By  Rev. Dr. Linda Smith

and Police Chief Kevin Milosevich

In March 2015, the Renton Police Department partnered with the African-American Pastoral Group in Renton to build trust between law enforcement and the Renton community. The purpose of this partnership is to facilitate a frank and open dialogue to encourage communication, involvement, understanding, trust and respect in the Renton community in general, and more specifically between the Renton Police Department and the black community in Renton.

This group is co-chaired by the Rev. Dr. Linda Smith and Police Chief Kevin Milosevich. The following is joint statement from Smith and Milosevich, released through the City:

The United States has a long history of mistrust and adversarial relationships between law enforcement and the African-American community. Recent events in different parts of the country have brought national attention to the importance of strong police-community relationships.

In Renton, we are taking proactive measures to build trust and positive relationships between the African-American community and the Police Department. We believe our partnership and approach is a unique and pioneering effort to make real change in our community and be a role-model for other communities.

“We from the African American clergy of Renton are very pleased to join forces with the City of Renton and its law enforcement department to be the change we want to see in our community,” said Dr. Linda Smith in a statement. “We believe that we can be the change that will mirror what ‘justice for all’ looks like to the world. As we move forward, our goal is to engage our community, educate our youth, strengthen relationships with law enforcement, and review and revise policies and practices to promote equity.”

“As law enforcement leaders, each of us has an essential obligation and unique opportunity to ensure fairness, eliminate bias, and build community engagement,” said Police Chief Kevin Milosevich. “Our partnership with the African American pastors and other major faith community leaders in Renton allow us to build on the pioneering work we are already doing to emphasize inclusion and equity in our city.”

The partners meet monthly to exchange experiences, address issues and questions from the community and plan a series of ongoing community forum / dialogue sessions.

The first forum was held on June 20 at Renton High School in partnership with the Renton School District. The forum was open to all but there was an additional emphasis on youth. The forum attracted over 80 participants and about a third of them were youth.

The second forum, “Real Issues, Real Solutions,” was held on Nov. 14. Despite it being a rainy windy day several members of the community attended, reflecting a spectrum of the community in terms of age, gender, race, culture, faiths and other dimensions.

The forums were designed for small group discussions and each group was co-facilitated by a pastor and a member of the police department. The group discussions were very lively and characterized by candid conversations, tough questions addressed to police personnel and engaged listening.

Themes that emerged from the most recent forum included building authentic relationships among community and police, preferably one-on-one; increased understanding of each other’s expectations and needs; and joint accountability for both community and police as they work together to address these issues.

The next forum is tentatively scheduled for Feb. 15.

And as one discussion group stated in the forum this past Saturday, “we need to build a non-hostile relationship between the police and our community. There are many components to this and it won’t happen overnight. This is for the long term, but we can create opportunities now.”

The column was written by the The Rev. Dr. Linda Smith, SKY Urban Empowerment Center, and Chief Kevin Milosevich, Renton Police Department.