Grant to help Independence tabulate racial profiling data

The Independence Police Department has on the horizon a grant to the purchase new software/hardware to better tabulate racial profiling statistics.

A $6,400 grant from the Missouri Department of Transportation’s Highway Safety Division will help reimburse the city for the purchase of a new racial profiling system designed to help the department maintain data gathered from traffic stops.

The City Council unanimously approved Monday an ordinance authorizing the grant, which adds to the $1,895 the city appropriated for the purchase.

Acting Independence Police Chief Dave Lamken said the grant will be used for the department to purchase a server to be used in conjunction with a year-and-a-half-old computer program used to comply with racial profiling laws. The new program replaced the department’s old system that officials said was costly, antiquated and not fulfilling the current needs.

“This is more of a data saving thing,” Lamken said, “an enhancement to the system we already have in place.”

Last year, Yvette Hayes, an elementary school principal in Kansas City, filed a discrimination complaint with the Missouri Commission on Human Rights alleging the city of Independence and a security officer at JCPenney, 17610 East 39th St., discriminatorily subjected her to a traffic stop last July based on her race and color after an incident in which Hayes was forced to lie face down during a police stop.

Hayes, six months pregnant at the time, cited as reason for the compliant 2006 racial profiling statistics filed with the Attorney General’s office that showed Independence police pulled over, searched and arrested African-American drivers at a disproportionate rate.

Police officials have previously said those stats, as well as some from previous years, may have been incomplete because of lost data due to errors in the old reporting forms.

“We want to get this right,” Lamken said. “We have to get this right.”

City Manager Robert Heacock said the city will undoubtedly benefit from the grant.

“From my understanding, the software will assist us in tracking and monitoring our activities relative to ensuring the public we are not racial profiling,” Heacock said. “If there are any issues we will be able to identify them and address them quickly. I think we are trying to treat this as an important issue and one that we want to make sure we are treating appropriately.”