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EU ENE POLICE COMMISSION FY 2004 -2005 Work Plan I. Background The Eugene Police Commission is a twelve-member citizen body that acts in an advisory capacity to the City Council, the Chief of Police and the City Manager on police policy and resource issues. The commission is one of five standing City Council boards and commissions, and was created by City Ordinance 20136 in December of 1998. The enabling ordinance requires the commission to develop a yearly work plan, to be reviewed and approved by the City Council. The work plans follow a July 1 - June 30th Fiscal Year (FY) schedule. Major accomplishments over the past five years include: Development of strategies to address street level prostitution, including adoption of the prostitution free zone ordinance (FY 2000) Crowd control and use of force policy recommendations (FY 2001) Media access policy recommendations (FY 2002) Community policing outreach and education project; development of recommendations for next steps in community policing implementation (FY 2002) Vehicle pursuit policy review (FY 2003) Development of strategies to reduce speeding and red light running (FY 2003) Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) and related policy review (FY 2004) Interim Report on Strategies to Improve Police and Community Interactions (FY 2004) Ideas for work plan projects come to the commission from a variety of sources, including the public, City Council, other community organizations, police department staff, and from commission members themselves. A list of potential work plan topics is maintained and updated annually in preparation for selecting items for inclusion in the next plan. While there has been no shortage of ideas for new projects, managing workload while maintaining some flexibility to address emerging issues can be a challenge. As the list above illustrates, the commission has not refrained from confronting controversial or complex topics, both of which are time-intensive. The Police Commission's FY04 work plan contained two main projects. First was the completion of the SWAT Policy Review work, begun the prior year in response to community concerns around the deployment and practices of the department's tactical team. This report was adopted in April 2004. A new work plan item, "Strategies to Improve Police and Community Interactions" was initiated as the primary topic before the entire commission. This item consisted of several separate but related projects culminating in three main outcomes: 1) development of a social security number policy that establishes protocols for when and how officers should request an individual's social security number for identification purposes; 2) adoption of an interim report containing recommendations for improving police/community interactions; and 3) agreement to conduct an extensive review of police policies and practices for handling complaints and conducting internal investigations, and to examine different civilian oversight models.