County Organizations Roundup

The first meetings of the year can be helpful in catching up with local organizations and what they're planning in the year ahead. Regardless of when you attend your first meeting, however, the most important step is just showing up! This post has updates on the NAACP of Champaign County, Champaign County Reentry Council, and Champaign County Community Coalition.

NAACP of Champaign County:

This month the NAACP of Champaign County didn't have a regular meeting, but it did have its second Q&A meeting on the COVID vaccine and additional concerns within the community about implementation, safety, and building trust. For folks who missed it, the Community Coalition had a brief presentation from C-UPHD's Julie Pryde and Dr. Oliphant here (COVID presentation starts at roughly the 35:34 minute:second mark and Dr. Oliphant's comments start at roughly 41:20).

The local NAACP was also in the news this week for its feedback on the City of Urbana's attempts to reform its use of force policies:

But the changes did not please many of the public commenters at Monday’s city council meeting, including the leaders of the Champaign County branches of the ACLU and NAACP.

“Overall, this policy fails to accomplish the purpose of protecting the public from excessive use of force, or other misconduct by police, nor is it designed to substantially diminish the number of incidents in which force is used,” past president of the local ACLU Carol Spindel said on behalf of her organization and the local NAACP. “And really, this is a policy for the 20th century, not the 21st.”

...

And local NAACP President Minnie Pearson called “weak” the language that says “tactical de-escalation should be used whenever feasible.”

“The word feasible kind of troubled me,” she said. “I thought a better word would be ‘shall.’”

Full article here. The local branch has also been heavily involved in seeking reforms in Unit 4 schools and its search for a new Superintendent. The News-Gazette had an update on the three superintendent finalists for the position here. Video of their community presentations is available from the Unit 4 website here along with a link for community feedback.

Champaign County Reentry Council:

The Champaign County Reentry Council had its first meeting of the year last week as well. My last update on the Cheat Sheet was pre-pandemic (post available here) so a quick reminder of what the Reentry Council is:

The purpose of the Reentry Council of Champaign County is to provide a means of communication and coordination among community organizations, public officials, advocates, and others involved in the community response to persons returning to Champaign County from incarceration in federal prison, state prison, or the county jail. The Council also receives and reviews data regarding jail bookings, jail-based screenings, and connections to services for the purpose of coordinating community services and planning. The Council receives regular reports from organizations providing reentry and related services, reviews funding opportunities, and recommends actions which will enhance public safety, reduce recidivism, and improve outcomes for those returning from incarceration and their families.

The constituencies with voting representation on the Council are the Champaign County Board, the Champaign County Sheriff’s Office, the Champaign County Mental Health Board, the State's Attorney's Office, the Judiciary, the County Jail, Champaign County Health Care Consumers, Champaign County Probation, U.S. Probation, Rosecrance Central Illinois, the Champaign County Continuum of Care, Champaign County Housing Authority, Champaign County Regional Planning Commission, FirstFollowers, Ann's House, GROW, State of Illinois Department of Corrections Parole, TASC, a law enforcement representative, a liaison from the Crisis Intervention Team Steering Committee, and a designated Citizen Representative.

Each month the Council meets and goes over data related to the reentry population and connecting them to services to meet their needs as well as presentations from various agencies and reentry programs locally. This month's meeting had a lot of updates on mitigation changes and how various agencies and programs have had to adapt to providing services during the pandemic.

There was an active discussion supportive of bringing IDOC's Summit of Hope expo back to the Champaign-Urbana area for connecting parolees and probationers to local services. There was also some follow up to an opportunity for agencies to make short videos that would play in the prisons to let the people housed there know about reentry programs and services they may need.

The Housing Authority of Champaign County also has a flyer posted in its news section this month of one of the programs they're working on for reentry populations: The 2nd Chance Eviction Prevention Program. 

Champaign County Community Coalition:

The Community Coalition meeting (video, agenda) included updates on a COVID-19 youth messaging campaign, information on today's MLK Jr. Celebration (which will include live remarks from civil rights activist Reverend Barber), and a the COVID presentation mentioned above (starting at 35:34 in the video). 

The Coalition has regular updates on gun violence and other issues in their Police Chiefs' Update in which the local chiefs of law enforcement present updates to the community. The increase in shootings and gun violence mirrored an article earlier this month in the News-Gazette:

What police are finding is that not only are there more shootings, but there has been a significant increase in the amount of firepower.

Consider, for example, a Dec. 4 incident in which two men in a vehicle fired at Champaign County sheriff’s deputies trying to stop their vehicle for speeding. When the car they were in was ultimately stopped, police found an AR-15 assault rifle, two handguns and a drum magazine that can hold 50 to 100 bullets.

“Most officers don’t even carry 50 bullets on their person,” said Champaign police Sgt. Dave Griffet, a police officer for 30 years.

That full article here. There were also some updates on getting back to school this spring at Unit 4 and District 116 with the latest mitigation rules and strategies.