NYC NOW - September 6, 2023: Midday News

Episode Date: September 6, 2023

The New York City Council will hear arguments Wednesday in support of a bill that would increase awareness of the dangers of illegal cannabis products. Also, New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has signed a law that reinforces a person's right to interracial marriage. Finally, The NYPD is vowing to change the way officers respond to protests in New York City. This comes after a proposed settlement was announced this week to resolve lawsuits accusing police of violating demonstrators' rights during the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests.

Welcome to NYC Now. Your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Wednesday, September 6th. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. New Jersey is now protecting a person's right to interracial marriage in case the federal government ever does not. Governor Phil Murphy yesterday signed a law that reinforces that people in the Garden State are entitled to marriage or a civil union with a person,

regardless of race. New Jersey has never banned interracial marriage, but after Roe versus Way was overturned by the Supreme Court last year, some experts feared the court could use a similar legal reasoning to undo Loving v. Virginia. Lawmakers are looking to launch a citywide campaign that will deter people from shopping at the growing number of illegal smoke shops within the five burrows. The New York City Council is meeting today to discuss the purported risk associated with buying weed from unregulated shops. Its council member Julie Menon primary response for the bill that would authorize the campaign.

We all know that in New York City, thousands of smoke shops are illegally selling cannabis and cannabis products. These products have been targeted to our youth and a report issued last November found that many of these products contain lead, salmonella, ecoli, pesticides, and other hazards.

The bill has the support of more than half the council almost guaranteeing that it will pass. 89 and sunny feeling like 95 right now under this heat advisory. Sunny and 93 today and then tomorrow, almost a repeat. Sunny and 92 in the real field, 95 at least tomorrow. We begin to cool off on Friday. I'm Sean Carlson for WNYC. The NYPD says it will change the way officers respond to protests in the city.

The new rules are the result of a proposed settlement announced earlier today that would resolve lawsuits brought by State Attorney General Letitia James and police reform groups who say the police department violated demonstrators' rights during 2020's Black Lives Matter protest. NYC Samantha Max covers public safety for us. She's reporting on the settlement today. She joins us now. Hey, Sam. Hi.

Before we get into the specifics of the settlement, can you just remind us how we got here? Why was Attorney General James and Civil Liberty groups suing the NYPD? So if you think back to the late spring and early summer of 2020, people have been cooped up in their homes because of the pandemic. And then all of the sudden, this video goes viral of George Floyd being killed by police. That was in Minneapolis, but it sparked protests across the country. And also here in New York City, after those protests, Attorney General James, the Department of Investigation, the Spilling Complaint Review Board, they are all issuing reports that are highlighting major concerns. concerns about how the NYPD responded to those protests. And protesters have filed hundreds of lawsuits and civilian complaints describing all sorts of chaotic scenes. People who were there might

remember them themselves. Police were actually driving through crowds in some cases or indiscriminately spewing pepper spray, breaking people's bones with batons, zip tying people's hands so tight that they actually, their hands went numb. And the civilian complaint review board, which investigates some allegations of police misconduct found that at least 146 members of service who responded to the protests broke department policy. Walk us through the terms of this settlement. What did the NYPD agree to? So there were a bunch of different things that they've agreed to. And I should also say that this is a proposed settlement. It still needs to be finalized by a judge. But they have agreed to a new system that will kind of standardize how officers are deployed to demonstrations. It will require them to use the escalation before just calling for more and more officers to come to the scene.

It'll put new limits on the strategic response group, which is this NYPD unit that has been scrutinized for how it handles protests, changes to the guidelines for discipline, a new position for someone at the department to actually just be in charge of overseeing protests. And, you know, there are also protections for the media. So police will be barred from presenting members of preventing them from, you know, observing or recording in public areas. Now, listeners to this program are probably familiar with this term, but it's a pretty specific one. As part of the settlement, the NYPD says it will end the practice that's known as kettling. Can you bring us up to speed again on what kettling exactly is and why it is so controversial? So this is when officers surround protesters and leave them with no way to do.

get out before they're suddenly just conducting a mass arrest. So imagine you're a protester, you're in the middle of a giant crowd, there are gates around you, there are police officers, maybe they're holding their bikes up, kind of forming a gate. And then suddenly, before you know it, they're arresting everyone around you. You don't think you're doing anything wrong, but you have no way to get out. This is something that happened at some of the 2020 protests. It has been criticized by advocates who say that, you know, you need to give people a real chance to live. leave the scene before you just start arresting everyone in sight. Now, the settlement also calls for the formation of an oversight committee.

What role is it going to play and who's going to sit on it? So this is a committee that will actually be taking a step back and assessing how police do protests. So they're going to be meeting and they're every few months going to be deciding, okay, we want to look at these two protests and let's just delve in and see what went right, what went wrong, what changes could be made to respond better in the future. It will include representatives from the Attorney General's Office, New York Civil Liberties Union, legal aid society, the Department of Investigation, and they will also be issuing

regular reports to update the public on their progress. And if the NYPD is violating the terms of this agreement, then these plaintiffs, who are also going to be members of this committee, will be allowed to take them back to court. So have the plaintiffs in the case said anything yet? What is their response to this settlement? Yeah, I mean, those who I've spoken to have expressed cautious optimism. So they're hopeful that this could really change how the NYPD responds to protests. But, you know, cautious because obviously we've been here before. There have been other mass protests in the past if you think about the Republican National Convention.

If you think about Occupy Wall Street, you bring together lots of people, they protests. and then the police response turns chaotic. And then you have all these lawsuits, millions of dollars shelled out. So they're hoping that this will kind of break that cycle by really getting at the systemic issues at play. Well, then that really begs the question. What have the NYPD and police union said about it? I mean, the NYPD has voiced support. You know, the commissioner Eddie Caban, he said that he believes that officers were put in a tough spot during the protest.

but the department is committed to improving. Mayor Adams has also voiced support. But the police benevolent association, which is the union that represents most of the rank and file officers, they are not happy with the agreement. They have said they will not be joining on and warned that it could even encourage future violence against police. That's WMIC, Samantha Max. Thank you so much as always, Sam. Thank you. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WNYC. be sure to catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. We'll be back this evening.