MANSFIELD — Mansfield police Chief Keith Porch will be the special guest of a Black/Brown Coalition community forum on Thursday, Nov. 12 at Providence Baptist Church.
The meeting will begin at 6 p.m., according to a press release from Wayne McDowell, director of the coalition, who said attendance will be limited to the first 130 attendees, due to COVID-19 restrictions.
It will be the second Black/Brown Coalition community forum in recent weeks at Providence Baptist, 112 W. Sixth St.
A session conducted on Oct. 23 was designed to explain the new Code of Conduct, a document signed Sept. 28, setting forth standards of behavior for residents and Mansfield police officers when interacting with one another.
Organizers said during that session a future session would be planned and they hoped Porch would attend.
McDowell said the purpose of the forum is to improve relations between the entire community and the Mansfield Police Department.
“Community members may inquire about police operations, policies and procedures and appropriate police conduct in encounters with community members,” McDowell said.
“All questions and inquires must be done in a respectful manner,” McDowell said.
The first forum came four days after a Mansfield officer was suspended without pay for 60 working days after he drug a handcuffed Black teen several feet on Oct. 12 during an incident on West Fourth Street.
The officer, Jordan Moore, has since filed a grievance, claiming it was “improper” and violated the “just cause progressive discipline” provision of the city’s contract with the Fraternal Order of Police.
That moved the grievance to arbitration, a hearing during which an FOP attorney will represent Moore. The union and the city will choose the arbitrator. The arbitrator has a wide range of options, including upholding the entire 60-day suspension, reducing it or even to overturn it entirely.
