Systemic Anti-LGBT Bias at MPD’s Fifth District (5D) and Its Fifth District Citizens’ Advisory Council (5DCAC) Prove Plan to ‘Expand’ GLLU to Districts Not Effective…

MPD Police Chief Cathy Lanier’s policy to expand GLLU training– and presumably, achieve EFFECTIVE LGBT community policing and sensitivity throughout all of MPD’s 7 District stations– is clearly not having a meaningful result in MPD’s 5D (NE DC).

Both 5D Commander Lamar Greene and 5DCAC Chairman, Robert Brannum are now backpedaling– if not in full retreat– from their promises to 5D’s LGBT residents to provide a meaningful GLLU presentation at the September 5DCAC meeting. That was to include an introduction to SLU and GLLU policing, unique aspects of GLLU policing, what hate crimes are/ are not, religious and speech issues, as well as specific hate crime and other crime prevention advice for LGBT residents.

5D’s/5DCAC’s promises were made in the wake of homophobic remarks made publicly by one of 5DCAC’s own, high-ranking board members in August. In recent weeks, though, it has become clear that 5D LGBT residents and their unique public safety concerns are not welcome at 5DCAC meetings. 5DCAC’s systemic, anti-LGBT bias is now being swept under the rug through 5D meeting manipulation and attendance suppression tactics.

5D/5DCAC is relegating GLLU to a greatly abbreviated “speech” of as little as 15 minutes and a single GLLU “speaker.” Moreover, Brannum has ignored repeated requests for the most basic meeting information. So even with its gutted GLLU content, that prevents early and multiple announcements of the 5DCAC meeting.

This is an attempt to suppress LGBT 5DCAC meeting turnout by limiting reliable, effective meeting notification and promotion to just one week or less. If 5D LGBT residents don’t know about the meeting in a timely fashion, 5D LGBT residents simply can’t attend it.

Backpedaling even more, last Thursday, Brannum strongly implied GLLU’s greatly shortened speech could even be cancelled altogether by the 5DCAC executive board. 5D is not serious about dealing with systemic homophobia on its main civilian advisory board.

The GLLU presentation to 5D should be postponed to its October meeting, and a full 90 minutes should be allotted for a presentation at the beginning of that 5DCAC meeting, with plenty of time built-in for attendees’ Q&A. 5D and 5DCAC should work promptly and closely with 5D LGBT activists and citywide LGBT stakeholders alike, to make this happen. And a reliable agenda, not subject to arbitrary time reduction, should be published at least 4 weeks prior to the meeting. Anything less by 5D and 5DCAC at this point, is simply not credible.

Whatever Chief Lanier’s policy intent in cutting the central GLLU and “expanding” its District affiliates– sensitivity to the LGBT community’s unique policing needs is certainly not getting through to MPD’s top people at 5D and 5DCAC.

Gray will be under pressure from Anti-Gays just as Fenty is. What are the SPECIFICS that Gray will do, and especially when Gays are under a rash of attacks? What is he doing Right Now? City Council is the Ultimate Controller of the city. The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. Nothing now will mean Nothing later.