Tsaike Brundige had plans when he moved to Virginia. They involved his career, his physical health, and his social life. Becoming an activist on racial profiling issues wasn’t on his list. But before he had even unloaded his furniture, he had been stopped by police officers in circumstances that disturbed him. He began to research the related law, planning to defend himself in court. When officers came to his house, apparently to intimidate him, he says now, “I knew that I was in for a tough fight — but I chose not to back down.” Not long afterwards, through a local group called Unity in the Community, he made contact with VOP, and became part of VOP’s statewide campaign committee on racial profiling.

In November, he was part of the second VOP delegation to meet with Leonard Cooke, director of the Department of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS), the Virginia agency which assists law enforcement around the Commonwealth.

In the process of developing ideas and building support during 2006, VOP leaders also met with representatives of the Virginia Sheriffs Association and the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police, and participated in a workshop at the annual conference of the Virginia State Convention of the NAACP. At the NAACP Conference, Tsaike shared his experiences, and found they struck a deep chord with other NAACP members.

Ralph Cooper, another member of the VOP Racial Profiling Strategy Committee, is a retired U.S. Army officer with 20 years service. His wife and daughter went with him when he served in posts like Saudi Arabia, and experienced no disrespect or discomfort. But in Northern Virginia, they experienced the humiliation of being detained a few blocks from their home for no good reason, while Ralph waited for them and wondered what was happening. He also is concerned about “our young war heroes returning from the Global War on Terrorism who are stopped in Virginia while Driving While Black (DWB) due to racial profiling.”

Cooper, who is also Legal Redress Chair of the Fairfax County Branch of the NAACP, took a leading role in the passage of a resolution by the Virginia NAACP’s 2006 annual conference. The resolution called on local Branches to “advocate and monitor law enforcement personnel statewide to ensure that they are are properly trained about racial bias and its harmful affect on law enforcement and the communities they serve.”

Like the other members of the VOP Racial Profiling Strategy Committee, Cooper supports data collection, which was VOP’s goal at the 2005 and 2006 sessions of the General Assembly. In a September conference call of the Committee, Cooper said, “Data collection is an objective means to see how people of different races are treated by law enforcement officers.”

But, Cooper also said, “I am open to training legislation as a first step. I know from my military experience that trainers with expertise in understanding and interpreting racial diversity — operating from more than just hearsay and local officer experience — can make a critical difference.”

Richael Faithful, an original member of the VOP Racial Profiling Strategy Committee, noted in an e-mail, “Virginia has the longest negative track record on data collection of any state.” She agreed that, on racial profiling, VOP should present “a menu of legislative options to legislators and law enforcement, in part simply to demonstrate that we have been listening to their objections and concerns.” When it came to training, however, she felt strongly that “we should focus on getting training on bias-based policing specifically, not on cultural diversity as a broad concept.”

Another reason that VOP has looked closely at law enforcement training this year is an exciting new effort by VOP members and others in the Harrisonburg area. Representatives of Copwatch, the Rockingham/ Harrisonburg NAACP Branch, the Latino community and the Kurdish immigrant community, as well as other Harrisonburg area residents, have been working on a community-based training program for Rockingham Sheriff’s Deputies and the Harrisonburg Police Department. The Police Diversity Training group, which has had local law enforcement officers working as part of their group, hopes to put this program on before spring comes. This effort helped VOP envision how communities could be an active part of the training process.

So the VOP Racial Profiling Strategy Committee came to the table this year with a new approach — with nine principles that would lead to improved training on biased policing in Virginia. Rev. Millard Boone, who played a key role in developing these principles, built on the experience of his own denomination, the United Church of Christ.

“We have learned a lot in my denomination about how skilled people can change behaviors based on longstanding attitudes,” Rev. Boone said. “I have great hopes that our law enforcement officers can benefit from similar support.”

Danica Jamison of Staunton, another Committee member, wrote in an e-mail that without real improvements in training, “Virginia residents and travelers might not see any real changes in racial profiling for a long, long time.”

VOP members in Virginia Beach had established a good working relationship with their state Senator, Ken Stolle, after meeting with him last year. Senator Stolle is chair of the Courts of Justice Committee, and also of the Virginia Crime Commission, and speaks with a powerful voice on criminal justice issues. Some of his constituents, joined by Richael Faithful, met with Senator Stolle several times, and found him willing to take actions that the Committee felt would advance the principles it had come up with.

In the 2007 General Assembly session, Senator Stolle plans to do the following:

• Introduce and work for budget language that would provide Virginia’s law enforcement academies with the funding they need to provide adequate bias-based policing training, and that would also require all local Virginia law enforcement to adopt DCJS’ model policy on bias-based policing.

The Virginia Organizing Project strongly supports Senator Stolle’s proposals, which would closely track VOP principles in these ways:

1. All law enforcement departments in Virginia would finally be covered by a policy against bias-based policing.
2. DCJS and the law enforcement academies around Virginia would have the resources to provide more adequate training to reduce bias-based policing.
3. Local community groups concerned about bias-based policing would be able to work through their local Community Criminal Justice Board to approach the issue. (There is a Board covering every locality in Virginia.)
4. DCJS and the academies would have more resources to evaluate the effectiveness of their training on this issue.
5. DCJS and the academies would have more resources to hire more qualified trainers with culturally diverse experience.
6. VOP has a commitment from DCJS for further conversations on this issue, and hopes to bring in other organizations, such as the NAACP and the Virginia Coalition of Latino Organizations.
7. If every department has a policy against bias-based policing, then all officers must be trained to that policy during their regular in-service training which must occur every two years — and if this was no longer an unfunded mandate, there would be more support for this.
8. Adequate funding for training has been a concern of VOP from the beginning on this issue, and this is also Senator Stolle’s goal.
9. Disseminating information on best practices is already being done by the Department of Criminal Justice Services, and there should be much more to disseminate.

“VOP hopes that people of good will all over the Commonwealth will ask their legislators to support Senator Stolle’s proposals, which we believe reflect both the best law enforcement practices and a real respect for Virginians of color,” said Kate McCord of Williamsburg.

For more information on the VOP racial profiling campaign, contact Larry Yates at (540) 436-3432 or llyates@shentel.net.