll I'll I'll get to HR and dig into that a little bit more, but I know we have been doing some work.

Um, Deputy Mayor Abby and I have been doing some work on finding some trainings with you guys so that we can get um some good training going on there.

One training that um kept sticking out to me that I did not see a module on was youth development.

Now, trust me, I'm a teacher, so I went through a whole gambit of youth development, like, and I know at the stages of life where their frontal lobe don't work.

And I honestly believe that because of the interactions of our officers with our youth, um, that should be something we could possibly look at putting a module in to even touch on.

I mean, it doesn't take you don't have to really go into depth to really understand the stages of life of of youth development and child development, um, because um that is something that I feel like is lacking in the modules.

I did not see it.

If I'm wrong, you tell me.

So I am told it is in one of the juvenile justice, but we've actually um before you came, we are looking at uh a whole uh 2027 in service training, and one of our courses is actually titled Child Development and Juvenile Crisis Response Training.

Um it integrates child development and adolescent behavior, youth crisis intervention and juvenile legal considerations in our in-service training company.

And I actually did that training before I actually did that training in an educational setting for younger teachers, so I know that it would be beneficial, and I actually was trained through Akron's Children's Hospital.

Um, and it actually is a and they may still have that program, and it was for the free for me.

Um, but I think that of course you can't train someone that has been taught that uh not to do that, but you can because at the end of the day, we don't go home with these people and they don't go home with us.

So we don't know what they do at home.

The issue that I'm having is because I actually live in that neighborhood where he said enjoy living in poverty.

Well, I live in my grandmother's house, and she's lived there, she lived there for 51 years, and then I've had it for eight years, and I just live around the corner, so I guess I'm enjoying poverty because I'll never leave that house.

So it bothered me, and it bothered me so much so because I walked a red and white too.

So I was glad to see that the officers were dealt with swiftly, um, but I'm still concerned that there's, and I said it in the news as well.

There's a system that is in place with the Brotherhood of Police where um and you know, I'm okay with taking blowback from from having these comments because at the end of the day, um I'm held to a standard in life.

We all are held to a standard in life, but when I go to God and meet my maker, and I don't want to preach right now, but when I meet my maker, I don't want to go up to him and say that I didn't take care of people.

That is what I need to do is take care of people, and I get frustrated because we constantly have this conversation of interactions when the basic thing is taking care of people, and police are headed to a different standard.

I really am for get frustrated because the interactions in impoverished neighborhoods are getting more frequently, and with us being on this dais and we speak out about it, we're targeted because we're taking care of people, but we're actually talking to the staff to talk take care of people.

Um it's frustrating to me because we're here again, um, and I and you know, I respect both of you guys.

You guys are uh good people with me, but at the end of the day, everybody knows wrong, and and I want the good officers to who take care of community to actually be able to do it, and they're not gonna be able to do it if we constantly have these interactions.

So I have been working with you guys uh uh and deputy mayor Arnold behind the scenes to get this done, but it's gonna take a lot of time and effort to get this done.

But what do we do in the meantime?

So we've been working on this and constantly having conversations about this, and I am committed to tearing down a system at a time.

And if it's teaching youth development with our new officers or teaching um the interact, how to interact customer service skills are easy, you learn that.

I learned that working at KFC.

So I'm gonna stop talking and I'm gonna let the community talk, but I want the community to know that we have been working, but there has been systems in place for decades, far beyond my centuries, that we are trying to break down here, and it's gonna take some time.

So I thank you for being here today.

Apologies, but I was taking care of kids today, so you guys um would love to hear some feedback from the community.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, councilwoman Kramer.

Thank you, Chair.

I will be very brief.

Um I was here in April um listening to our community have a conversation, and I am very saddened that I have to be here again for this conversation, but I thank you all for being here today.

Um we've talked a lot about training and the training that goes into um the day-to-day of our officers, but I know it is a very rigorous um standards to get into our academy, and I know you talked about the psychological evaluation.

Um, you know, I agree with my colleagues when they talked about, you know, people are coming from households that we don't know what they've learned since they were little kids and when they go home.

So what how do we um what do we do to um check and see how they are before they actually get into the academy?

I know we have a lot of physical tests, and I know you talked about the psychological, but if we could catch that before they get into the academy, to me, you know, we could avoid having a lot of these issues.

So it it is quite the process actually to be hired as a police officer.

And one of the things, you know, those are steps, physical fitness obviously is one component or mental wellness and uh psychological profiles is another one.

We we spend an in-depth amount of time doing background investigations on uh potential officers, and and that runs the gamut between um not just criminal history checks, but um, where we look at they have to provide references and we talk to all the references, but we also go out into their neighborhood that they live, and we talk to neighbors, we talk to all their previous jobs, and we try to do our best to try to get information on somebody um so that we capture those red flags early on um and don't hire and there's been people that surprisingly some people will step up and go hey I don't I don't think that's gonna be a good police officer um I question some of their um some of their thoughts or some of their motivations and stuff like that and generally we try to skip over those um but even then that becomes a tough process on the motivation of the person doing it because sometimes it could be a former uh girlfriend boyfriend spaws stuff like that so there is a lot that goes into trying to hire somebody um unfortunately there is no there is no way to completely look into somebody's background or to somebody's mind to say what they do think don't think how they will perform how they won't perform um and that's kind of where the training comes into play and we watch them and our officers go through a lot of different scenarios through the academy through the FTO program through all those kinds of things where we're constantly watching and evaluating how they act and we do terminate a lot of people from our FTO program and we do wash out a lot of people from our academy based on a lot of different reasons it's just very hard because most people are not going to come forward even like employments they don't want to answer questions because they don't want to get sued so it does become difficult to get a clear picture of everybody that is coming into your police department okay thank you all right at this time if you have um something as far as the community we want to provide you the time there will be three minutes for everyone that wants to come speak I'm gonna go right down the list and this is your opportunity to come and speak um concerning um any of these issues that you may have everyone is gonna have three minutes to speak I'm gonna start if you need to sign a list please let Andrea know so we can get you signed if you want to be called upon to be a part of this conversation.

Thank you again I had this meeting especially at five o'clock today so that those that are working could get off work and get here because a lot of times three and four o'clock does not provide working people the opportunity to come so this is why this meeting was at five o'clock today so those in the community could get off work and then come to be a part of this conversation.

All right number our first person up is I believe this is Joyce Singer.

Thank you for being here.

Do I need to state anything okay there it is.

I thank you for the opportunity to speak my name is Joyce Singer stated.

I am the um chairperson and founder of Glenwood Park Neighborhood Coalition that rests in the O West End community and so um we're very interactive with our youth I wanted to just I thought it was important to come and just to make a statement um about the incidents that happened with the police officers I'm encouraged to see that you guys take this very seriously and that the chief of police also is handling it in appropriate manner.

I just wrote something out that I wanted to share um briefly the latest um encounters between TPD and our youth particularly our back youth is both disturbing and heartbreaking it is without a doubt a misuse of authority and a misrepresentation of positive engagement that we expect our officers to display I know it can be challenging dealing with our youth today I I get that our youth are different but and I am sure these types of incidents that the officers encounter daily can be very stressful and demanding.

However, they are supposed to be trained to know how to de-escalate and not escalate the given situation.

This type of behavior from our law enforcement is unacceptable and cannot be tolerated.

As the gatekeepers of our city, and all of us are the gatekeepers.

It does take a village.

It's not just on the police to handle this.

It's on all of us within our city to ensure that every citizen is being treated with the utmost respect and the and the burden of correction and expectation rests on all of us, but especially on the city government and the chief of police to ensure that such behavior will not be tolerated.

And if it does happen, swift and appropriate discipline with sensitivity training will follow.

And that's what uh Chief Crawl said today that they are they are doing.

I want to propose that the youth and police interaction should be taught in our schools.

I think that there should be some type of program where the police officers are going to the schools and they're interacting with the youth with a training, both sides, and and the parents to be involved, because it's a it's part of the parents' responsibility as well, right, to teach the children, as um councilwoman McPherson said that she was taught by her parents to be respectful.

So sometimes unfortunately, our children um get engaged with situations and it escalated because that's the behavior that they've been taught, right?

And so I'm thinking that if we could come together and come up with some type of program where we can, you know, engage and train, or not wanna say train, but engage the parents, the students, and the police officers, and on the school level, that might help.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ms.

Singer.

Thank you.

Richard uh Arnold, Mr.

Arnold.

Uh, thank you for the opportunity to speak.

Uh, used to be that our pre-screening for police candidates was done locally.

It was done by a uh local uh guy named uh Greg Ford Jacobs, a psychologist.

I knew him for years.

Uh well respected in the community, but he retired two years ago, and on June the 12th, 2024, you signed a contract with NTN.

I don't I don't know much about they were the only bidder, it's called National Testing Network, and they are now in charge of screening our police cadets.

So uh given what's going on in Toledo and across the country, can we evaluate their performance?

Can we look at how many people are they screening out?

Is it about the same as it was two years ago?

Is it more?

Is it less?

For what reason are they being screened out?

Is it a psychological problem?

Is it drug use?

Is it uh past criminal activity?

And can we use that information when we recruit new officers?

Because we do need the new recruits.

Uh, we're seeing retirements all over the country.

So can we take a look at this national testing network and see what kind of job they're doing and compare it to when our uh pre-screening was done locally.

And since I have that microphone, if anybody didn't see today's Detroit Free Press uh waste company service gets trashed, priority waste, which we've heard a lot about lately.

Uh they they had to fire their executive director across Michigan.

People are saying, get us out of this contract.

So, on behalf of the citizens of the city of Toledo, thank you for not signing a five-year contract with them.

Just that I would throw that in.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

Thank you, Mr.

Arnold.

Mr.

Harold Harris.

Good evening.

I'm gonna open the curtain up.

I'm gonna shine a light because I think that's exactly what we need.

Um, we have an issue with bad policing.

I've lived in the city all my life.

There's good officers out there.

I would say 90% of them are good.

But when you've got that 10% that's bad, it spoils it for everyone.

Officers wear that patch on their left shoulder, says Toledo Police.

When I served in the military, I wore a patch that said United States Air Force.

I represented this country, outside on duty, off-duty.

And I think it's despicable for an officer on TPD to do what these two officers did on the north End and on junction in the inner city in that neighborhood.

And the problem comes, as far as I'm concerned, since TPD is structured under a military structure.

The buck stops at the top, and that means your command and authority.

That means your safety director, ex-Chief Krawl, your chief of police, Trendle, your lieutenants, your sergeants.

They're supposed to lead these guys on the bottom.

These officers and these cruisers, the patrol officers, they're trained to follow commands.

They train to follow policy.

They're trained to take their orders from the top.

So when we got things going bad on the streets of Toledo, I'm looking at the top.

I'm looking at the guys in charge.

For years, for decades, this problem has gone on.

This is not just recent.

This is not just April and May of 2026.

This has gone on for years in this city.

From Chief Crawl to Chief Trendle and prior, these operate these officers have operated, not all of them, like I said, that 10%.

In my lifetime in this city, I know at least 300 officers.

Active, retired, lieutenants, detectives.

They all know me, Harold Harris.

And I've had good encounters, but there are the bad ones out there.

And my thing is, when you're talking about police in that inner city, and you're talking about the black community and the brown community, you have these bad officers acting out, police brutality, excessive force, officers that go into these communities, disrespectful to the citizens in this community, civil rights violations by these officers, using profanity and verbal abuse towards citizens of this community, racial profiling in our black and brown communities.

Police escalate.

They don't de-escalate when they make these stops.

And I'm talking about the bad officers.

Let's keep this separate.

We got good and we have bad.

We need change, and my look on it is we need a new safety director.

We need a new chief.

We need a new vision and a new mindset on police and in this city.

We've had these guys in office.

I respect Chief Krawl.

I don't really know Chief Trendle, but I've met Kraw quite a few times.

We had a lot of good conversations.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you, Mr.

Harris.

Mr.

Morris.

Good afternoon.

I'm back here again for the same thing.

What's happening in our community?

When does enough become enough?

Back in 2024, we had an incident where a white officer said to a black female at Deweyla Homes, shut the F up and take your fat wind shelf back in the apartment.

I had a conversation with Chief Kral about that.

And I said, the woman had a right to free speech.

His response to me was so did the officer.

But now he wants to penalize this officer for exercising his free speech.

I'm confused.

No officer on duty, in uniform, is limited in what they can say on duty.

I'm from a family of law enforcement officer.

I currently hold Ohio Peace Officers training certificate.

Been in law enforcement, public safety for a long time.

To watch that video was upsetting to me.

When does enough become enough?

And I do understand that I'm not here to relegate uh litigate the cases.

The mayor and the chief condemned the language, and an officer was reassigned.

Those are steps, but statements of disappointment or not reform.

And reassignment is not accountability.

Internal affairs reviewing itself is not enough to restore public trust.

I am here to ask when will the black community feel safe around white officers patrolling their neighborhoods.

I'm gonna make this real point and clear.

Black people are not liked.

We've never been liked.

It doesn't matter the initials at the beginning of our name or at the end of our name, what positions we hold where we live and where we work.

Law enforcement has never liked black people.

Growing up in Charleston, South Carolina, I remember reading a book.

And in the book, there was a photo of a family.

It was from 1934.

They're holding up a sign, and the sign said, Police, would you please stop killing us?

That is stay with me my entire life.

And I want to say to Chief Kroll and Director, I'm sorry, Chief Trento and Director Crawl.

Our freedoms don't end where your fairs begin.

Laurie Hammond.

Lori Hammond.

No, thank you.

Thank you, Miss Ms.

Hammond.

Georgia Daniel.

That said that right.

Good evening.

I like to start first by saying we may have 99 problems in Toledo, but stopping young black teenagers as they travel through their neighborhood is not one.

I like to say that there's an underlying pattern of racist and biased behavior in the Toledo Police Department.

And when you look at who leaves the Toledo police department, the buck stops with him.

And if he can't control his officers, if he can't provide the right type of training, he needs to go.

Now this is a teaching moment for everything because I know we have a limited amount of time.

But as it relates to black poverty, we have been an oppressed people since we have arrived in the United States of America.

When you look currently at where we are, and I'm gonna look at my page here, unemployment rate is twice as high for black people as it is for whites.

Our officers should be trained to realize that and to act accordingly.

There were a number of good suggestions uh given at the mic, but I didn't hear anything about really the young people.

So I would recommend that a survey be conducted among our young people and ask them, how do they feel?

Are they safe with the police?

Do the police provide care for them?

What would they like to see?

And I would encourage the council and whoever else is responsible to do that.

To do that.

We last time I came here in April, they were talking about a hot summer, and I told the chief, he's in control.

He's in control of whether we have a hot summer or not.

I believe in our children.

I believe that we can be accountable.

I believe that we as a black community, a white community, a yellow community, a brown community, we will fight for the welfare of our children.

At this point, I'm I'm ill.

I have been fighting for over 60 years for equal justice and rights.

And if I have to die fighting, I am prepared to do that for our children.

And I ask each of you to look in the mirror.

Are you prepared to fight for the future of our children?

Thank you very much.

Vanessa Lynn.

Vanessa Lynn.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Thank you for the opportunity to make a couple of comments.

They're not in any order.

I guess I was just chatting down notes.

Um I think we all have the capability of um masking.

So in training, you do what you do to get in.

Once you're in, then the true person comes out.

I look at this as a heart issue.

I don't know how you train a heart in this situation.

I don't know how you do that.

Maybe there's a way with some kind of training, but personally, I don't know how you train a heart.

Um it doesn't seem to be any love or compassion or empathy or anything of that sort that has happened in these last two uh incidents.

Um this may be harsh, um, but I the the officers that were involved, I don't think they should be suspended with or without pay.

I don't think that they should be on a leave of absence.

I personally think they should be fired.

Thank you.

Mr.

John Bibbish.

In as much as every comment has been on it on an important subject relating to community affairs, I know I'm gonna be the only person here that's gonna be speaking about the police station, so I would appreciate if I'd be given a little latitude.

I asked it on April 16th if there was a project plan for the establishment of the sub station on Savania Avenue.

Is there I understand there was a referral by counsel to the administration asking for it?

Has it been received?

It's a bank, that's where they're doing it.

So, is it is that a no?

Nobody knows.

I mean, that's a that's a hell of a note, if if they have if that has not yet been answered, but it does relate to the question that I'm having because so far we've heard talk, and we know that the movement of the station is at the zero percent of completion, and we know that there's no goal life date on it, but we also know is that on March 31st, council passed a budget where they specifically said they wanted $500,000 allocated for the opening of the station.

That's general fund money, and that means that if that doesn't get done by December 31st, the money's gone.

Okay, so timing is something of an issue with me, and the fact that there's no project plan indicates that it hasn't been given any priority, despite the fact the city council specifically said in effect to the administration, hey, we think this kind this is kind of important, we want you to do something.

Well, it appears that the administration doesn't agree.

I'm imploring City Council to put the boots to this to hold the administration accountable to get this project off the ground.

I would be very interested to find out if even a penny of the $500,000 that's been appropriated has been either committed or spent to date.

This is this is two months after the money's been appropriated.

What's going on?

Can anybody answer?

I mean, can anybody provide any answers to me on this?

Does it am I making sense?

Yes, I'm sorry, I thought I said all of that.

We have um chief gave the report.

They are in negotiations now.

They have picked the site.

We talked about the signs.

Yes, they've given us a rough estimate of the cost.

They've given us they're in the process.

Well, that's the first question I asked, Councilwoman.

Yes, we we have it, and we're on it.

And he even I asked where the building really was because I needed to know.

So I'm sorry, you were sitting there.

I thought, okay.

It's it's in the works.

They're signing the contract for the building.

We've made out what what renovations have to be done, technology, and all of that, and we're as councilman uh Sam Meldon well everybody didn't get that report so that was a request from councilman serant so he's gonna give you the report sir yes we're on target that's everything we cheat on over Mr.

sitting there with the bitch yes doesn't have any I appreciate this yes I that's why I said I said I wasn't gonna look at somebody that was in the audience but it was you that I was really talking to saying yes we got you wouldn't you find it uh that if this is so important they can't tell you when they're gonna go alive thank you councilman belden it's okay thank you I don't want to um we're over the three minutes that should have been a lot of there so I don't want to say anything I think councilwoman fearson covered it really well so I have nothing else to say Michelle Williams oh I'm so sure I'm ready testing you can hear me uh I am Lincoln School Coalition uh CEO president um our area in we're a part of Inglewood our area is from from um Lincoln down to Bancroft and between Detroit and the railroad tracks thank you Andrea for coming to our meetings Dr.

Jones she comes to our meeting and we're looking forward to having past the house at our meeting and we meet every second Monday of the month at Mount Branch Library so I'm inviting the police officer the incident that happened I live right around the corner from from those people and and if I would have been out they wouldn't have had an opportunity to say what they said to those teenagers because Inglewood and I have the plan the Inglewood community plan look it up the uh our Englewood has a high rate of educated people I am a retired educator highly qualified educator I have my master's in education I came back because this is my neighborhood and and that situation I want to build up my neighborhood this situation that happened around the corner with the kid with the girls is that they live with their uncle and they were taken away from their mom so he raised in the house full I think it's like five or six kids in the house if the police would just come down the street because they do not come down grand I guess they just come that dude sub and keep on going around to they reach Detroit but please come down the neighborhood stop I have a big side that the city of Toledo gave me my sign because they have fixed up my house and Eaglewood neighborhood revitalization area project and they are building up that area with home ownership of businesses and um uh programs for our youth so have them to ride down our streets stop and talk to our youth get to know our you get to know me because I will tell you about the neighborhood and I'm not going nowhere thank you.

NAACP president, Ms.

Darlene Sweeney Newburn.

Thank you for being here.

Well, thank you as well.

Good evening, Chairman Howes, Vice Chair Williams, and members of the public safety and criminal justice reform committee.

You won't pull your micro.

Can you be okay?

Pull your mic down.

You can hear me okay now?

Most people can hear me whether I'm close to a mic or not.

I am here on behalf of the NAACP.

As you know, we have been actually quite vocal about the officers, their conduct, and the treatment that we have observed of the black community, in particular our teenagers.

I am happy to hear that there will be some sort of conclusion in the next week, because that was one of the NAACP concerns as to when we're going to get feedback and what's going to happen in this particular situation.

So we are going to be actually looking forward to hearing what's going to go on next week.

The NAACP.

As this committee discusses crisis response in a multi-district substation initiative at the Toledo Police Department Standard Operating Guidelines, we must also address a larger issue.

And that issue is the culture of the department itself.

It must be addressed because it is true that training alone is not going to cut it.

It's not going to do it.

Policies and procedures are only as effective as the culture that enforces them.

Recent incidents involving community interaction have raised legitimate concerns about whether respect, de-escalation, and impartial policy are consistently reflected throughout the organization.

We know that it dates back a long time ago, probably before some of you were born.

But it is still present.

When similar complaints come to the surface, the public naturally begins to question whether these are isolated events or indicators of deeper systemic problem.

We know that these, this is a deeper systemic problem, so it's going to need a deeper systemic answer.

Building additional substation, that's fine, but it will not by itself build public trust.

Trust is earned through accountability, transparency, and a commitment to training treating every resident with dignity and fairness.

The NACP encouraged this committee to view the review of standard operating guidelines, not simply as an administrative exercise, but as an opportunity to evaluate whether the department's internal cultural alliance with the value of constitutional policing and community partnership.

Thank you, Miss Sweeney.

That's a three minutes.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Thank you so much.

Reverend John Jones of.

Wait a minute.

Yes, Reverend John Jones of Hope Tolegal.

To uh Chairman Hobbes, to Vice Chair Williams, to each of these council members who are here today.

Um I really did not want to stand up today and talk.

Been trying to be quiet for a little while related to this.

But the latest incident which took place on the Fitchland and Detroit neighborhood is my neighborhood.

1960s, my grandmother started a Toledo Christian training center, about a half a mile from where the interaction with the officers took place in 1972.

Our church was formed at that same corner of Fernwood in Detroit.

So for me, this now becomes personal.

It was personal before because I love my children.

But it really became personal when an officer can say what they said, and it's not worthy of repeating, but we can when they can say what they said about our neighborhood.

It's a struggle.

Numerous men and women have done phenomenal work in this neighborhood.

John McKissick pastored at St.

Paul Baptist Church.

IJ Johnson pastored across the street of Fernwood and Detroit.

Dr.

Samantha Adams and her family had a church right in that same neighborhood up and around Grant, where Robinson school currently sits.

The legends of the Negro Leagues literally played ball at Swain Field.

I could talk about a whole lot more, but the greatness of the neighborhood was intentionally vilified by these officers.

Maybe they didn't know who these people were, but they intentionally vilified the neighborhood.

And it is that that is offensive.

Harmful, and based on their intention, it is borderline unforgivable.

I can't mess up with God, so I still got to be able to forgive.

What can we learn?

The officers did this intentionally, and it revealed, as my sister said, it revealed their heart.

It revealed more than what they think, but it revealed what they feel.

What can we learn?

We can learn that our children were the excellent ones in this instance.

One young lady actually said they're doing this because we black.

And the response was, no, no, no, that's not it by the young man.

What can we learn?

For as much as training is discussed, it reveals that the system is broke.

And it finally reveals in my last 10 seconds that we have a problem of leadership.

Not just the police chief, not just the safety director, but it goes all the way to the top.

And I'm not talking about anybody, but we have to ensure that leadership takes the right steps as we move forward to hopefully begin a better day in our community.

Thank you.

Uh Mr.

John Dorn.

Chairman, uh, uh Vice Chair, Council members, it's uh a great honor and pleasure to speak before you, Chief.

Um I was here back in April and I spoke about the incident involving the 15-year-old girl, and at that time I made known that I live in a different neighborhood, but now we're talking about my particular neighborhood.

And by the way, I have family and friends that live in that neighborhood.

They have homes there, they have businesses there, and my grandmother, my aunts, uncles, everywhere, I have people in those neighborhoods, okay, of all different um races and ethnicities and so forth.

Okay, so it affects everyone.

Um, I've heard talk today about the officer that was involved in the latest incident being reassigned.

Why?

He needs to be reassigned to the unemployed list.

Okay.

We have the the chief is aware of this, but besides uh just the uh policies and so forth, the Ohio has the uh police officers' uh training uh standards, Ohio Peace Officer Training Commission standards, okay.

Those standards before these uh officers even uh graduate or go to their academies, they have to be uh comply with these standards.

Jumping out of on marked uh gang task force or special operation vehicles is not in compliance with these uh standards.

I heard a lot of talk about the uh despicable comments that those officers made in reference to that neighborhood, but uh, Councilman Hobbes.

Uh, there's a greater issue here that these officers were in an unmarked vehicle.

Ohio law provides that those unmarked vehicles must be uh distinctly marked and have in on the top of visible lights and so forth.

They're not for hunting down uh children and teenagers in neighborhoods, they're for enforcement on uh ATF and special warrants and other things like that.

In regard to the station in West Toledo, I live in West Toledo.

Just a couple of nights ago, there were 10 or 14 on marked police officers on my street alone, all the way backed up on this street.

This is not an isolated incident that these occurrences are going on, it happens all the time.

I have videos, I have pictures and stuff.

It's not a one off, it's the training.

You have a training officer coming to work, uh slipping out the back door because he's under the influence.

That was a training officer.

Okay, we don't need more training like that.

They're not following the training, they should be disciplined and fired.

Thank you, Mr.

Paul.

Pastor Troy Brown.

Newly uh elected pastor of Third Baptist Church, Swanton, Ohio.

Good afternoon.

I am from Toledo, Ohio, born and raised there, now reside in Perrysburg, but my heart never leaves Toledo.

I work, live, worship, volunteer in the central city often.

I'm a quiet person by nature, and I too grew up on 1616 North Detroit Avenue, where the late George Brown and Rosie Brown, who recently passed two weeks ago, of 102 years old, resided at 1616 North Detroit.

They were the sole proprietors of Zanzibar, downtown where the Mudhead Stadium is located.

They were also the sole proprietors of the Yankee Inn on Detroit and Oakwood.

Wife and five kids, three daughters, two boys, one girl is adopted.

Two of my girls are 15 years old as of right now.

We are now the adults in the room, what are we gonna do?

And if I had to channel some of my ancestors who were not educated for 400 and some odd years, what is we're gonna do?

Every morning I have to get up and tell my children because of the hue, H U E of their skin.

You is smart, you is kind, you is pretty, you can do all things.

When is it gonna be enough for us to teach our kids to be respectable to adults when the adults refuse to respect them?

I don't have much time.

I didn't plan on saying anything, but in the time that I have left, I want to remind us of the humanity that we all share.

We are now the adults in the room.

And at my grandmother's funeral, the pastor got up and said and looked in the casket.

I said, Mother Brown, take your rest and poured to my mother and said, We have a new Mother Brown.

But the new Mother Brown is my mother, and she is 76 years old.

Catherine Conley Brown.

She's been on the battlefield for a long time too, growing up on Norwood Avenue.

But we are now Toledo, the adults in the room.

We got one chance to get this right.

One chance.

We better not mess it up.

Look at our collective humanity and do the right thing for the right reasons at the right time.

Please, our children and grandchildren now are watching.

I yield.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Don, I think it's Don Lynn.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you guys for still sitting here.

Y'all catching it.

Hearing the words.

But what I what I wanted to do, when they had the people up here, the officers, I only had two questions.

One, first, do you guys know about the code of conduct that the police have?

Anyone don't know about it?

Raise your hand.

The code of conduct that the policeman have done maybe some tens some years ago.

Okay, so there is a code of conduct.

And then my question is I was gonna ask the officer at the chief, do they use that code of conduct when they're doing their training?

Do they make them aware that they have this code of conduct with the city?

I wanted to ask that question.

So if you get a chance and you're discussing this, find out about the code of conduct that's been around for some time and see if that's involved in their training, and then discuss does code of the code of conduct make any difference because if it does, Talio has one.

Thank you.

I think this is Manita Mongo.

Did I say that correct?

I'm sorry if I did.

I'm sorry.

Hi, thank you for this opportunity.

Um a lot of wonderful things have been said, so I'm not going to rehash that, but I do want to say my first um interaction with the former chief of police was at an NAACP meeting when he was talking about, we were discussing about the officer calling a black woman wench, and I've tried to give better words because he didn't know that was not a good word to be using to the black woman.

And I was quickly dismissed, quickly overspoken and told, well, I didn't know what that word was, and so I didn't see the problem.

So to come here and see that he is still involved, and I'm gonna let that I'll let you finish how you want to finish.

Um we sat here for approximately 30 minutes and listened to a wonderful model, financial resources and human resources have been expended to create what is what will be some behavioral health modification in policing, correct?

We do know across this country there has been wonderful models of community policing, right?

What resources will be expended to do that?

Because clearly we have a community community policing issue, right?

So I encourage, and I mean, just like our our the national um stage is set, we do everything around the problems that need to be fixed but fix the problem.

Historically, we know why police were created, right?

Do I need to do a history lesson?

I'm pretty good at it.

If not, you can Google it.

We are still here in 2026, having the same types of discussions that my ancestors, your ancestors had.

We will do everything to go around the issue of race and racism, but not weed out racism.

It's going to take proximity, right?

So making that officer go into the pol going to the schools in which he is policing or she is policing, right?

We need to do things better because like the wisdom of McPherson, you cannot train or untrain racism.

You just can't, right?

We learned how to respect people, right?

Second point, if you don't see our children as children, my daughter is 5'11.

I'm not 5'11.

My daughter is 17.

People have been confusing her as my sister for years.

All right.

If you don't understand that these are children, you understand and see that they are human, so treat them as such.

That's the basic, right?

Basic understanding, respectability, and human.

If you don't see our kids as kids, see them as humans and start there.

And then when you find out that frontal lobe isn't working, because it probably isn't, then you deal from that point.

All right.

That's all.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Richard Torres.

Good evening.

I didn't come here with a speech.

I didn't even come here today to speak, but my heart compelled me to speak today.

And I'm tired of what's going on with the black and brown community.

Let's call it what it is, it's racism.

And it starts at the top.

And if we can't get the chief of police to correct these things, and I know about the code of conduct, I've been around when that is signed.

Another thing is uh you're these are children you're dealing with, and there's no excuse for the way they're treating these children, the black and brown children, and they should be fired, and these children deserve an apology from these police officers, and I have a hard time getting that out calling them police officers.

It's a time for a change.

If they're not gonna change what they're doing, then it's time to change it, the chief of police, Dr.

Hope Bland.

Hello, everyone.

Can you guys hear me okay?

Okay.

Um thank you for this opportunity to all of you.

Um, I just wanted to share or talk a little bit about the elephant in the room today.

I want to thank you also for what you shared, Ditto to that, because it really is about the heart.

Um, but what I also want to talk about as far as the elephant in the room is that our chief talked about the fact that after the investigation, he was going to review the case, and honestly, I think that we need um an independent reviewer because I think he's too close to it.

I also think that he has bias, um, natural bias because he is too close to it, and also in the first incident, um, I believe that he didn't react soon enough.

I believe that his responses were um in the sense that he felt in some way he didn't share this, but it seemed to come about as we talked about it, that um the incident again needed to be reviewed.

The officer was still um in the same neighborhood, and so when we think about just going back and reflecting on that, it really makes me think he really should not be involved in making the final decision, and this is not to be harsh on him.

This is just when we think about when we think about how the leader is just too close.

There is natural bias there, and so we we should, we should consider the fact that there should be an independent reviewer for that case.

I also want to share that as a community, we have rights.

So if we were to see, and I want to go back to the first incident.

If we were to see a child slammed to the ground and tied by their parent, who would we call?

Thank you.

Our is our law enforcement above the law.

So if we were to have seen another adult do that to another child, this community has a right to call child protective services on that individual, whether they're the law enforcement or not, and I think that's important because we don't consciously think about that.

We look at them as protectors, we look at them as people who are in authority, and sometimes we're very intimidated by them, but it doesn't mean that we cannot call another agency or system when they are doing something wrong, and I think we need to understand that.

Okay, and I want to make that very clear, and we can still do that if we feel that that child was that violated.

We know the names.

We know who he is.

We know who she is.

And it doesn't mean that he can't be investigated.

And I think that needs to be said as well.

Thank you, Dr.

Hole.

Thank you, Dr.

Blaine.

I want to again thank our community for being here tonight.

I want to say, Mr.

Bibish, I'm sorry that you did not, I don't know where there was a disconnect, but we did spend all of that time talking about all the questions that you were asked asking, and I don't know where the disconnect was, but I do hope those questions have been answered.

We have one more person, Mr.

Earl Mack, and then after Earl, after Mr.

Earl Mack has come, then that will be this meeting for tonight.

Thank you for being here, Mr.

Mr.

Mack.

Well, thank you for having me, for sure.

And I know there's a lot of folks probably gonna raise your eyebrows, but you know what I'm most concerned with in this city.

Uh I live around a corner from uh off of uh uh Hill Avenue in Reynolds.

Not too long ago, a young lady was shot and killed in a bar there.

Uh responded after hearing those shots, and watch that.

I have responded to several shootings involving black on black crime in this city where they're shooting each other.

I have responded with Chief Crawl before when we had we had an officer shooting, uh, and our community was in an uproar because they didn't understand what had happened.

There's a lot of problems that we have in our community.

I like to see resolved.

We Buffalo Soldiers, we do a lot of things with our schools and we talk to those little kids.

How many of you have ever heard gunshots almost the whole hands in the room raised?

How many of you have seen someone shot?

A few hands raised, and what do you do in that?

This officer, that the latest one that was involved in this ten years go using the profanities and all.

I met with Chief uh Truny.

I believe what he's gonna do is uh is going to set that straight sooner or later here, but the more concerned with the violence black on black balance in this city that seems like nobody has these kind of meetings to you know to deal with that.

But when a police officer appears to uh do something wrong with one of our folks, we all come together and and and we f we fight against that.

Uh again, there's there's policies.

When the chief and I talked this morning, there's policies to follow.

If if if a police officer's heart is not in it, then you follow the policy.

The policy means if you don't find his policy, you can be fired.

And that's and that's what I always see done.

You know, uh, he's got to deal with unions on this, he's got to do all kinds of things, as you know.

Um, but when we're also doing what they do, when I see Ms.

Officer cursing it as a one, he's not a person that needs to be in our community, but we need to give those the the those command officers time to deal with things like that because you don't know how hard it is.

I've been I was once a homeland security deputy director over law enforcement in this state, and we know what happens when chiefs have to get involved with misconduct of those officers and the hardship that they have going through the unions and everybody else.

I'm all concerned because that's gonna be handled, I guarantee you that I'm more concerned with black on black crime in the city and how we're dealing with it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chief Crawl, thank you, Chief Trinley, thank you to every council member that came tonight.

I really appreciate you all being here for this meeting.

If that be all, this meeting is adjourned.