Why We Organize

Common Ground had a pretty big night recently when the City of Vallejo presented their research on police oversight models to the City Council and the public. As you may know, Common Ground has been working on its Oversight Model for the last 2 years and have narrowed all the different models into one that will work for the City of Vallejo. The model has been circulated around to the community, Chief of Police, City Council, and also to the City Staff, including the City Attorney. After the over hour long  presentation by the City Attorney, City Council began commenting and had nothing but praise for the work Common Ground had done on its own proposal.

Common Ground was not allowed to give a presentation at the meeting, but the Council gave them 15 minutes to talk and had 8 speakers who gave public comment. Between them and the 10 or so other speakers, everyone threw their support behind the Common Ground proposal. The City Council directed the City Attorney to schedule a meeting with us within the next couple of weeks.

Common Ground has been around since 2013 and this is the first time that it got the full weight and respect of the City Council and the community. The next steps are to follow up with the City Attorney and convince her to listen and partner with them. Then when it is time for more public meetings, the members will be there, ready to act.

This is why Common Ground organizes our people power and the members of First Christian Church should all feel very proud of their mission with Common Ground right now! It was nice to have 7 members of the church there live for the meeting, plus several others on Zoom.

If you would like to make a personal investment in Common Ground, please visit https://www.commongroundiaf.org/donate