City of Boston, Massachusetts Office of the Mayor MICHELLE WU October 4, 2023 Boston City Council 1 City Hall Square, Suite 550 Boston, MA 02201-2043 Dear Councilors, ‘Thank you for convening the recent hearing on Dockets #1476-1479 regarding funding for the Boston Regional Intelligence Center (BRIC) from the Massachusetts Executive Office of Public Safety and Security, held on Friday, September 29th. Our Intergovernmental Relations team is in contact with Committee Chair Flaherty to provide further information and data requested at that hearing, but I also wanted to personally follow up in response to questions raised about why I voted against this grant several years ago as a councilor and am now requesting authorization on these dockets as mayor. On June 30, 2021, | joined a majority of the Boston City Council in voting No on a motion to accept and expend grant funding for the BRIC, following the recommendation of the then-committce chair. The chair had not planned for a vote on the docket at that meeting, as she had not yet received a response from the then-administration about questions from the prior hearing, but the docket was pulled out of committee from the floor by another colleague for a vote over the objections of the committee chair. At the time, I shared particular concerns about the BRIC’s management of the gang assessment database and how surveillance was being used to further a school-to-deportation or school-to-prison pipeline. ‘The news of a 2018 deportation case involving an East Boston High School student—who had been apprehended by federal immigration authorities after being added to the BPD gang assessment database—highlighted the need for reforms on several levels, starting with the Council's 2019 amendments updating the Boston Trust Act to strengthen prohibitions on information sharing between Boston Police and federal immigration authorities. As this case made its way through the court system, in January 2022, a federal court ruled that immigration authorities must allow the former student to continue his claim for asylum rather than face deportation, citing flaws in the gang assessment database's reliance at that time on ‘unsubstantiated inferences.Since the events of that case, and since the June 2021 Council vote, several consequential policy and leadership changes have been implemented such that the BRIC and Boston Police Department operate in a significantly different environment today: In October 2021, the Council unanimously passed the ordinance for community, ‘oversight aver surveillance that I helped co-author and introduce alongside a coalition ‘of advocates. The ordinance includes a section specifically regulating information sharing related to BPS students and school community members. In 2021 the Boston Police Department issued new regulations governing the gang assessment database to amend criteria related to assessment, verification, and review; +o require removing information on any inactive individuals on a regular basis; and to require annual reporting. Since then, 609 names were purged from the database in 2021 and 1,836 in 2022. In July 2021, Boston's ordinance creating the Office of Police Accountability and ‘Transparency (OPA) went into effect, with the full board appointed in January 2022. This office exists to investigate complaints of police misconduct and review Boston Police policies and procedures. ‘The Massachusetts Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) Commission, created by state legislation in December 2020, went into effect in April 2021 and began releasing official reports in March 2023, as a new layer of oversight over certification, discipline, and training for all officers statewide. In August 2022, Commissioner Michael Cox took the helm of the Boston Police Department with a focus on building community trust through transparency and community policing. In July 2023 Superintendent Luis Cruz became the Bureau Chief of Intelligence and Analysis overseeing the BRIC, and over the summer additional key leadership roles were filled to focus on diversity in recruitment and retention across the entire department. In April 2023, the City of Boston launched a Violence Reduction Workshop to build specific and coordinated plans to tackle gun violence based on a data-informed, community-driven approach, led by Senior Advisor for Community Safety Dr. Isaac Yablo with a coalition of departments and partners, As we continue to build out infrastructure for violence prevention and intervention, the BRIC has been an integral part of setting the strategy for partnerships and collective action across the service providers ecosystem, In June 2023, Commissioner Cox launched the Community COMPSTAT initiative to share information and data directly with residents based on identified community concerns, with a goal to support ongoing efforts to build trust within all of Boston's neighborhoods through community engagement, transparency, collaboration, and collective problem-solving.Our administration introduced these BRIC grant dockets in September 2023, only after setting a solid foundation for accountability and coordination with the steps outlined above and many others. The funds would support additional civilian positions, including four analysts to monitor active events and communicate in real time, two to coordinate with Massachusetts State Police, Transit Police and MassPort Police, and two analysts to ensure sustainability for the Community COMPSTAT initiative to reach all neighborhoods. In order to most effectively deploy our investments and resources to reduce gun violence and other types of crime within our neighborhoods, we must invest in public safety intelligence and analysis. From reimagining community outreach and coordination of providers, to engaging high-risk individuals with high-quality supports, and boosting investments in the micro-places where violence concentrates—our community safety efforts rely on detailed and accurate intelligence to guide all City agencies to close gaps through deploying coordinated resources, and services. Having spent many hours learning about the operations of our police department and the BRIC, I know there is no substitute for firsthand observation and discussion with our frontline first responders. We encourage you all to take the time to visit the BRIC and continue to engage on data and policies going forward. With the leadership, culture, and oversight in place today, Tam confident in the Boston Police Department's capacity and commitment to keep our communities safe, and will continue to ensure that Boston is implementing necessary changes to build community trust and collaboration, respectfully urge your Honorable Body to approve these dockets for the deployment of resources to build safety and trust in our neighborhoods. Thank you for your partnership. Sincerely, Michelle Wu Mayor of Boston