Los Angeles Urban League applauds Governor Newsom’s recent signing of SB2, which creates a system that allows for the decertification and removal of officers deemed unfit to serve as police officers in any jurisdiction within California. We thank and congratulate our State Senator Steven Bradford (D-Los Angeles) for his leadership in getting SB2 signed into law. This legislation is an important step forward in rebuilding trust between our police and the communities they serve.
Decertification adds another layer of transparency and accountability in our criminal justice systems, and we are glad that California finally decided to join 46 other states in passing such a law. We train our police officers to be professionals. As is the case with other professionals, such as teachers, doctors, lawyers, and more than 250 other certified professions in California, if police officers fail to adhere to the standards that they swore an oath to uphold, they should rightfully lose the privilege to be an officer of the law anywhere in the State of California.
In response to the murder of George Floyd last year, we saw a wave of police reform legislation at all levels of government. The list of needed changes is not yet complete, but today, we applaud these latest reform efforts. We will continue the fight for increased police accountability to the communities that police officers have sworn to serve. Today, however, we support State Senator Stephen Bradford and Governor Newson as we stand with the families of all those who have lost loved ones to police who failed to respect the honor, privilege, and responsibility integral to being an officer of the law.
