October 8

Carl Crawford reaches out to a select group of community representatives requesting they attend a meeting about the public forums.

Carl contacted the representatives on the morning of October 8th to invite them to a meeting about the forums at 3:00pm that same day. The group invited excluded many of the involved community members/leaders actively working on the issue.

Through previous communications and relationships with community organizations, the City of Duluth had access to the contact information of all of the leaders who had been involved in organizing against the riot gear purchase, but only initially invited approximately five of them.  At this point, no official email from the city had been sent to the community leaders involved. Community organizers attempted to include all organizations that had been a part of the conversations so far, but because of the last-minute notice, attendance was limited. Additionally, although some community members had been sure to explicitly give their contact information to the Human Rights Officer (Carl Crawford), they were continuing to be left off of invitation lists.

At that meeting, participants were told by Carl Crawford,  Keith Hamre (Interim Administrative Officer – City of Duluth), and Phil Jents (Community Relations Officer – City of Duluth) that the meeting was about planning the forums. In other words, the forums’ program and/or facilitation had not been planned prior to 3:00 PM the day before the first forum (other than setting dates and booking rooms). During the meeting, a specific request was made that officers be asked to not come in uniform, as it can make community members with traumatic relationships with police feel unsafe and unwilling to participate. Hamre agreed to this ask. It was also stated multiple times that the forums were a place to gather information on both policy and whether or not the purchase should be made at all, per the request of the CRB. Specific questions were formulated to get at that question of whether or not the city should purchase the riot gear.

During this meeting Carl, Keith, and Archie Davis (President of the CRB) all stated that there was not adequate time to plan the forums. Keith and Archie understood that Carl did not reach out before scheduling the forums because he felt pressed for time. The city administration could have – publicly or privately – recommended to the City Council that they provide more time, but did not do so. Content, times, and dates for the forum were decided without full input from the CRB and then presented as CRB forums.

IMPACT: The lack of effort around communication and planning for these meetings and forums demonstrates yet again the City of Duluth’s lack of concern for real community engagement and input. Because only some folks have been contacted for meetings on any given occasion, the community feels they cannot trust the city to effectively gather folks for a meeting.