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Campus Police Presence Not Healthy for Development, Astor Says

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Social Welfare Professor Ron Avi Astor was mentioned in a Southern California News Group article about the controversial presence of armed officers on school campuses. Many school districts in Southern California have armed officers on their campuses despite opposition from parents and students. In September, 18-year-old Mona Rodriguez was fatally shot by a school safety officer in an off-campus parking lot in Long Beach. In that school district, non-sworn officers are able to carry guns, batons and pepper spray but do not have arrest powers. Other school districts have their own police departments or have contracts with police and sheriff departments. According to Astor, a heavy police presence can adversely impact the school climate. “Very heavily armed schools prime the kids in those schools to think of the place more like a prison,” Astor explained. “Militarizing and turning schools into things that look like prisons is not healthy for development. It’s not healthy for identity.”

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Armenta on Repercussions of ICE Collaboration Programs

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Associate Professor of Urban Planning Amada Armenta spoke to the Los Angeles Times about increasing pressure to reform the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE), which has for years been criticized for its treatment of immigrants in detention. The implementation of any changes will fall under the responsibilities of the new director, nominated by President Joe Biden. Some advocates have demanded improved conditions in detention centers as well as the scaling back of programs such as 287(g), which allows for collaboration between ICE and local law enforcement. While ICE says the local collaboration programs are meant to promote public safety, the result is that many undocumented immigrants are reluctant to report crimes to law enforcement out of fear that they will be expelled from the country. Armenta argued for doing away with the collaboration programs altogether. When immigrants are afraid to engage with law enforcement, “that’s bad for all of us,” she said.

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Armenta on Enforcing Accountability With Body Cameras

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Associate Professor of Urban Planning Amada Armenta spoke to the Los Angeles Times about privacy and accountability concerns regarding the recent announcement that U.S. Border Patrol agents and officers will soon begin wearing body cameras as they patrol the southwestern and northern borders. Following other local and state departments that have adopted body cameras, the policy change is meant to improve oversight of the agency and reduce the use of force by officers. Customs and Border Protection expects to deploy 6,000 cameras by the end of the year. However, some immigration experts are concerned about the fact that agents will be responsible for activating their own cameras. “It’ll be very easy for agents to claim that they forgot to turn on their cameras,” Armenta said, adding that it will be hard for migrants and others to counter officers without a recorded version of events.

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A Spotlight on Community Policing Research

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A USA Today opinion piece written by former Los Angeles Police Department Chief Charlie Beck and prominent civil rights lawyer Connie Rice highlighted research on community policing led by Adjunct Professor of Social Welfare Jorja Leap. Beck and Rice were part of a team that launched Los Angeles’ Community Safety Partnership (CSP), which they described as a “ ‘whole of community’ alternative to paramilitary enforcement that changes neighborhood conditions to boost safety, build trust, cut police use of force and drop violent crime with fewer arrests.” After conducting an extensive independent review of the program, Leap’s team concluded that with CSP,  “the community feels protected and strengthened.” Beck and Rice wrote that Americans want policing that is holistic, racially fair and effective, but that true criminal justice reform is blocked by a lack of political will to dismantle the “labyrinth of exclusion” created by pervasive inequalities in the nation’s systems of employment, health, wealth, education, housing and justice.

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Newton on Villanueva’s Uncertain Future

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Jim Newton, editor of UCLA’s Blueprint magazine, spoke to the Los Angeles Times about L.A. County Sheriff Alex Villanueva’s decline in favorability since his shift to the political right. In 2018, Villanueva campaigned for sheriff as a relatively unknown Democratic candidate and promised police reform and transparency. However, since being elected, Villanueva has resisted calls for greater transparency, pursued controversial hires and resisted multiple subpoenas. The sheriff responded to the growth of the Black Lives Matter movement and widespread demands for police reform by publicly rebuking local elected Democrats and working to increase the number of people permitted to carry concealed guns in Los Angeles County. The story cited UCLA’s 2021 Quality of Life Index, which found that Villanueva’s favorability has decreased since he was elected; he will be on the ballot for reelection in 2022. “Whether Villanueva is vulnerable depends in huge measure on who runs against him,” Newton said. “Without a credible opponent, none of this really matters.”

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Leap on Public Safety After L.A.’s Leadership Transition

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Adjunct Professor of Social Welfare Jorja Leap spoke to the Los Angeles Times about how to address rising rates of gun violence, one of several issues that the next L.A. mayor will face. While some city leaders have expressed a desire to reform the duties of the Los Angeles Police Department, including moving away from armed responses to certain calls, the city is facing a surge in homicides and gun violence. As of July 3, homicides had increased by nearly 41% compared to the same period in 2019 and the number of shooting victims increased by nearly 40% in the same period. Leap expressed concern that the gun violence could spark a public backlash against community policing programs and partnerships with gang intervention workers. “What terrifies me is that people will say, ‘Crime is increasing, we’ve got to stop this,’” Leap said. “And they’ll go back to the bad old days of command-and-control policing.”

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Weisburst on Racial Disparities in Policing

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Research by Assistant Professor of Public Policy Emily Weisburst was cited in a Star Tribune opinion piece about racial disparities associated with police presence and crime. Weisburst co-authored a paper that looked at changes in police force size, crime and arrests in 242 large American cities over nearly 40 years in order to draw conclusions about the impact of police presence on different populations. They found that “investments in law enforcement save Black lives … but at the cost of more low-level ‘quality of life’ arrests and all the insults and injuries of intensive policing.” The authors calculated that, on average, one homicide is prevented per year for every 10 to 17 additional police officers employed, but the number of street arrests for low-level offenses, especially for Black civilians, also increases with greater police presence. The paper concludes that “Black communities are simultaneously over- and under-policed.”

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Weisburst on Impact of Police in Schools

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Assistant Professor of Public Policy Emily Weisburst was mentioned in an Axios article about the presence of police officers on school campuses. Some school districts are considering replacing campus police officers with improved mental health services after studies have shown that Black and Hispanic students are disproportionately affected by disciplinary action in schools, contributing to the school-to-prison pipeline. Weisburst’s research also found that disabled students are disproportionately affected negatively when police or school resource officers rather than teachers and administrators maintain discipline. In her 2019 paper “Patrolling Public Schools: The Impact of Funding for School Police on Student Discipline and Long-Term Education Outcomes,” Weisburst found that school police presence was associated with a decrease in both high school graduation rates and college enrollment rates. Her analysis also confirmed that Black students experience the largest increases in discipline when police are on campus. Weisburst and others recommend increasing funding and quality of mental health services for students.

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Researchers Analyze Incidents Involving UCLA Police

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Property-related incidents are the most frequent type of police-related event at UCLA, followed closely by incidents involving people whose presence or behavior is deemed disruptive or out of place, without any indication of violence, according to a new report from the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies and the UCLA Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy. The study examines police activity at UCLA based on data compiled in compliance with the Clery Act, which requires public disclosure by the Police Department at UCLA regarding the nature, date, time and location of incidents, as well as their disposition status or outcome. The researchers use maps and charts to visualize Clery Act data relating to events involving police, plus some fire department responses, in 2014 and 2019, with supplemental information focusing on arrests by the UCPD in 2018, the most-recent information available. Less than 10% of events involve force or threat of violence, they found, and data maps reveal that a substantial amount of UCPD activity and arrests occur off-campus, mostly in the greater Westwood area but also farther afield. Paavo Monkkonen, associate professor of public policy and urban planning at UCLA Luskin, helped oversee the study, working with Noah D. Zatz and Jennifer M. Chacón, professors of law at the UCLA School of Law, and Alejandra A Martinez, an undergraduate research assistant at the Lewis Center who studies economics and was the lead author. Their report also found that more than 80% of reported police activity during the study periods did not result in follow-ups for any asserted or possible crime.

Partnership Aims to Build Bonds Between Community, Police

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An ABC7 News report on the Los Angeles Police Department’s Community Safety Partnership (CSP) outreach cited a UCLA Luskin report that evaluated the effectiveness of the program. The LAPD launched CSP to address rising tensions between police and the public and build trust within the community. Although the program was initially met with skepticism, officers met with community members to establish trust and transparency. In 2020, Adjunct Professor of Social Welfare Jorja Leap authored a report evaluating the success of the CSP. The report found that the program improved resident perceptions of safety, built trust, helped reduce dangerous conditions, and allowed residents to gather together and enjoy public spaces. It also found that the partnership reduced crime and gang violence and helped prevent homelessness. The report is now being used to endorse the expansion of similar programs.

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