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March 21, 2003
Hearing on Civil Rights Issues Affecting DC's Latino Communities
Charles H. Ramsey
Chief of Police
Metropolitan Police Department
Chief Charles H. Ramsey delivered the following statement to the United States Commission on Civil Rights on March 21, 2003.
Members of the Commission, staff and guests – thank you for the opportunity to present this testimony regarding police-Latino community relations in the District of Columbia and the Metropolitan Police Department’s ongoing efforts to strengthen and improve those relationships. For your information, the text of my statement is posted on the Police Department’s website, www.mpdc.dc.gov.
The Mt. Pleasant disturbances of 1991 represented a low point in relations between DC’s Latino communities and its Police Department. And while those events predated my arrival in the District of Columbia by seven years, I certainly appreciate the history and the gravity of that time. I recognize that Mt. Pleasant will forever serve not only as an important moment in our city’s history, but perhaps more importantly, as a starting point for rebuilding the relationship between Latinos and the MPD.
I applaud the Commission for the leadership role it has taken over the years in analyzing that event and helping us understand the underlying issues that contributed to the Mt. Pleasant disturbances. And I acknowledge and commend the Commission, the Council of Latino Agencies, the Washington Lawyers’ Committee, and many others for keeping these issues in the forefront and monitoring our progress along the way. I also want to assure the Commission that during my time as Chief, relations with the Latino community have been a priority, and they remain a priority today. And in recent years, the pace of reform in this area has accelerated – and accelerated dramatically. Even more importantly, the results of our efforts have been equally dramatic.
Today, I will outline our progress, accomplishments, and challenges in four key areas: (1) recruiting, hiring and retention; (2) deployment of resources; (3) community outreach; and (4) police integrity. Because many of our reforms in these areas have come about in just the last several months, these efforts are not fully covered in the Council on Latino Agencies’ September 2002 report. So I appreciate the opportunity to bring the Commission up-to-date on the full range of our reforms.
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