Sacramento Mayor Heather Fargo called a report showing that black motorists are pulled over by city police more frequently than other drivers "very disturbing" and apologized to those who have suffered from racial profiling.
During a tense – yet sparsely attended – City Council meeting Tuesday at which the report was presented, city officials said the Police Department needed to become more diverse and communicate better with the community.
The council session was the first public debate on the report, which was conducted by an outside consultant and released last week. Three town hall forums are scheduled this week.
The report, based on police traffic stops over a six-month period, found that black motorists were twice as likely to be pulled over in the city as non-black drivers, but no more likely to be cited.
It also found that black and Latino drivers were asked to get out of their cars more often than Asian and white drivers. Latino motorists also were patted down "at a significantly higher rate than would be expected," the report stated.
Asian and white motorists were stopped less often than would be expected.
"I want to offer a very sincere and heartfelt apology to those that have suffered from the profiling that has been done," Fargo said. "I want to apologize to those citizens who feel they haven't received equal treatment or protection."
Fargo said it was time for city and police officials to work with the community "to find solutions" to the issues raised by the report.
Police Chief Rick Braziel said that process has begun. He said many officers in his department received racial sensitivity training this year before the study was conducted because of perceptions within the community that officers were profiling motorists based on race.
"We need to not only enforce the law, we need to have equal treatment and equal enforcement," Braziel said.
The chief said the department needs a way to compile feedback from those who are stopped and needs to coordinate better with advocacy groups to hear about trends in profiling when they pop up. The department also "needs to look like the city that we serve."
Mark Tyndale, vice president of the city's police union, said the study's methodology was flawed because it did not fully take into account the reasons why many of the traffic stops were made.
The report noted that during the study, 58 percent of the suspects were described in bulletins sent to officers as African American.
"I don't want it to get to the point where our officers are fearful to go into those communities and fear they're going to get retaliation from the council and everybody else who seem to think these officers are doing something wrong," Tyndale said. "Please do not sell our officers short."
Councilwoman Bonnie Pannell said acknowledging that racial profiling exists does not prevent the police from doing their jobs.
"We have a problem here, so we need to figure out a solution to the problem," she said.
Call The Bee's Ryan Lillis, (916) 321-1085.
