The Madison Common Council voted just after midnight Wednesday to refer proposed changes to the ordinance governing the Office of the Independent Monitor (OIM) and Police Civilian Oversight Board (PCOB) to the PCOB for input and recommendations, and a Common Council vote on August 4.
The vote was 16-4, with Alders Ochowicz, Tishler, Field and Figueroa-Cole voting no.
The proposed amendments to the ordinance would give the PCOB greater accountability to the Common Council, specify that it is subject to City Administrative Policy Memos, require quarterly reports and require the OIM to use the city attorney for administrative tasks.
The PCOB and OIM were established in September 2020 to provide independent oversight of the Madison Police Department, analyze data, and investigate complaints from citizens.
The vote followed hours of public testimony from families of victims of police murders, youth justice advocates who have witnessed the traumatic impact of police interactions with children as young as 10 and 11, and a parade of commenters excoriating the common council for even appearing to get in the way of the IM’s mission.
Members of the PCOB and IM also provided anecdotes about their lack of resources and bristled at public attacks they claim have happened over the past several months.
City attorney Michael Haas came under fire earlier in the day when Meeka Glass, who serves as interim independent police monitor, alleged that he is “unequal” in handling inherent conflicts of interest in his role as city attorney.
Haas simultaneously represents the Madison police department, the office of the independent monitor, the common council and the mayor’s office, making it seemingly improbable that he could fulfill his duties to protect each of those entities equally if and when they may need to litigate against or investigate one another.
During the council meeting, former alder Rebecca Kemble, one of the primary authors of the ordinance which created the IM and PCOB, said that the work Glass is doing represents the intent of the ordinance.
“This body has been administratively captured until recently, until December (when Glass arrived in Madison),” Kemble said. “When I read this first report from our new IM, I broke down in tears. I thought, ‘my God we’re finally doing it.’ Do you guys know how precious this is?”
Amendments to the IM’s ordinance were put forth mostly by former alder MGR Govindarajan, who did not join in person but answered questions via Zoom.
Govindarajan called for more “transparency” and collaboration from the IM and detailed frustration that the IM does not provide more frequent reporting to common council and expressed fears surrounding city payouts in lawsuits which targeted the IM.
At one point, northside alder Carmella Glenn asked the Independent Monitor if she was willing to engage in such collaboration with members of the council and the city.
“I mean, I was,” Glass replied, referring to when she first arrived in Madison last December. “The lies that have come from this city leadership has caused me to believe I cannot. I’ve come to the table with everyone and there was no reason for this.”
Glass then expounded on what she has experienced since beginning her work in Madison. She referred to a three-hour meeting she and PCOB chair Maia Pearson had with city attorney Mike Haas during which she says agreements were made that Haas reneged on.
Glass also detailed how her office’s data analyst, Greg Gelembiuk, has been publicly slandered with allegations he mishandled sensitive data. Glass raised the possibility that Gelembiuk was also used as a fake source for a Wisconsin State Journal article.
“When you all ask MGR questions about what took place and there’s not an honest conversation, I don’t know if I can work with you all,” Glass said. “When I’ve seen Greg be dragged through the mud and there is no real context, I don’t know. I don’t know if I’m going to have another agreement for three hours, and then that be completely scrapped away.”
Glass said Madison Police chief John Patterson and assistant chief Angie Komaske- two of the very people Glass is tasked with overseeing- have been the easiest to work with out of everyone.
“I know I’ve been able to work with the chief, the people I have oversight of,” Glass said.
West side alder Barbara Harrington-McKinney has not often seen eye to eye with Gelembiuk and some of the supporters involved with getting the PCOB and IM off the ground.
But Harrington-McKinney said she has been impressed by the work Glass has done since coming to Madison.
“I had a conversation with (Glass) and it was very clear to me that a lot of what did not happen prior to her coming here was being shifted over to her, and I don’t think that’s fair,” Harrington-McKinney said.
Alder Glenn said the community needs to have the Independent Monitor succeed.
“This community deserves for us to give it our best shot every single time this office comes to the table,” Glenn told the other alders. “This office needs equity. It needs us to give it more than what we give something else. Don’t compare them to other committees, they are not the other committees.”
“They’re the committee for people that have been harmed by the city and the system we work for,” Glenn continued. “It is our duty to make sure we get it 100 percent right and that is going to take a little more time with the information we were given.”
Former council president Yannette Figueroa Cole voted against referring the item to a future meeting, stating that the council should continue the meeting “until 4am” if need be.
Glass goes public
On Monday, Glass released a public statement detailing what it alleged were false statements used to damage its office and what it called erroneous front-page headlines in the Wisconsin State Journal.
“False statements about this office and its staff have been used to manipulate news cycles,” Glass wrote in a press release Tuesday.
At the core of the issues facing the independent monitor is a duality in the role performed by Madison city attorney Michael Haas.
Haas is tasked with representing the mayor’s office, the common council, Madison Police Department and the office of the Independent Monitor. Haas’ role is to mitigate risk to the city and provide legal counsel to those entities.
The independent police monitor, however, is a watchdog that inherently provides risk to Madison police and, potentially, the city by investigating and uncovering wrongdoing.
Conflicts of interest abound with Haas in a situation where he simultaneously advises the monitor while also having to protect those whom the monitor investigates.
In separate interviews, both Glass and Police Civilian Oversight Board chair Maia Pearson flatly told Madison365 they do not believe Haas is performing those dual roles equally.
“It is a conflict to have a city attorney that is the police’s counsel and the independent monitor’s counsel,” Pearson said. “We have tried to get him to understand that fact.”
Glass publicly alleged the city attorney’s office has violated Madison’s general ordinance, which states, “No city employee or official shall attempt to use their political or administrative position to unduly influence or undermine the independence of the monitor.”
In a public statement on April 21, Glass pointed to the city attorney selectively applying statutes to obstruct the monitor’s mandated access to MPD while serving in his role as counsel to both entities and alleges the city attorney engaged in coordinating with alders’ amendments that restrict the monitor’s ability to get independent counsel (also while serving as the counsel for the monitor).
“The city attorney demanded that this office disclose all open investigations, citing insurance requirements, while simultaneously representing the department those investigations concern, with no independent counsel available to this office to challenge whether that demand is legally binding,” the public statement reads.
“I made it a point to say, you’re not equally representing all of your clients,” Glass told Madison365. “So, the answer is no, the city attorney is not supportive.”
The public statement, posted on the City of Madison website, lists several bullet points of alleged violations of Madison General Ordinances by city attorney Haas and threatens legal action as a result.
The independent monitor and the PCOB said it is vital that they are allowed to pursue outside legal counsel when they need to confront wrongdoings by police.
A spokesperson for the mayor said they already have the ability to do that and there is budget available for the monitor to get legal counsel in the amount of $50,000.
Beyond that, according to the spokesperson, the monitor will need to apply for money to be allocated to its office during budget season in October.
No such interview
Meanwhile, Glass alleges the Wisconsin State Journal orchestrated false statements in the media about her office.
According to Glass, Chief Patterson contacted her, saying that Gelembiuk had given a sit-down interview to the State Journal, claiming that MPD was denying the monitor access to data. Glass says Patterson told her he was being asked by city staff to respond to that interview.
“Gelembiuk gave no such interview,” Glass wrote in a statement. “Not a sit-down, not by phone, not in any form.”
Glass says that when she informed the chief Gelembiuk had not given any such interview, the chief responded that he had already given the State Journal a statement.
Glass also maintains that the State Journal published a story on April 17 with a headline that “Police watchdog mishandles sensitive data.”
“That headline exists because city staff told the chief something that was not true, did not correct it when the truth was available that same afternoon, and allowed a front page story to be published based on a fabrication,” Glass wrote in a statement.
Chief Patterson confronted the Independent Monitor’s office about Gelembiuk using a personal laptop to store MPD data.
Some of that data, according to Patterson, contained sensitive information, including the names of crime victims, that it was completely inappropriate for any person to have on their personal laptop.
Gelmbiuk disputes that, and told Madison365 that he “never even had crime victim information” on his personal laptop.
Gelembiuk, Glass said, did use his personal device because city IT would not give him access to the software he needed to perform proper data analytics and he was forced to use his own resources to get that software.
Amend that
Glass has been doing police oversight work for more than 15 years and is dismayed at how far behind Madison is compared to other cities with independent police oversight.
“100% yes, Madison is behind,” Glass told Madison365. “Madison created one of the most powerful ordinances in the country. I wanted to come here and do the work without fighting the same fights like ones we had with police unions fifteen years ago.”
Glass said her office’s charter is powerful.
“This model (that Madison has) represents everything that has been needed, that people have been fighting for,” Glass said.
Her disappointment with Madison’s politics could not be hidden.
“The city is now trying to take away the power of the ordinance because they see what it can actually do,” she said.
MPD, city attorney Michael Haas, and the office of Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway were all contacted for this story. Most wish to provide statements following the vote at Council.
