The January 21, 2020, City Council meeting kicked off with a special recognition session for two firefighters that were recently promoted. Greg Elliot, who has been with the Champaign Fire Department for 10 years was promoted to Fire Engineer. Jeff Jones, with 35 years of firefighting under his belt (21…
On January 14, 2020, City Council met for a study session regarding Champaign City Code, Chapter 24: Special Events Ordinance. Deputy City Manager, Matt Roeschley, walked City Council members through the proposed amendments to the ordinance initially discussed in April 2019. During the prior study session, council discussed city policy…
At the January 8th, 2020 Champaign Citizen Review Subcommittee (CRS) meeting, board members spent some time discussing the suggested changes to the police complaint process, a discussion that has been simmering for at least the past year. The ordinance which created the CRS in 2017 specifically tasks the 5 member…
The first City Council meeting of 2020 started with City of Champaign Township Supervisor Andy Quarnstrom announcing the hire of two new personnel. The first hire, U of I social worker intern will mainly assist with the Emergency Rent Assistance Program. Their second hire is a Program Director for Prosperity…
Urbana City Council meetings ran long on November 25th and December 2nd of 2019 as a result of discussion on one particular agenda item: armed “school resource officers” in Urbana schools. At both meetings, members of the public, Urbana Police Chief Bryant Seraphin, and Council members spoke at length. The…
At the October 23rd, 2019 meeting of the Urbana Civilian Police Review Board (CPRB), it was revealed that board members had not been receiving copies of citizen police complaints for the past several years. Apparently, the Urbana Police Department simply stopped issuing copies to the board, and neither City staff…
The 2019 October 23rd meeting of the Urbana Civilian Police Review Board (CPRB) was a treasure of revelations about the shortcomings and failures of not just the CPRB ordinance itself, but also the Urbana City staff that have been manipulating the process. At the meeting, one mind-blowing realization was that…
On October 23rd 2019, citizens spoke at the Urbana Citizen Police Review Board (CPRB) meeting, questioning its efficacy, and more specifically, how city staff handle the process. Of particular note, board members heard complaints about Human Resources Director Todd Rent, who has repeatedly refused to deliver public records to complainants.…
The Urbana Civilian Police Review Board (CPRB) met on October 23, 2019 with only four of the seven members present. Mikhail Lyubansky, Ricardo Diaz, Darrell Price, and new board member Darius White were in attendance, forming the quorum. After council’s approval of minutes for the July 24th meeting (article here),…
At the July 24th, 2019 meeting of the Urbana Civilian Police Review Board (article here), founding member Scott Dosset called for a “special meeting” to discuss police Taser policy and reviews. The controversy which led to this request began when Urbana Police Lt. Richard Surles announced that the Police Department…
