City, County & Local Affairs Committee - Senate

That last. I am with you. Thank you. Members are collie the Senate city county local fires meeting to order jerseys quorum. For those who may not of heard I'll stand in presenter Stubblefield of today he is brother passed and he went home so create you remember him and the family in your prayers of. Also welcome centre Hendren to the city county committee or new Senate rules we change in the center hammer his moved insurance covers centre Hendren here's we welcome him. Well without any further delay we have a concurring in the house amendment with the Senator Jane English for Senate bill thirty two the Senator English if you will. Sittin table and you're recognized present. Thank you very much this is just an amendment to concur with the House added two additional folks the list. Okay with the Any questions if not. Senator Johnson. Thank you Mr chairman Senator English I heard there is going to be a bill that would cover the microbrewery restaurants and small breweries is the idea was just to amend this bill to kind of put them all in there together that's what we did okay so How and again I'm this is maybe slightly off subject and I apologize to committee for this what about other restaurants that have a retail or have a permit we have another bill for restaurants so we will have to be separately it's a separate bill okay all right thank you very much be out this week thank you Mr Mr. Okay members any other questions. If not do I have the. Motion for concurrence. Motion from Senator Flippo. Second from center Jason. A center for large you will be on screen with this. All in favor say aye opposed. Senator ensure concurrence is passed thank you. And with that we will move on to the regular agenda which is house bill eleven ninety five. I believe Senator Wallace. You may eleven ninety seven sorry let ninety seven and the Senator Wallace and Representative shall be and the center Wallace you are recognizing will recognized Representative W. two. This is down there is usually need. Thank you Mr thank you members. Members this bill is a result of recommendations from the governor's task force to advance the state of law enforcement in the state of Arkansas some of its clean up some of it just gives us tighter control over the way we're doing our law enforcement you know so line twenty of the first page we've changed definition of an active law agency. To me one that has not existed or not operated. Six months to sept twelve so we've time that UPS under six months. If we. Come back in after the six months. And we need to re activate or start a new law enforcement agency. We're going to have to the the individual need to appear before the Arkansas Commission of law enforcement standards and training. I think this call C. last saman pronounce it. So that basically means that if you've not had a law enforcement if your town without a police force if you start one I knew that you had it for six months of its brand new then you gonna come down here and you've got to talk about some specific issues. Funding being some of them. use of force vehicle pursuit being some of the others and one thing we've changed on line seven of the second page in the past we use the term bias based policing we're now going to change that to racial profiling so that we've updated that. In the key point comes on Page two it line nine and line ten. We have a requirement that if you could have a police force you've got to have a full time police chief not have small towns might hear that this will affect because they've not really had a full time police chief so that's a major change for some of the smaller towns and smaller entities and basis a minimum of full time police chief. The part comes at the line twenty on page two and we talk about part time law enforcement officers in the past it's been a little bit vague what we're doing now is is put in and codify the saying that for every full time police officer you have you can have two part time. We've also added a provision in there that if you need a greater number you can come down to see lap and talk with them and if you convince them then they will give you a waiver you could have a ratio of more than two to one on your part timers to full time. The last part is on page three it talks about. Separation. And we've we've cleaned it up so we've made it a point that if a law officer. Is involved in the top of controversy. They try to resign or retire of whether subject of the pending internal investigation. That that is being held up. And it also applies to the law enforcement officer being separate from excessive force or being separated from dishonesty and untruthfulness it's a good bill The use of more thirty two are civilian control over our law enforcement officers. In that are. I am standing by for questions. Thank you senator Solomon your record for question. Thank you Mr I'm looking at Page two line seven where we changed it from five space racial pelo profiling it seems like we narrow that quite a bit so. One that was by a religious bias for gender bias through all kinds of lives out there that would that we covered this before now we're limiting. Only racial profile yeah why would we make it less well my my answer that is that was a recommendation of the Task force to do this at bat I don't know the logic that the use of that is the mark of the task force here. The. They are you're recognized after. There goes I'm not on the test for senator but. That that term was changed to fall in line as my understanding of with with the federal guidelines yes and that's how the FBI keeps their statistics that's how law enforcement keeps it in so they're trying to bring that all online to make it. Universal universal so it's yes that is the root rationale behind it now director I mean Secretary cookies here and she may have something else to add to that but that's my understanding that that is a term of art class of what law enforcement's keeping their documents their documentation growth I have a little bit of a I think there's more I think about a bigger and a growing problem that were actually excluding by us on a whole bunch of issues that we have. Created by us. car events that were. People have demonstrated by after a whole range of things other than racially and I'm this year were not excluding all those I guess so that those by for now okay as long as it's not racial profiling or okay within. No it wouldn't be something that or okay with this is just bringing it online and Secretary cook can probably explain it a little better than I have I don't mean to mangle it but if the chair would recognize secretary could to answer that question we'd appreciate it. If you will recognize yourself I believe watching the House Committee on this it be testified to if you recognize yourself you're or recognized to speak yes thank you I'm Jamie code secretary for the Arkansas department of public safety I'm also the director of the Commission on law enforcement standards and training this put up piece of the statute requires that new or an active departments come before the commission and supply certain policies and some of those policies or use of force vehicle pursuits and those that are listed the reason another reason of the issues we arrived we do keep that on racial profiling the law specifically twelve twelve fourteen oh three in Arkansas statute makes a requirement for every law enforcement agency to have a policy on racial profiling so all of the policies that I know of do include all of the biases but we we change this to get it in line with Arkansas statute existing statute twelve twelve fourteen oh three I certainly agree with the racial profiling would be considered under Neath bias policing that's a subsections are greeted that needs to be there but so what happens now if if someone is found guilty of religious profiling our gender profiling is that. What happened there well that that's wrong and that's a violation of the law that is now yes the racial profiling law includes all biases it should specifically titled racial profiling in Arkansas statute as it currently exists okay yes I'm a little slow to get. Thank you Mr. Thank you for any other questions. Senator Clark you're recognized. Yes all four former. Of this sow racial profiling here doesn't just mean racial profiling a means racial profiling Mendez main racial profiling as I read it. The words it means racial profiling referring to some other section of what racial. Profiling means. It Arkansas state she racial profiling is already defined and twelve twelve Fortino three required policies from every department yes Sir and that specific there's no doubt about it under Arkansas law. Because I mean if the I'm not a lawyer and I read this I'm not going to. I'm not going to understand that. But but it's going to be understood in law. Yes Sir the Arkansas law right now defined or or calls it racial profiling the not buys based I can tell you that all the policies and our training is inclusive of all biases because any policing based on any bias is wrong and illegal. But the the the definition. In Arkansas law of racial profiling. Include all these others. That's my understanding yes. That's not is affirmative as you were before. Of service for is a requirement for policies to be presented and the Arkansas law twelve twelve Fortino three requires a policy in racial profiling and so that I've got or attorney here and she probably has some more information on the legal part to that but the what the change was made not to eliminate other biases from policing but rather to and to to bring the statute in line with existing statute on racial profiling policy requirements but I think you want me to have a mandate to come up and talk a little bit more about that. The. Shares six with yes if you will okay. She can if the room at the end of the table are amended to side table where you wrote a chair day honoring all of you want to be playing musical chairs. Grab a map you will identify yourself please and you're recognized yes there are many are Committee are broke committee counsel for the commission on law enforcement standards and training. And to answer your question Senator yes twelve twelve fourteen no one specifically defines racial profiling to include race national origin ethnicity and religion so this is just bringing it in line racial profiling is defined in state statute. Okay so anywhere we find racial profiling in Arkansas law it includes all of those things yes Sir. Okay. Because most of us would not understand that all right thank you. Thank you have any other questions while I have you been there ten the table just a minute and this is for anyone there Senator Wallace or or whatever. Listening to the good testimony of the House alarm live streaming could you go back and pick up things that sometimes I don't think about in Malik's not directly On this bill is due can you tell me that with the task force find much change in the part time and auxiliary are we seeing much of the shift I know this that was some of the question being in there on the two for one and all. Can you can you just touch on it just a minute has there been much change. A so the the way that we have this bill written is to bring it in line with the requirements for auxiliary officers now so right now on auxiliary we can a department can have two auxiliaries per one full time so this statute just or this bill would bring the part time in line with that as well I think what you're referring to senator rice is the analysis that we did add prior to riding this legislation how many departments it would affect we we have reduce that now we're probably down around twenty twenty five departments that it could affect and we're still consistently trying to work with them to get them in line with this before it takes effect and or get them prepared to come before the commission to ask for a waiver and I believe correct to keep your state for the committee that that your testimony will use is is is the Commission are the board or whatever is going to work with all even the little small departments to make make sure there's not anything detrimental absolutely absolutely this is one of the committee to hear that. Any other questions. Senator so. What if one term is more inclusive why would would not change the other bill. The to be more inclusive and used a five set includes racial and gender why would we what would not let me change this bill to be compliance to the other one. It just seems like a language for general citizens don't understand that so I wouldn't. So the racial racial profiling of the House section and cold so number one we changed the to the question to be you know it to be much more understandable but that's not on this bill I appreciate Mister thank you. Senator Flippo you're recognized. Okay. The question for this witness if not we'll go back to the walls. Thank you Mister chair and twenty no other questions I'm closed. All right and Center for large if you will be on screen. I'm here I moved for a. do pass all right they have to do pass from center flowers second from center Johnson all in favor aye opposed. Senator Wallace and Richard Dever your bill passed thank you Mr chair thank you members thank you. We or. Have. Sixty two. Okay we have Senator Flippo go run the house bill twelve sixty nine cents and Flippo you're recognized when you get to the end of the table. Thank you Mr chairman thank you members Hospitales eighty nine what it does is it's going to allow counties the authority does that to designate by ordinance areas where golf carts to be driven on on streets you know the General Assembly years ago gave cities that that same authority as to what this does is just confer upon counties the same ability and I'll be happy to answer any questions. Member a question down the bill Senator Johnson you're recognized. Thank you Mr chairman Senator Flippo as this talk about the Nile and places like that we're residents use the golf carts is there yes I know that maybe younger children not acting in the most responsible manner. I didn't say that you did I just for the record Mr but I did not bring that up only Senator Flippo brought that up but but this is that because I do know him and have some familiarity because of a get my boat there for many years and there the local resident using golf carts obviously to go to the golf course but also to go to the marina and things like that so this is basically to. Codify legalized practice did certainly would apply there. Okay great thank you Sir thank you thank you Senator all right do we have any other questions. If not the take a motion center