Community members ask for transparency from new Salinas police chief

Roberto Filice has served as Salinas police chief for roughly a month.

When Filice was was introduced to the public as the new police chief, he encouraged community members to get to know him. He insisted that he has an open door policy and hoped people will call him by his first name.

Filice acted as interim chief for the department following the retirement of former chief Adele Frese.

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"I was looking for someone that had the highest levels of character, integrity, had respect for the community," City Manager Steven Carrigan said. "At the end of the day, there was no doubt in my mind that the next chief of police in the city of Salinas was going to be Roberto Filice."

Despite the positive outlook by city leaders, the police department has long been plagued by their oftentimes tense relationship with the local community.

Issues with the department were brought to the forefront in 2014, after four officer-involved shootings and subsequent protests. At the time, the Department of Justice was brought in to assess the city’s law enforcement.

Recommendations were made and the department claimed earlier this year to have implemented 97% of them, though activists have issues with the department’s interpretation of what was done.

“Just like community members in Salinas, we have just not the closest relationship with the police department,” said Cesar Lara, the policy programs director at MILPA, a local community organizing group. “We’ve definitely been at odds with each other for some police decisions.”

Open door policy

One recent incident that put the department at odds with activists is the recounting of the deadly shooting of a local 19-year-old Gerardo Martinez Chavez.

The main disagreement is about what language Chavez spoke. Activists report that his family and neighbors say he spoke an indigenous language.

Salinas officers issued commands in Spanish for Martinez to come out with his hands up. He was recorded on drone footage coming in and out of the home through the side door several times, while officers issued commands.

Filice said the department has evidence that Martinez spoke Spanish. However, activists say they have yet to see this evidence.

“We had a 19-year-old young man die at the hands of police that otherwise would not have happened if they did the same kind of policing technique that other departments use, kind of waiting it out,” Lara said.

Because Martinez was found with a "realistic" BB gun, The Department of Justice declined to investigate the police shooting.

To combat mistrust of police, Filice said he wants to focus on the following three areas: Accessibility, transparency and accountability. Filice says he believes in community policing and wants to connect with those in the area.

“My door is always open, anybody that wants to talk to me, they’re welcome to. Let me know where to meet you,” he said. “I come to you, you don’t come to me.”

Activists have questioned how the department defines community. Filice says it means doing their job, such as “putting bad people in jail.”

Filice said he wants officers on the force that value community policing and officers who come from the community.

“Because there’s nobody that’s got more invested than local people,” he added.

Forming a partnership

Another point pushed by community members is how much of the city’s yearly budget is spent on policing, rather than other areas such as library services and the parks department.

The police department receives 43% of the general budget.

“You would classify it as bad customer service, but the problem is when it’s bad customer service with a police officer that has a gun and has power, that can really change people’s lives in a negative way if you don’t have a better police department,” Lara said.

Filice encourages those who criticize the department to join it and work to change it from the inside.

“The last three years, we know that law enforcement has been under the microscope," he said. "Anything that happens in society, some people point the fingers at police officers, but nobody stops to ask the officer, ‘How are you doing?’”

Filice brought up instances of the department trying to connect with the community through events such as meeting with a group of young people, but Lara says the community wants more than superficial community outreach.

“There’s just no partnership, no relationship with the police department with such a large segment of the farm working, immigrant community,” Lara said.

During the announcement that Filice had been selected as police chief, he acknowledged that there are many challenges that lie ahead.

"The only thing that matters to me is my community and I want them to feel free to go out and be safe " Filice said in October. "Whatever they need to do, they know that they have a police department that's going to stand by them."

Angelica Cabral is a journalist and podcaster for The Californian covering a wide variety of topics from movies filmed in Monterey County to how much political candidates have fundraised. Have a tip for an interesting story? Email her at acabral@gannett.com. You can also follow her on Twitter @avcabral97

This article originally appeared on Salinas Californian: Community members ask for transparency from new Salinas police chief