Brooklyn Residents Suggest Ways To Improve Police-Community Relations At Public Meeting
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A town hall-style meeting was held Sunday afternoon at Brooklyn Borough Hall to address steps needed to take to improve relations between police and the community.
As 1010 WINS' Roger Stern reported, the public spoke for two hours, asking for economic opportunities, recreational programs for youths and respectful treatment from all officers.
Brooklyn Residents Suggest Ways To Improve Police-Community Relations At Public Meeting
"Most people from the black community don't hate police," said one attendee. "But what we do hate is police brutality."
"We require a equality of man and woman that is above reproach," said another attendee.
There were also straw votes in which the public called for more police foot patrols, residency requirements for future officers and random psychological testing of officers, Stern reported.
"We don't know what your wife said to you the morning before, what the sergeant said to you at the line up, and then that comes out and you run into somebody who's acting ignorant on the street and we got two people crashing against one another," said Henry Muhammad.
Jose Richards said he expects a cop to talk to him with respect.
"When I address him, it's as an officer. I've never had a police officer address me as sir," he said.
The meeting was arranged by Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams and prominent civil rights attorney Norman Siegel.
"There are good people on both sides of the issue and I want them to have a dialogue," Adams said.
The borough president added that he plans to invite police officers to join the discussion at future meetings.
The first of several meetings comes in the wake of protests over the Eric Garner grand jury case on Staten Island and the fatal shooting of two on-duty NYPD officers in Brooklyn.
