San Mateo County Community College District examines police academy

The police academy is housed by the district but school officials have no authority over instruction, which is shaped by the Peace Officer Standards and Training commission and law enforcement agencies.

But with intense recent focus on use of force and cultural sensitivity training for police, as well as discussions around mental and emotional health issues, Trustee Dave Mandelkern said he felt it was due time to assess the program.

“We have a responsibility to understand what is happening in that building,” said Mandelkern.

Academy President Linda Vaughn assured officials the program, which is run in partnership with courses in San Jose and Monterey, is acutely aware of the need for community-minded officers who are prepared to avoid violent confrontations.

“If there is no communication, then there can be no de-escalation,” said Vaughn, regarding the value of building relationships and trust to prevent using force.

The academy accommodates cadets who aspire to be police officers, and works with police departments throughout the county to train professionals already on local forces.

Vaughn also noted that the academy is addressing most of the policies raised in the #8CantWait campaign, which was formed following Floyd’s killing as a recommendation to avoid more lethal police encounters.

For his part, Mandelkern believed more could be done to assure those in the academy are comfortable intervening when they witness misconduct by a colleague, and he additional focus is in order to prepare officers when engaging with someone experiencing a mental health crisis.

He also said he would like to see academies have more authority to weed out those who demonstrate behavior suggesting they may not be fit for law enforcement careers.

Vaughn suggested she agreed, but said officials are often at the mercy of policy preventing the academy from obstructing a cadet’s advancement.

“If they are passing all the tests and they are doing everything we are asking them to do, unfortunately, we don’t currently have an ability to flunk people out of a college class for an attitude,” said Vaughn, regarding instances in which officials identify a cadet exhibiting troubling behavior.

Absent the ability to push such a cadet out of the program, Vaughn said the most that can be done is detail the concerns in a personnel file, which would empower a law enforcement agency or police department to take appropriate action.

In turn, Mandelkern and Trustee Maurice Goodman advocated for education policy amendments to grant academies more latitude to take action.

Furthermore, Goodman said he favored pursuing additional measures assuring the atrocities of the past are prevented by improved law enforcement techniques.

“With enactment of community policing you still see deaths, you still see stops, you still see profiling. So it is historically disproportionate against people of color … that is the history of this country, and it is not going to change unless we start to critically look at some of these policies,” said Goodman.

Vaughn agreed there is room for improvement, and committed to working alongside officials to continuously refine the academy’s approach.

“We are not doing everything right, and we want to be better,” she said.

In other news, officials approved extending the contract with private fitness company Exos to operate the San Mateo Athletic Club at the College of San Mateo for one more year.

Officials will also issue a request for proposals to seek other companies which may be interested in running the gym, and they will look into the costs associated with the district running the facility as well. No decision was made regarding the contract for the athletic facility under construction at Cañada College.

The San Mateo Athletic Club has been closed since the stay-at-home order was issued due to health threats posed by the pandemic. The gym and swimming pool is expected to reopen in early July.

austin@smdailyjournal.com

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