He Says a Union Fired Him Over His Push for Police Reform

“We are constantly talking to our brothers and sisters in those unions about these issues,” he said. “No one has shut a door. Obviously there are issues that law enforcement unions have against some of the more popular demands that are being made nationwide.”

The limits of internal labor dialogue have also become apparent. In Seattle, the police union responded to the labor council’s ultimatum with a letter acknowledging that structural racism causes “undue harm” to people of color and promising “to embrace reform and accountability.” The two sides had what was by all accounts an earnest discussion of the problem during a two-and-a-half hour meeting, yet the labor council still voted to expel the police union.

Their views may have simply been irreconcilable. Near the end of the conversation, Nicole Grant, the labor council’s executive secretary-treasurer, cited the killing of a mentally disturbed woman by the Seattle police in 2017, after the woman reportedly brandished a knife, as evidence that policing needed to be rethought.

“I said this can never happen in Seattle again,” Ms. Grant recalled. But she said the union head, Mike Solan, interpreted the episode differently. “Solan’s response was that it was tragic, but that it will happen again,” because of human nature, Ms. Grant said.

Mr. Solan said in an interview that the death reflected a breakdown of other systems, not policing, and that the police had de-escalated a similar situation involving the same woman two weeks earlier, but that her behavior had remained erratic after a judge released her from custody. “For de-escalation to work, it takes two parties,” he said. “The person on the other end of police interaction has a say in how that interaction goes.”

In some ways, the differences between Mr. Acevero, the Maryland lawmaker who was fired from his union position, and his boss at the union, Mr. Renne, proved equally insurmountable.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/01/business/economy/police-unions-labor.html