Three forces present obstacles to creating the kind of oversight system promised by the Austin Police Oversight Act; one is located at City Hall, one at the Texas Capitol, and another at the courthouse.
Until the needle moves, the office is reduced to little more than a receptacle for complaints against officers where rigorous follow-up – the heart of effective civilian oversight – is all but impossible.
The legislative threat, though, is officially dead . A bill we've written about before – Senate Bill 2209 – failed to get a vote in the Texas House before the midnight, May 24, deadline for the lower chamber to approve Senate bills. If SB 2209 had become law, it would have killed any form of true civilian oversight of police departments throughout Texas, including the kind Austin voters endorsed May 6.
What about the OPO director? The fundamentals of their job revolve around how the ordinance is implemented. But leadership in the office has been a revolving door as of late. Deven Desai, who was the city's Labor Relations Officer before taking a human resources job at the University of California, Santa Cruz, last summer, was brought back to Austin to serve as interim OPO director.
Council Members have thus far shown little fortitude in standing up to the interim city manager, who has moved swiftly to make aggressive and sweeping changes to the city's bureaucracy. A city spokesperson said on May 18 that Garza does not intend to clarify how APOA changes OPO operations; in a follow up statement, May 24, the spokesperson said the APOA is"in effect" and that the city is"working to implement those portions that can be done without a contract.
We must circle back to Garza, because OPO staff are directly subordinate to him. Two memos Garza issued in March and April outlining OPO authority show he has a much more conservative view of OPO's powers than Council and Austin voters. The first memo, a brisk two-pager issued March 30, was so badly received that less than three weeks later Garza issued another on April 18, clarifying his stance.
Bear in mind,"unfettered access" to records by OPO does not mean unlimited right to publish those records for public consumption. That's an entirely different area of authority, which Ch. 143 is clear on; OPO would not be able to publish most internal records . Creating rules to allow publication would have to be negotiated in a meet and confer agreement.
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