With the death of George Floyd and protests nationwide, police accountability legislation may be on the horizon for the city of Kingston.

"Something about this time has pushed this forward," said Callie Jayne, the executive director of Rise Up Kingston.

For years, Rise Up Kingston has been working with the community on legislation for police reform in the city, especially after the case of Fabian Marshall, who accused Kingston police officers of police brutality in 2015 and settled with the officers this year.

Now Kingston Mayor Steve Noble has agreed to pass police accountability legislation, writing in a Facebook post to common council members after June 3's Kingston protest: "Let’s make this happen. Adopt police accountability legislation and I will sign it."

Kingston Ward 4 Alderwoman Rita Worthington chairs the Common Council’s Special Policing Committee.

"We're planning on putting some proposals on the table and putting some legislation on the table so we can finally go ahead and end this practice of misconduct on the part of law enforcement," said Worthington.

This legislation aims to refine the complaint process against city officers and change the makeup of the city’s police commission, a board made of residents, the mayor, and the police chief that oversees decisions like hiring, firing, and discipline.

"What we want is to make sure the commission represents the diversity here in Kingston," said Worthington. "We want to make sure that all residents are represented."

In addition to pushing for implicit bias training for commissioners, which was enacted by the common council this April, Rise Up Kingston has pushed to increase the number of people on the commission and to eliminate the mayor from the board — changes that would require a referendum on the city’s charter. But Rise Up Kingston says diversifying the police commission and refining the police complaint process is a good start.

"The complaint process, as it is right now, is having a lot of complaints ignored and thrown into the garbage, and so we have been working on a platform, which was then transferred into a piece of legislation, to create guidelines for our commission," said Jayne.

Now it's up to the Common Council to put legislation on the mayor’s desk.

"If it gets passed and we can make real change, I think it's going to bridge the gap between community and police," said Worthington.

"The people pushed this through and lobbied their elected officials for what they needed in their community, which means that we can never not get what we need again, " said Jayne. "Because they have heard us now."

Jayne says the city’s lawyer, the mayor, and Rise Up Kingston will meet with the New York Civil Liberties Union on Monday to further discuss this legislation.

Spectrum News has reached out to the city of Kingston’s police department for comment, but has not received a response.