Three finalists have been announced for the Office of Accountability and Transparency (OAT) director position and spoke at a community forum Thursday night.
After multiple interviews and consideration, the applications for the OAT were narrowed down to three candidates earlier this week.
A virtual forum was showcased by the City of Phoenix Thursday night, which allowed the candidates to speak regarding the director position just days after they were announced.
One candidate, Andrew Myerbeg, is currently the director for the Seattle Office of Police Accountability. He has held the position for several years and has a lot of personal experience delving into police wrongdoings. Myerbeg said as director he would create an office that would hold a culture of accountability in order for there to be trust between the community and police.
“I want things up and running in six months,” Myerbeg said regarding the investigations he would be in charge of as a director. Myerberg is open to the idea of staffing in people from Phoenix as director of OAT, to form a better perspective as Myerbeg himself isn’t from the Phoenix area.
In addition, candidate Erin Ellison, currently holds the position of senior director of the Office of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion at Arizona State University. Ellison has also held this position for several years, in addition to the almost 20 years she has undergone conducting workplace investigations.
Her previous investigations do include police officers and many issues of discrimination and harassment. Ellison said she would make a great director as she has a connection and flair towards objectivity and is able to carry heavy workloads.
The last candidate Roger Smith has been administrator of the Office of Professional Standards for the City of Cleveland, a prosecutor with the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, and a trial attorney.
With all of these positions, Smith has been involved with many different examples of police misconduct through different lenses.
Smith, who is a person of color, mentions how he has had personal experience growing up with the police and can relate to members of the Phoenix community who feel they are being targeted because of their skin color. Smith hopes to build a team that can be represented by the Phoenix communities’ issues regarding the police department.
The purpose of OAT is to track misconduct within the Phoenix Police Department as it was within public demand within the Phoenix community. OAT is formed to monitor police, and place investigations on any possible misconduct by police officers. The moderator of the forum Vielka Atherton said the director will be responsible for the development of the new office, as well as hiring a team of professionals that will carry out these responsibilities in addition.
The next steps were for the three candidates to participate in a panel discussion with the City Of Phoenix in order for a decision to be made on who the director will be. Until then, Phoenix residents have the opportunity to know more about the candidates, before it was announced who will be the official director of OAT.
Contact the reporter at jmmclai1@asu.edu.
