ROCHESTER, N.Y. — The Rochester Police Accountability Board is calling for a state investigation into suspended Executive Director Conor Dwyer Reynolds.
Reynolds was put on administrative leave in May following human resources complaints.
He countered with claims another former employee was harassing him.
The PAB alleges that following his suspension, Reynolds interfered with the city's investigation against him by holding meetings with current and former PAB staff.
Acting manager Duwaine Bascoe says the PAB is ready to move on from internal turmoil and that a state investigation into this matter is necessary.
In response to the claims against him, Reynolds issued the following statement:
"Yesterday, a majority of employees made a public call to fire current PAB management. Making ludicrous, defamatory statements about me is a transparent effort to distract from that fact. I have fully cooperated with Council's investigation. It is long past time for PAB management to listen to the demands of their employees and take responsibility for their own actions."
To restructure, Bascoe says the PAB will:
- Work with a consultant to develop a three-year-plan that considers city residents
- Hire a mediator to address internal agency issues
- Create an internal task force to investigate and address issues around organizational culture
In his response Wednesday, Bascoe did not address the letter from members that was issued Tuesday calling for his removal. They are also calling for the reinstatement of PAB staff members terminated under this management and for a firing freeze.
“As one who helped draft Police Accountability, I’m very disappointed, very disappointed, in what I’m seeing," said Rochester City Council Member-at-Large Willie Lightfoot. "And I have no problem with holding them accountable."
It could be an understatement to call the operations of the Police Accountability Board dysfunctional.
“We should continue to freeze any hiring,” Lightfoot said. “We should continue to freeze any money going to them from this month forward until we get adequate reports of work that they’ve done.”
Lightfoot expressed his concerns over the latest staffing issues coming out of the PAB, the agency charged with investigating complaints filed against Rochester Police Officers.
"If you remember, Police Accountability didn’t want to move like the government moves, having information in executive sessions and having information behind closed doors. And what have they found that they’re doing all the time now? Exactly what they said they didn’t want us to be, oversighting on them."
"I think that’s a little absurd," said Rochester City Council President Miguel Melendez about the requested firing freeze. Melendez says he’d like to explain more, but cannot because many of the issues are personnel HR related.
“What I’m concerned about is I want to make sure taxpayer money is being used wisely, which is the only role I really have in any of these conversations about the Police Accountability Board,” Evans said.
Earlier this month, the PAB’s head of Policy and Oversight was put on leave. Following Dwyer Reynolds’ suspension in May, Board Chair Shani Wilson stepped down. Since then, several employees have either quit or have been fired.
There have been allegations of sexual harassment, a hostile work environment and unreasonable working conditions.
The board started accepting its first complaints back in June, nearly two and a half years after its very first meeting.
The PAB, as stated on its website, was created thanks to “an overwhelming support from local voters.”
“We have to put that into perspective to,” Lightfoot said. “First of all, I think it was like 30 or 40% of the people voting. So it wasn’t really a large margin. So I always like to put that into perspective. So this wasn’t an overwhelming mandate from the community, number one, which is not uncommon with our elections, low turn-out. The second piece is I think people’s ideas have changed significantly since two years ago, right? I just think the whole defunding police and reimagining police, that whole thing has just changed. So I think if we were to go back and ask people now, I think we might hear a different conversation. That’s why I said we have to go back to the community. Because I think the conversation will be different. I don’t think this is what people signed up for or what they voted for.”