Meaningful LEOBOR Reform Was Dead As Soon As Sen. Lockman Took Charge
Talk about not learning from history. Tizzy Lockman chose the same failed path that Val Longhurst, for example, tried with the NRA and the Delaware Sportsmen’s Association. You know, involve ‘all the stakeholders’ in the conversation. As if you can negotiate with legislative hostage takers.
Riddle me this, Batman. How many ‘stakeholders’, including community activists, impacted residents, and minorities who had traditionally been singled out by police, do you suppose took part in the creation of LEOBOR? The answer is none. This was a bill crafted by law enforcement, for law enforcement, and passed by the gaggle of law enforcement legislators/groupies who ruled the roost when the bill was passed. The bill, and the people who crafted it, are/were the problem. Given these circumstances, whatever possessed Sen. Lockman to decide that she needed sign-off from the police leadership in order to get a bill passed? Their entire mission was to whittle the bill down to nothing, which is exactly what they accomplished. This is one of the worst examples of bill management that I can ever recall. Lockman should never be allowed anywhere near a police reform bill again.
Those of us who participated in her town halls where, despite the almost unanimous consensus that SB 149 be passed unamended, she made it clear that she wasn’t even listening to us. She almost certainly had the votes in the Senate to pass the unamended version. But her obsession to get even the slightest bit of buy-in from the cops overrode her common sense. Hey, the House was gonna destroy the bill anyway. Couldn’t she at least have gotten something respectable through the Senate? No. No, she couldn’t. Nor wouldn’t. Just–this. Utterly pathetic.
I’m to the point where I’d welcome a primary challenger to her who has a genuine commitment to police reform. I think she played us.
All this work, all this lobbying. For what? Nothing. Great work, Senator.
Tizzy is a Delaware Way politician….
She has higher ambitions…
Wonderful woman, smart and charming. But she is going to play along with the Carney/Coons/Carper crowd.
I would not disparage Sen. Lockman, but I do include myself in the many advocates who are very disappointed in SS1 for SB149. The substitute bill would achieve none of the purposes of the original bill and frankly would be worse than nothing. Let’s work to stop it.
You wouldn’t. I did. You’re nicer than I am.
Why in hell was she so obsessed about getting police buy-in? It never made any sense.
I agree with you. Let’s give this thing an unceremonial burial and work for a more progressive General Assembly to pass a LEOBOR reform bill that actually accomplishes something.
Here is what Cassandra over at Blue Delaware wrote about the LEOBOR fiasco:
“I know that Senator Lockman worked hard to get to SOMETHING, but I’m stunned at how bad this “reform” is. It basically does not exist. It undermines Wilmington’s Home Rule, leaves substantive oversight of bad behavior in the hands of the police, and still provides the public — the people who pay for this enterprise — quite in the dark. It’s also quite a remarkable back of the hand to the local D base that was pretty active in getting many of these folks elected. On a day where this body finds taking up the question of who gets to vaccinate ferrets, this bill is a genuine insult. Especially since a year ago, the Maryland GA did blow up their LEOBOR shield.”
Pretty much everybody knows that Cassandra has a leadership position in the Democratic Party. She deserves all the props in the world for coming out and saying this. Here’s the link:
https://bluedelaware.com/2022/03/22/a-revised-leobor-reform-is-filed-aclu-walks/
Sen. Lockman Hangs Herself With Her Own Comments:
https://www.wdel.com/news/revised-leobor-reform-bill-shields-certain-complaints-weakens-community-review-boards/article_dbb862a2-a9fb-11ec-a664-9f96966fd6d7.html
She outsourced changes to the bill to the fucking cop leaders. In so doing, she sold out her own constituents and many others who were counting on her. Primary her!
No doubt Sen. Lockman was shocked not to be lauded for #gettingthingsdone, like Sen. McBride was lauded for family leave.
As I pointed out for family leave, getting things done by watering them down is a terrible framework for progressive action.
The Medical And Family Leave Bill was a huge step forward. About 80% of what I’d hoped for.
This was not. It was a capitulation. Unforgivable. I’m serious about a primary challenge.
If you can’t tell the difference between the two, it’s on you.
“It was a capitulation. Unforgivable.”
It will be interesting to see if McBride supports Lockman’s LEOBOR bill.
*eyeroll*
Give me a fucking break.
Many years ago the News Journal sued to get arrest data from the state police. Then-AG Jane Brady fought it in court for years. The reason: They were afraid reporters would use the data to identify racist, bad-actor cops. We never got the data.
That’s the reason they don’t want data in the hands of the public: They’re harboring criminal cops, they know it and they’ll be damned if they let us do anything about it.
It’s quite possible that some of those criminal cops went on to have careers in the General Assembly. We would never know.
We DO know about Steven Smyk. The Thin Blue Line of cops/legislators have made sure that nothing about that comes out.
Business-as-usual.