On Thursday, March 11, the village posted a draft of its New York State Police Reform and Reinvention Collaborative document on its website. It was prepared by Olio Consulting of Ballston Spa.

In an effort to modernize policing in the state, Gov. Andrew Cuomo issued Executive Order 203 on June 12, 2020. It requires local law enforcement agencies to review their use of force policies and develop plans to improve them in ways that would promote community engagement “to foster trust, fairness, and legitimacy, and to address any racial bias and disproportionate policing of communities of color.” The plans must address items such as implicit bias training, deescalation, hot-spot policing, environmental design to deter crime, community-based outreach and violence prevention programs.

The executive order was issued in response to the police-involved death of George Floyd on May 25 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and subsequent protests organized by Black Lives Matter and other groups throughout the country.

Lake Placid’s police reform plan includes a proposal that the village police department continue to contract with Lexipol and implement a new policy manual drafted by that national law enforcement consulting firm. Lake Placid police have been working with Lexipol for more than three years.

“Our general orders are changing through Lexipol, and that’s probably the biggest piece we put into the police reform,” Lake Placid Police Chief Bill Moore said Tuesday, March 16. “I don’t think any of them were really based on one gender, one race or one sex in general anyway. But I think it’s a good thing we’re rolling this out so it brings awareness.”

Officials involved in implementing the executive order “have thoroughly reviewed each policy, practice and procedure to ensure that there is no room for racial bias in their community,” the plan states.

In the use-of-force policy, the option for officers to implement any use of force that restricts airflow has been eliminated. New York state banned police from using chokeholds in June 2020.

The plan also says the implementation of Lexipol was an “intelligent step” for the village and was “based on Lexipol having a proven ability to provide policies that are clear, direct, and fair for not only the community but for the officers as well.” The contract “not only provides a fair and just Police Manual free of racial-bias, but is also an annually renewed contract to ensure that policies are kept up to date as laws change,” the plan states.

Short-term goals of the plan include implementing the Lexipol Policy Manual into practice, training staff on the new manual, requiring diversity training for staff, providing training opportunities for officers in deescalation and mental health awareness, and increasing officer involvement within the community in official capacities.

Long-term goals include increasing officer-involved programming in the community (youth programming, community conversations, etc.), completing safety planning for the 2023 Winter World University Games, adding officer training opportunities to enhance response to the community’s needs, and increasing the use of social media to notify the community of possible health or safety concerns.

The Lake Placid Police Department currently has 18 employees: a chief, assistant chief, sergeant, 10 full-time patrol officers, two part-time patrol officers, an executive assistant and two officers for traffic control and parking enforcement.

Staff have already begun racial bias training led by RENZ Consulting and hosted by the Adirondack Diversity Initiative, according to Moore. The training is free and presented virtually as a webinar.

Asked what the police reform process has done for the Lake Placid Police Department, Moore said, “I guess make us more aware, brought more of an awareness as far as race, gender biases that maybe people thought existed prior to that.”

Asked if it was worth doing, he added, “I think at the end of the day, the best thing that it did was open up lines of communication, and communication with your community is a great thing. I’m not trying to reinvent the wheel. I want to see what other people have to say and use their thoughts and input into what we do on a daily basis.”

Lake Placid’s review process started late last year. Unlike other neighboring villages such as Saranac Lake, which put together a Saranac Lake Police Reform Committee and held numerous public meetings, Lake Placid’s review process has largely happened behind closed doors. The village hired Olio Consulting in October to guide the review process, spearheaded by company CEO Theresa Wilson. In her proposal, Wilson suggested public forums be held in November and December. Ultimately the village decided to host one “community listening session,” which happened in February. No one, apart from village staff, attended the session.

“There’s been very little input on police reform, but I did get a lot of phone calls and inquiries just about how our community had previously handled complaints,” Moore said. He added that in his time as chief, he’s never received a racial complaint against one of his police officers.

In addition to the police chief, residents, stakeholders and village office staff, the following people helped Olio Consulting with the plan: Mayor Craig Randall; trustees Art Devlin, Peter Holderied, Jason Leon and Scott Monroe (a retired Lake Placid police chief); and Assistant Police Chief Chuck Dobson.

The draft plan is available for review on the village of Lake Placid website, “http://villageoflakeplacid.ny.gov” rel=”noopener noreferrer” target=”_blank”>http://villageoflakeplacid.ny.gov. Click “police reform” on the quick link to the left. All public comments must be sent to Olio Consulting at olioconsultingny@gmail.com by 4 p.m. Saturday, March 20. The subject line in the email should read “Village of Lake Placid.” Comments will be reviewed, and the final plan will be updated if necessary.

The village board will hold a special board meeting on Monday, March 29, after a public hearing on Local Law No. 1 of 2021 (codification of local laws and ordinances into a new “Code of the Village of Lake Placid”), which starts at 5 p.m. Board members expect to adopt the final police reform plan at that time before sending it to the State Budget Office.

(Staff Writer Elizabeth Izzo contributed reporting.)