The formation of a Chattanooga police oversight board may be delayed at least one more week after a mix-up in document versions.
The 11-page proposed ordinance would have been up for a vote during the Chattanooga City Council's May 7 meeting. But during Tuesday's strategic planning session, council members and police Chief David Roddy realized they weren't on the same page, literally.
Council members started discussing the formation of a police oversight board earlier this year after allegations of police misconduct and as Tennessee Republican lawmakers pushed a bill to strip police oversight boards statewide of their subpoena power and add more regulations to their operation. (That bill has since been amended in a few sections, reaching a compromise on the subpoena issue.)
Councilman Russell Gilbert drafted an ordinance to get the process going, Councilman Chip Henderson said. But since its first draft, the document has undergone several revisions.
That is where the miscommunication came from, council members and Roddy said.
"Apparently, when Councilman Gilbert emailed the council this latest version - and I don't know if Chief Roddy never received it or if Chief Roddy didn't notice or recognize [it]," Councilman Chip Henderson said. "[But he] was working off of one of the older versions."
Roddy has been working with council members to ensure current police policies and legal requirements are met, police spokeswoman Elisa Myzal said.
Berz said it sounded like Roddy had a very early version, because several of his suggested revisions had already been made.
Gilbert did not return a request for comment.
Henderson said the ordinance still needs some tweaking to be in line with a potential new state law.
The proposed legislation - House Bill 658 and Senate Bill 1407 - passed both House and Senate in mid-April after a number of amendments and is now sitting on Gov. Bill Lee's desk for signing.
One of those amendments provides a compromise on the issue over subpoena power: Oversight committee members would not be able to issue subpoenas, but a city council can.
With things still apparently up in the air, it's not clear if Chattanooga's ordinance will be voted on next week. Henderson said he doesn't expect it to come to a vote any sooner than May 14, but others think it should still move forward.
Councilman Anthony Byrd and Councilwoman Carol Berz think it can still be voted on, and noted it is still on the May 7 agenda.
"The longer you drag things out, the longer the discussion gets and you're distracted from the need to solve the problem," Berz said. " [We] have to at least start the ball rolling so people take it seriously," she said.
Ordinances have to be read and voted on twice, anyway, and Berz said it can be amended between the first and second reading.
"At the end of the day, we will keep on pushing until we get it right," Byrd said. "[The ordinance] has to have teeth to make the community feel safe Chattanooga is in a difficult place."
He pointed to how black Chattanoogans often feel like they're being targeted by police.
"So when the community is crying out, that creates a difficult place for everyone, politicians, police and the community," he said. "We have to do everything in our power right now and the community needs to know we're doing what needs to be done to protect them and officers too."
As for Roddy, "he is very optimistic that the process will continue to move forward in a timely manner," Myzal said.
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