A nationally acclaimed Equity in Policing expert has been visiting communities and police departments in Kansas at the invitation of the Kansas NAACP to help communities and first responders find solutions to the increase in crime and attitude of distrust between police and the communities they share.
Carlton Mayers II, Esq., founder and CEO of Mayers Strategic Solutions, has more than a decade of experience working for criminal justice reform on Capitol Hill and in more than 30 states.
While he was in Kansas, he met with leaders in several communities and also visited the Kansas Commission on Peace Officers Standards and Training (CPOST) in Hutchinson.
Kenya Cox, president of the Kansas NAACP said the organization has been working with Mayers to help them draft legislative changes that would make (CPOST) more effective.
CPOST, governed by a 12-member board appointed by the Kansas governor, is responsible for setting training standards for law enforcement officers across the state. CPOST grants certification for all law enforcement officers, but also can suspend, revoke or deny the certification of a law enforcement officer who fails to meet the requirements of the Kansas Law Enforcement Training Act.
Through their investigative process, the CPOST board can follow-up on reports of failing to meet the requirements of the Training Act and to investigate allegations of falsifying documents to meet the requirements.
Mayers praised Kansas as an early leader in establishing a route for ordinary citizens to pursue complaints against police officers with CPOST but said the training police get was “disappointing,” in that police are trained by other police officers with no input from the community.
AT the NAACP’s encouragement, Mayers also visited Wichita, Hutchinson, Topeka, Lawrence and Kansas City.
“We want communities to be more involved from the beginning, working with police to improve communication between them and the people they serve,” Cox said.
She added that NAACP is also trying to help minorities in rural parts of the state make their needs understood.
“I think it is essential to involve the community in training,” Mayers said. “It’s essential to building trust. Police need to hear from family members to people struggling with mental health, from women, from people of color, about how the current culture affects them. As it is in most states, law enforcement has more power than the people who pay their salaries. That just doesn’t work.”
Mayers offers a program centered on building a partnership between communities and first responders. He calls his program the Community Empowerment-Center Approach. It uses his CAT Method – Community Empowerment, Accountability and Transparency.