WCPR is a group endeavoring to help build safe communities, improve community-police relations, & improve police accountability & transparency.
The Westchester Coalition for Police Reform (WCPR) is a group of concerned community organizations, religious institutions and individuals who share a vision to help build safe communities, with improved community-police relations and greater police accountability and transparency.
The catalyst for creating WCPR was the police-involved killing of Kenneth Chamberlain, Sr. in 2011 in his public housing apartment in White Plains. We pledged to support the family in their search for justice, as well as victims in similar Westchester area cases.
From the outset WCPR committed for the long term to advocate for structural changes that could help prevent police violence and ensure justice when it occurred. We have rallied, testified at government hearings, and met with public officials. We have worked with county legislators to reinstate the use of mental health units for crisis situations; State Senators to establish a Special Prosecutor office mandated to investigate and, where appropriate, prosecute cases of police-involved deaths or serious injury; and police chiefs and commissioners to explore departments’ use of body cameras.
Now WCPR seeks support for oversight at the municipal level. At a recent White Plains Common Council meeting we requested information regarding the Public Safety Commissioner's current civilian advisory group.
WCPR's March forum on police body worn cameras was attended by over 70 community members and nine police departments.
NYU School of Law's Policing Project reached out to us to say that our White Plains forum was one of the best examples of community law enforcement partnerships that they had come across in their national research.
Westchester Objectives:
•Establish independent oversight structures with subpoena power in order to review the policies and practices of law enforcement agencies, investigate cases of police misconduct, and impose sanctions.
•Implement clear and current protocols within all police departments addressing the use of force continuum, as well as proper handling of emotionally troubled individuals, with an emphasis on deescalating confrontations without resorting to violence.
•Make the rules and regulations of all police agencies available to the public.
•Review and reform the training program of the Westchester Police Academy, with particular focus on proper means to deescalate situations through non-violent methods.
•Centralize in-service police training to encourage sharing of best practices and reduce financial costs.
•Expand the use of Crisis Intervention Teams throughout Westchester.
•Increase police department efforts to recruit from a diverse applicant pool, so that the departments more accurately reflect the communities they serve.
•Reassess police department promotion policies in order to advance more African-American and Latino officers into positions of leadership.
New York State Objectives
•Establish a special prosecutor to investigate and discipline police misconduct.
•Create an independent entity to review the policies and practices of law enforcement agencies throughout the state and propose necessary reforms.
•Require that all police interrogations be recorded.
•Prohibit custodial arrests for violations-arrests where an officer has discretion to issue a summons or arrest an individual.
•Close the loophole that treats possession of small amounts of marijuana differently depending on whether or not it is in public view-a citation versus a misdemeanor.
