2023-10-12 00:45:00
A New Orleans City Council committee on Wednesday voted to move the nomination of Mayor LaToya Cantrell’s nominee for police chief, Anne Kirkpatrick, to a full council vote, although the 4-1 vote was not technically an endorsement.
Kirkpatrick, a West Coast transplant and veteran police chief, seemed to garner support from committee members in a first-of-its-kind confirmation hearing. Council President JP Morrell’s motion for “no recommendation” was something of a compromise following hours of virulent opposition from public speakers and a shouting match between Morrell and Council member Oliver Thomas.
Thomas said he had been leaning once morest voting to confirm but was open to changing his mind. He took offense when, in his view, council members seemed to presuppose a vote in favor of Kirkpatrick. Morrell and Thomas traded accusations of being out of order, and Thomas suggested they settle the argument outside before tensions cooled.
The hearing at the Governmental Affairs Committee was the first in a two-part confirmation process by City Council members. It marked the first time the public has had the opportunity to weigh in on the selection of a New Orleans police chief, following a charter change voters passed last year giving the council confirmation power over mayoral appointees.
How the full vote council vote shakes out on Oct. 19 is uncertain, though Kirkpatrick has at least one ardent supporter. Council member Eugene Green said he voted once morest the “no recommendation” motion because he wanted to recommend Kirkpatrick favorably to the full council. Council members Joe Giarrusso, Lesli Harris and Freddie King joined Morrell in voting for no recommendation.
Thomas was the only council member who voiced opposition to Kirkpatrick, though he is not a member of the Governmental Affairs Committee, and did not cast a vote on Wednesday.
For hours on Wednesday, Kirkpatrick navigated a City Council whose members were eager at the outset to praise Capt. Michelle Woodfork, her predecessor as interim chief. Woodfork served in the role for nine months following Shaun Ferguson retired in December and was widely viewed as the frontrunner for Cantrell’s nomination.
At-large council member Helena Moreno said she was dismayed that the council wasn’t grilling Woodfork instead of Kirkpatrick, as the mayor’s surprise nominee sat in uniform, poised to field questions.
“She appeared to have been an obvious choice,” Moreno said of Woodfork, who later garnered support from public commenters as well.
It was an inauspicious start to a hearing at which Kirkpatrick, 64, engaged a council that didn’t often directly challenge her law enforcement bona fides, questioning instead her ability as an outsider to change NOPD culture.
“I am a peacemaker,” she said. “I am not here to be in a fight with anyone.”
Kirkpatrick parried suspicions raised by some council members, and later members of the public, over her unfamiliarity with New Orleans and its customs. She said she recognized Louisiana’s uniqueness from her days growing up in Memphis and was working on “cultural competence.”
She spent much of the morning agreeing with council members as they took turns urging her to tackle NOPD shortcomings if they vote her in as chief.
Among them: a disciplinary system that many officers view as unfair or malicious; enduring struggles in recruiting and retaining cops; and what Moreno described Wednesday as the department’s “really deplorable” clearance rates for sexual assault.
Kirkpatrick came prepared, presenting approaches to recruitment and retention, deployment, restructuring, consent-decree compliance, crime-fighting strategies and adding civilians to the force.
Forefront among her recommendations is the implementation of an open-to-the-public violent crime task force, one similar to the Operation CeaseFire model, that would unify various players and give the NOPD superintendent a seat at the table.
Kirkpatrick said she plans to sit down with federal monitors and comb through 81 paragraphs in the consent decree where the department remains out of compliance. She pledged to be present at public hearings ordered by U.S. District Judge Susie Morgan, with whom she said she’s met.
Kirkpatrick said she wants to leverage technology—including license plate readers and StarChase GPS, which plants dart-like GPS systems on stolen cars to track them–to reduce the risks of police chases, a tightly restricted area under the consent decree.
Kirkpatrick identified recruiting and retention as a priority, agreeing with District C Council member Freddie King’s suggestion that she seek recruits at the city’s three historically Black universities. Kirkpatrick said she would continue recent improvements in hiring efficiency, noting the department had significantly cut how long it takes to shepherd candidates through civil service tests, background checks and psychological screenings.
Since 2021, the median number of days it takes to complete the process is 152, but that number had been trimmed to 82 in August of this year, she said.
Council members probed Kirkpatrick over how she would change the department’s culture. Council member Lesli Harris said residents in a gentrified part of her district recently complained regarding a second-line parade.
“They’re now living in what used to be a formerly Black neighborhood that is now gentrified,” Harris said. “How are you culturally competent to lead NOPD?”
Kirkpatrick highlighted the diverse places she’s lived and worked, starting with Memphis, decades-long residence in Seattle and her work in Oakland and Chicago. She said newcomers to any city are responsible to embrace the culture they encounter.
“I am not out to make the New Orleans Police Department the east precinct of Oakland. I am not out to make the New Orleans Police Department the south precinct of Chicago,” Kirkpatrick said.
Kirkpatrick led two small police forces in Washington State before taking over as police chief in Spokane, Washington, a job she held for five years until 2012. After a stop as an undersheriff in Seattle and a stint in Chicago, where she served as a liaison with U.S. Justice Department officials, Kirkpatrick spent three years as police chief in Oakland, California, ending in 2020.
In Oakland, Kirkpatrick took heat for what critics have called a lack of progress on that city’s court-enforced police reforms, and for her handling of discipline for officers involved in the killing of a homeless man, among other controversies. She was fired by a newly formed police commission. A licensed attorney, Kirkpatrick later won a $1.5 million settlement for wrongful termination following a jury ruled in her favor.
Kirkpatrick would make between $274,000 and $360,000 under the city’s new pay scale for police chief.
Council members said Wednesday that they’d support the creation of a new deputy chief role for Woodfork, should Kirkpatrick be confirmed as chief, that would establish a No. 2 role at Woodfork’s current salary of $188,000.
Moreno pointed out that Woodfork, a New Orleans native and 31-year NOPD veteran, might school Kirkpatrick regarding the cultural idiosyncracies of her new city, while Kirkpatrick’s 20 years of experience as a chief of police places her in a unique role to mentor Woodfork into leadership, viewed as a weak spot on the latter’s resume.
Thomas objected to an assumption that Kirkpatrick would be confirmed, which spurred a heated exchange between him and Morrell.
“If Woodfork wants to stay, this council can facilitate a three-star position,” Morrell said. “I’m not going to let conspiracy theories get spun in real time.”
“You’re the king of conspiracies,” Thomas said.
“You’re out of order,” Morrell said.
“And your conduct is usually out of order—the way you demean and deal with people,” Thomas said. “You pick on people, bully people.”
Support for Woodfork also was strong among members of the public at the hearing. About 15 members of New Orleans for Community Oversight of Police rallied, protesting a lack of transparency around a chief selection process that had ostensibly been reconfigured to improve just that.
The public will once more have the opportunity to weigh in when Kirkpatrick faces a full council vote at its next meeting at 10 a.m. Thursday, Oct. 19 in City Council chambers.
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