TOWN REVAMPS POLICE ADVISORY BOARD
ST. ALBANS TOWN: At its meeting on Monday, December 7th, the Selectboard for the Town of St. Albans reorganized its Policy Advisory Committee. The newly reorganized Town Committee will be a tool in the Town’s effort to provide residents and the community with the fairest, most unbiased, evidence-based, and 21st centric form of policing possible. The Committee will have seven (7) members all of whom will be appointed by the Selectboard for one- or two-year terms. Those members will include: two town residents at-large, a third town resident with law enforcement experience but not affiliated with a previously or currently contracted law enforcement agency, two members from area non-profits including one specializing in addiction treatment, one town located business owner, and one representative from the St. Albans Town Volunteer Fire Department.
“The Selectboard felt that we needed to do more to increase civilian oversight and transparency in how our community is policed, reorganizing the Police Advisory Committee and making that their primary objective will help us do just that.” stated Selectboard Chair Brendan Deso, “We feel very confident that the St. Albans Police Department will help us in getting the committee up to speed with their efforts and share the needed data with the committee, and we know that Sheriff Langevin and his team will be dedicated and committed to working with the committee when our contract takes effect on July 1, 2021.”
Purpose
The Town of St. Albans is committed to the pillars of a free, democratic, self-governing society. Requiring at its most fundamental level the right for citizens to participate in their governance and to hold public entities accountable. To those ends, fostering community involvement in the administration of policing services within our community is critical. Historically, the Town has had a Police Advisory Committee in place and the duties of the Committee have varied to meet the needs of the Town at the time. Members have been appointed by the Selectboard, and have previously been assigned tasks related to public safety and policing services to complete as a working group. The Committee has not met regularly and has not played an integral role in the administration of policing services in recent memory. The Selectboard believes a change of policy and practice is required to improve citizen participation and oversight of how our community is policed. With added structure, a clearer vision and scope of work, the Police Advisory Committee will be a tool in the Town’s effort to provide residents, guests, and business owners with the fairest, most unbiased, evidence-based, and 21st century-centric form of policing possible.
Expectations
The Police Advisory Committee (The Committee) is expected to meet monthly. The Selectboard and the Committee will hold joint meetings no less than annually to review task statuses and other information. The Committee’s primary objective will be to monitor and enforce all provisions of any police and/or law enforcement contract in place between the Town and its contracted police/law enforcement counterparty. The Committee is expected to review data contractually required to be provided to the Town by its chosen policing services administrator/law enforcement agency at each regularly scheduled monthly meeting. The Committee will work with our contracted law enforcement agency to implement unbiased, evidence-based, and community-minded policing services. The Committee will work to engage area residents, local non-profits, business owners and other property owners within the Town (landlords, second-home owners) and develop a methodology to proactively seek input from community members on policing practices within the Town no less than twice annually. The Committee will analyze the contractually required data, feedback from our aforementioned area partners/stakeholders, and as a result may provide recommendations directly to the Selectboard and our chosen law enforcement partner. The Committee shall have no policy-making authority, however, the Selectboard will act on any recommendations formally received from the Committee within 30 calendar days.
Membership
The seven (7) members of the Police Advisory Committee will be appointed in December of each year for terms of 1 and 2 years and will be categorized as follows:
- Two Town Residents At Large (Two Year Terms)
- Town Resident with Law Enforcement Experience/Extensive Professional Background in Public Safety (Two Year Term) Resident may not be currently or previously affiliated with the law enforcement agency contracted with the Town to administer policing services.
- Representative of Area Non-Profit (One Year Term)
- Representative of Area Non-Profit Specializing in Addiction Treatment (Two Year Term)
- One Business Owner (One Year Term) -Business must be located within the Town, but owner may be resident of another community.
- One Representative of the St. Albans Town Volunteer Fire Department (One Year)
The Town of St. Albans not only values diversity, it celebrates it. We strongly encourage women, people of color, LGBTQIA individuals, people with disabilities, members of ethnic minorities, foreign-born residents, and veterans to apply to serve on the Police Advisory Committee.
Committee Member Stipends
Police Advisory Committee members will be compensated $25.00 per each meeting attended. This is a standard rate and is meant to match the Planning Commission and Development Review Board stipends.
To achieve the formation and success of the newly reorganized Police Advisory Committee, the Selectboard supports and approves the following process to be administered by the Town Manager & Selectboard:
- All Police Advisory Committee appointments to be immediately vacated by the action of the Selectboard.
- The Town is to immediately begin a recruitment effort for new Police Advisory Committee members.
- When a quorum of the Committee has been appointed by the Selectboard, the Committee will set its first meeting. It will not organize (elect a Chair & Vice-Chair) until all Committee appointments have been made. Each appointment will expire on the 1st of December in 2021 or 2022, whichever the term dictates.
- The Committee will meet with the St. Albans Police Department to review data as it sees fit, and will spend approximately 1-3 meetings researching where the Town currently is in its effort to provide the fairest, most unbiased, evidence-based and 21st century-centric form of policing possible
- When the Committee feels it has effectively researched current conditions, it will begin to meet with command staff from the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office. The Committee and the FCSO will begin to formalize their partnership before the Town’s contract with the FCSO takes effect (7/1/21).
- The Committee will then function within its Selectboard approved policy. The Town Manager or any staff member appointed by the Manager to staff the Committee will ensure that the Committee is meeting its expectations as defined above.
The Committee will begin meeting in January 2021 and will meet monthly, if you are or know anyone interested in serving on the committee please submit a Letter of Intent and resume to Jennifer Gray at [email protected].
