The city of Chicago is still moving slowly on police reforms, missing more than 70% of its deadlines during the first year of the court-overseen process of overhauling the Chicago Police Department, according to a watchdog report released late Thursday.
Former federal prosecutor Maggie Hickey detailed the city’s sluggish progress in enacting the consent decree, a wide-ranging court order aimed at forcing reforms to training, discipline and supervision in the troubled department.
All told, the city missed 89 of 124 deadlines during the first year under the order.
The new report, which covered the six-month period of September 2019 through February, states that the city missed 52 of 74 deadlines. In the previous report, which covered March 2019 through August 2019, the city missed 37 of 50 deadlines.
Hickey’s latest report said the city missed deadlines in a range of areas governed by the decree, which orders a raft of highly technical adjustments to policy and practice.
For example, Hickey wrote that the city did not meet the Jan. 1 deadline to review foot pursuits leading to uses of force to identify issues with tactics, training or equipment, though the report credits the city for “significant strides” in the area.
The city also missed a Feb. 29 deadline to put in place a policy guiding cops on interacting with members of religious communities, including “instruction on interacting and searching individuals with garments or coverings of religious significance.”
The filing comes as Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration faces pressure to change the Police Department in the wake of sustained protests sparked by the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police.
The mayor is being pressed by activists and some aldermen who want fundamental changes to policing — including cutting the police budget — as well as those who want to see technical changes done faster. Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, who is involved in the court case over the consent decree, has criticized City Hall and called for more urgent progress toward fulfilling the requirements.
Lightfoot and new police Superintendent David Brown touted changes the city has made thus far but acknowledged the city “can do better.”
“We are redoubling our efforts to meet important milestones mandated by the consent decree,” the two said in a news release.
The city’s slow progress thus far is in keeping with the long process of bringing court-overseen reform to the department in the wake of the November 2015 release of video of white police Officer Jason Van Dyke shooting black teenager Laquan McDonald 16 times. The footage and the protests it sparked led to a U.S. Department of Justice investigation that found the city’s police to be badly trained, loosely supervised and prone to excessive force, especially against minorities.
The consent decree gives the Police Department at least five years to fully comply and imposes rolling deadlines for the city achieve the overhaul.
