Increasing Trust Between Communities and Law Enforcement: Combating Racial Profiling

Contributed By:   The White House

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At a Department of Justice conference, President Clinton chaired a roundtable discussion with leaders from civil rights and law enforcement organizations on ways to build trust between police and the communities they serve. To address the issue of racial profiling, the President directed federal law enforcement agencies to begin collecting and reporting data on the race, ethnicity, and gender of the individuals they stop and search. The President also called on Congress to pass legislation to promote data collection and reporting by state and local law enforcement agencies.

Getting the Facts on Racial Profiling

Leading by example. No person should be targeted by law enforcement because of the color of his or her skin. Stopping or searching individuals on the basis of race is not consistent with our commitment to equal justice under law and is not effective law enforcement policy. Racial profiling is simply wrong. As a necessary step to combat this problem, we need to learn the hard facts about when and where it occurs. That is why the President has directed the Departments of Justice, Treasury, and the Interior to:

    1. begin collecting data on the race, ethnicity, and gender of individuals subject to traffic and pedestrian stops, inspections at entries into the U.S., and certain other searches by federal law enforcement agencies, including the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Drug Enforcement Agency, Customs Service, and National Park Service; and
    2.  

      3. after one year, report on the findings of the new data collection system and make additional recommendations based on those findings on how to ensure greater fairness in federal law enforcement’s procedures.

Helping states and localities. The President also is supporting legislation introduced by Representative John Conyers (D-MI) to establish a new federal grant program to assist state and local law enforcement agencies to implement similar data collection systems. This legislation also will authorize the Attorney General to develop a nationwide sample and issue a report on the number and nature of traffic stops conducted by state and local enforcement throughout the country.

Surveying the American public. As recently announced by the Attorney General, the Justice Department this year will amend its National Crime Victimization Survey and begin asking Americans about their experiences with traffic stops, police use of force, and police misconduct. This new information will help measure our success in building trust and improving relations between law enforcement and this community.

  

More Progressive Policing for

the 21st Century

Continuing the community policing revolution. To make our communities safer and stronger, we must enhance our commitment to community policing. The 21st Century Policing Initiative contained in the President’s crime bill extends his successful community policing initiative and contains several measures to help strengthen the integrity and ethics of police forces across the country. Specifically, his crime bill includes: (1) $20 million to expand police integrity and ethics training; (2) $20 million for police scholarships to promote the best educated police force possible; (3) $2 million for improved minority recruitment to help make sure police departments reflect the diversity of the communities they represent; (4) $10 million to help police departments purchase more video cameras to protect both the safety of officers and the rights of the individuals they stop; and (5) $5 million to establish citizen police academies to engage community residents in the fight against crime.

Roundtable Participants – Attorney General Janet Reno, Deputy Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., Associate Attorney General Raymond C. Fisher, Acting Assistant Attorney General Bill Lann Lee - Civil Rights Division, Secretary Rodney Slater- Department of Transportation, Ronald Daniels – Center for Constitutional Rights, Ronald Daniels – Center for Constitutional Rights, Paul Evans – Boston Police Department, Gilbert Gallegos – Fraternal Order of Police, Richard Green – Crown Heights Youth Center, Penny Harrington – National Center for Women in Policing, Wade Henderson – Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, Antonia Hernandez – Mexican American Legal Defense & Educational Fund, John Justice – National District Attorneys Association , Representative Sheila Jackson Lee – 18th District Texas, Ken Lyons – International Brotherhood of Police Officers, Kweisi Mfume – NAACP, Karen Narasaki – Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium, Ron Neubauer – International Association of Chiefs of Police, Professor Charles Ogletree – Harvard Law School, Hugh Price – National Urban League, Robert Scully – National Association of Police Organization, Rev. Al Sharpton – National Action Network, Chuck Sha-King - Youth Force, Dan Smith – National Sheriffs Association, Robert Stewart – National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives, Christopher Stone – Vera Institute of Justice, Beverly Watts-Davis – San Antonio Fighting Back, Mayor Anthony Williams – District of Columbia, Raul Yzaguirre – National Council of La Raza ¨ (Submitted by The White House)