As the more than 300 Hillsborough County Democrats drove into the parking lot of the Tampa Palms Golf & Country Club to celebrate themselves and their prospects for 2016 at their annual Kennedy-King fundraising dinner, they were confronted by a handful of Black Lives Matter protesters who stood in front of the entrance off of Bruce B. Downs Blvd.
“We elect these people. They’re out here at a country club hobnobbing, having a good time, toasting their cocktails, but they’re not doing what the people of Tampa are asking them to do,” said Donna Davis with the Tampa Chapter of Black Lives Matter, and the chosen spokesperson for the group on Saturday. “And we’re here to address that tonight, we’re here to make our presence known. We’re not going anywhere. And this is not the last place we’re going to be.”
The Black Lives Matter movement has spread nationally over the course of the past year in reaction to the deaths of blacks like Michael Brown and Eric Garner by the hands of local law enforcement agencies. They’ve become a presence on the campaign trail this summer, with one member taking control of the mic at a Bernie Sanders event in Seattle, as well as having meetings with Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush.
BLM activists have held marches in Tampa in recent months, and some members of the group are now part of the Tampa for Justice coalition. Tampa for Justice created its own version of what it believes should be how a police civilian review board should be constituted. Before the group was able to get its report to Mayor Bob Buckhorn or City Councilman Charlie Miranda, Buckhorn preempted them by signing an executive order last last month creating a Civilian Review Board.
Activists are upset with the mayor’s proposal on two fronts. They claim it won’t be independent because he will select the majority of its members, and they want the board to have subpoena power to call witnesses.
“We’re asking for a citizen-appointed review board,” Davis said on Saturday night. “If it’s to be true to its function, it needs to be guided by citizens, selected by citizens and run by citizens. If the mayor chooses his people, and the police have a hand in it, then it’s not citizens guided.”
Under the guidelines laid out in the mayor’s executive order, appointees to the board may not hold political office or be campaigning for office. They can’t work for the City of Tampa, be directly related to a member of the Tampa Police Department, work in any law enforcement agency, or have any prior felony convictions or any convictions involving moral turpitude.
Earlier this month, the Tampa City Council — all Democrats — voted 6-1 to workshop the idea of naming its own members of the Civilian Review Board, in reaction to Buckhorn’s executive order, which calls for him to name nine of the 11-member board. City Council Chairman Frank Reddick has called for a proposal that would allow the Council to have seven picks (one for each member), with the mayor having the opportunity to name the remaining two (with two alternates).
The Council will revisit the issue later this month.
