Council - Special Meeting

This is the East Lansing City Council special meeting of July 21st, 2026. The meeting will come to order. Could we have the roll call, please?

Council Member Whalen. Here. Council Member Meadows. Here. Council Member Singh. Here. Mayor Pro Tem Grigsby. Here. Mayor Altman.

Here. Is there a motion to approve the agenda? Moved by Meadows. Second. Second by Singh. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Agenda is approved. Is there a motion concerning closed session?

Yes.

I move that we enter a closed session to discuss and consult with the city's attorneys regarding the following. One, privileged and confidential attorney-client legal correspondence that is exempt from disclosure by state law under MCL 15.243 sub 1 sub g. as allowed under subsection eight sub one sub H of the Michigan open meetings act and to consult with the city's labor attorney regarding collective bargaining negotiations as allowed under subsection eight sub one sub C of the Michigan open meetings act.

Motion by Singh second by Grigsby roll call vote please.

Council Member Whalen. Yes. Council Member Meadows. Yes. Council Member Singh. Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Grigsby. Yes. Mayor Altman.

Yes. Motion carries. We are adjourned to closed session. OK, thank you for your patience. We are returning from a closed session at a special meeting that started at 530. So we are now returned to open session. We have public comment at this special meeting, but I will plan to call all the slips during public comment at the regular meeting, which will start five minutes after we adjourn this meeting. But I have to ask if there's anybody who would like to address the council during this special meeting, please approach the podium and state your name.

Kath Edsel.

today i received an email from the chief inviting me to coffee she said she believed in open communication mutual respect and willingness to listen and that she valued the role of independent police oversight commission let's define police oversight because it is clear she does not value nor understand the role of the independent police oversight NACOL, the National Association of Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement, outlines civilian oversight in the following way. Police oversight is proactive, independent, community driven, empowered, transparent, individualized, an investment in our communities, and an iterative process. In the two years that the chief has been part of ELPD, she has worked against every proactive change recommended by ELIPOC, including the pretextual stop ordinance, recommendations on training around mental health issues, and policy around use of force. That is until now that her main protector is gone, and she is worried that whoever follows our current placeholder in the city manager's office will actually hold her accountable. From day one, the chief has not recognized LAPOC's need for independence. She has pushed all the National Police Union recommendations to discourage oversight independence, including ride-alongs, police academies, and police meet and greets. We are required to watch body-worn camera footage at City Hall, which requires entering through security just down the hall from the police department. I have been harassed on social media by someone in the department for watching body-worn camera footage, and now I and others must come into the same building to do our work. She does not want an independent commission, but one that falls in line with the way she wants to police this community, a community she does not live in and does not understand as anything other than what she hears from the white supremacists who uphold her on social media and in person. the commission represents a broad swath of the community and as oversight commission should in panels many that from historically harmed communities the chief has repeatedly dismissed the input from this group except for those who look and oftentimes think like her she does not want the community to drive policing she wants white supremacy to drive the commission as to several if not all of you on council Policing evolved out of slave patrols, and just as it did 250 years ago, the racism and classism are baked in. Unless you are willing to challenge long-held beliefs, you will operate as this chief has and ignore what the community is asking because you are worried disassembling white supremacy will take away from what you have. Empowered and transparent. What little empowerment and transparency the Commission had five years ago was negotiated away away to the union by the chief, the labor attorney, and the council last year. And I'm sure even more was on the table today. Furthermore, once this chief stepped into the interim role, we were denied body worn camera footage and now get two hours to watch upwards of ten hours of video in a room at City Hall with other commissioners who are watching the same time. We know from both the killing of Isaiah Kirby and the shooting of D'Anthony Van Atten, releasing the video is completely within the right of the department and the city, but this council's and the chief's unwillingness to provide transparency to the community prevents the release even to the commission of any video footage. This is neither transparent nor empowered. Oversight is not a cheerleader for the police department. Oversight did not create the public relations nightmare that policing in this country created once cameras started documenting what black people have been saying for decades, if not centuries. Black people are stopped, arrested, brutalized and killed in far greater numbers than their representation in this community and this country. What oversight can do is provide the community transparency and let the community decide how they want to be policed. Oversight can provide accountability to the community's desire to be upheld and oversight can provide an opportunity for community members to be heard when they have been harmed by police. Currently, Ellie Potts cannot do any of these with fidelity due to the current chief, council, city manager, and city attorney. The chief reached out to me today because maybe if she's nice to me, I won't speak out about how incompetent and unprepared to do this job she is and how harmful what she is doing is to so many of these members of the community. She has no intention of making any substantive change and she needs to go. Thank you.

Thank you, is there anyone else who would like to address the council during this special meeting public comment? Okay, seeing none, are there any callers at this point?

There is one caller on the line. Okay. Caller with your phone number ending in 954, you are now free to address the council.

Hello? Okay, so this is Nicole Keyway-Biber, resident of East Lansing. I would like to remind you all that the words of the police chief that, or so among others, well, in addition to her lies about what occurred Welcome Week, she said, we have had a disproportionate number of minorities come into the community and commit crimes. That should have been enough for her to go. There's no chance that anyone who realizes they are said minorities is going to feel like they can rest assured that they'll be treated with as much expectation of fairness, dignity, respect, as those who are not considered minorities. I read that quote to my children today and my brown, increasingly taller son was pretty shocked by that. Painfully a reality for those of us who have children who are brown, particularly if they're male, I feel a bit uncomfortable as we see them get taller because when we are in a situation where a police chief who says obviously racist things is defended instead of removed, what conclusion can we have other than the ones who, as Kath mentioned, are online cheerleading for her, calling The so-called minorities, animals openly just assuming criminality. That's who's seen as, I guess, worth representing worth making sure they know that this community is one that is going to look out for them and that worldview. I was hoping, you know, we've been just watching the dead air listening, that when you came back from your special meeting, maybe it would be to say, yep, she's going to go.

But you haven't told us what the special meeting was about.

So here I am giving a comment, again, asking the same thing many of us have. Why is she still at the head of a department that makes life and death decisions?

Thank you.

Thank you. That concludes communication from the public for the special meeting, which brings us to adjournment. Is there a motion? Moved by Whalen, second by Grigsby. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion carries. We are adjourned. We need five minutes to transition the tech, and then we will start the regular meeting. So we'll be back at 6.57. Thank you.