Fourth District Police Committee Meeting (in-person only)

Covenant Community Church, 3342 E 119th St, Cleveland, OH 44120 (Directions)

Note: This meeting is in-person only. We add two extra hours of pay to the assignment ($36).

Note: This is our second time covering a police district meeting (first for this district), so we don’t know exactly what to expect. Lead with your curiosity and feel free to note if something doesn’t make sense in your coverage. You may be asked to introduce yourself and share more about Documenters. Here is some suggested language in response:

“I am a Documenter trained to monitor public meetings in the public interest. My work is made publicly available in collaboration with Signal Cleveland’s Cleveland Documenters program. For more information, visit cleveland.documenters.org/.”

This is a meeting put on by Cleveland’s Community Relations Board and the commanders of each of Cleveland’s five police districts.

These meetings may have a similar feel to Cleveland City Council Community Ward meetings. Fourth District Acting Police Commander Shawn Smith is typically in attendance to chair the meeting. So is Edwin Parris, the Community Relations Board’s (CRB) Fourth District representative. Find CRB contact information here. A volunteer co-chair — often a resident — may also be in attendance.

Common meeting sections include:

• An update from the police commander
• An update from Cleveland Fire
• An update from the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office
• Special guests
• Remarks from City Council members
• Updates from the Community Relations Board
• Q&A segments with residents

There are separate notetaking and audio roles on this assignment. Notetaker: It may be helpful for your coverage to record your own audio of the meeting, but it is not a requirement of your assignment. On the audio assignment? Learn more about the audio roles.

We offer these tips for covering ward meetings, and you may find they apply to these meetings, too:

• Arrive 10-15 minutes early and ask the officials or staff to give you the full names of the speakers (police, community groups, whoever.)
• You can attach pictures of any handouts to Documenters.org in the attachments section on the assignment role page.
• Don’t worry too much about residents’ names if you can’t catch them–just focus on their concerns.
• Include some scene details if you can, such as what food is being served, what the meeting space looks like, noises from outside that crept in.
• Don’t worry about catching everything–you won’t be able to. And keep the notes short and sweet (2-6 pages is the recommended guideline!).

Find past Documenters coverage of this agency here: https://cleveland.documenters.org/reporting/?agency=2229