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In the wake of protests against police brutality and calls to reform police culture, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti announced Monday the expansion of a bureau within the Los Angeles Police Department designed to be build relationships between LAPD officers and communities of color.
Protests sprang up around the U.S. in May after the death of George Floyd, who died while in the custody of Minneapolis police officers. Taking the spotlight in the protest was the Black Lives Matter movement which called for a defunding of police departments across the country. In July, the Los Angeles City Council voted to cut the LAPD's budget by $150 million. Garcetti said the creation of the Community Safety Partnership (CSP) bureau represents a "big step forward" in the arena of police reform.
According to Garcetti during a Monday news conference, the CSP will help "ensure equity and justice and fairness for every Angeleno."
Currently used in some public housing areas, the CSP will be broken out on a larger scale within Los Angeles. Officers are expected to be assigned to neighborhoods for up to five years. According to the LAPD, the efficiency of police work will be rated differently in the CSP.
"Rather than defining an officer's productivity by stops, citations, and arrests, the measure of their work is demonstrated by increased community capacity and feelings of overall safety and security," read a Monday release from the LAPD. "This is the essence of a guardian mentality, and it will become the lens through which all future LAPD policing initiatives are developed and evaluated."
Garcetti said the program would be part of a "wider strategy of reducing force" inside the LAPD.
Newsweek reached out to the office of California Governor Gavin Newsom for comment.
Garcetti's announcement comes after a June vote by the LA City Council to replace armed officers with unarmed responders to non-violent police calls, such as disputes between neighbors, substance abuse and mental health issues.
President Donald Trump has been adamant that police forces will not be defunded during his time in office. Trump has attempted to align his political opponent, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, with the movement to pull funding from police departments.
"The radical politicians are waging war on innocent Americans," Trump said in July. "If that's what you want for a country, you probably have to vote for Sleepy Joe Biden because he doesn't know what's happening, but you are not going to have that with me."
Trump has encouraged some forms of police reform. In June, Trump signed the Safe Policing for Safe Communities executive order. Under the order, the usage of choke holds by police officers is banned "except in those situations where the use of deadly force is allowed by law." No knock warrants, where officers do not have to identify themselves, were also discouraged but not prohibited.
Some Democrats did not believe President Trump's order went far enough to protect citizens. In a June statement, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called Trump's executive order "weak"."
Pelosi said the order "falls sadly and seriously short of what is required to combat the epidemic of racial injustice and police brutality to that is murdering hundreds of Black Americans."
