"Don't Call on Washington" for Police Reform, Writes Candace McCoy in The Hill

An op-ed by Candace McCoy (GC/John Jay, Criminal Justice) about police reform was featured today in The Hill, the top newspaper and website devoted to politics in Washington.

The editorial, "Don't Call on Washington to Reform Your Police," questions the effectiveness of federal intervention to improve police policies in cities experiencing civil unrest, such as Baltimore.

Although Baltimore has requested a Department of Justice investigation of its police department, "...matters of civil unrest, poor policing, and neighborhood conditions are fundamentally state and local problems," McCoy wrote. "There are many things cities can do to change the police-neighborhood relationship and the deep social inequalities that strain it. But Washington has only a small role to play."
 
Federal intervention is "probably necessary but scarcely sufficient," McCoy concluded. "Change will come when people in the neighborhoods are asked what they need from police, when the police work with them to figure out how to provide it - and when city officials really want to change."

Read more.