BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KERO) — On Thursday, 4 members of the Kern Sheriff's Community Advisory Council resigned, stating they do not believe the council will be able to fulfill its mission moving forward. Council Chair Arleana Waller gave the explanation in a resignation letter she sent to Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood on behalf of herself and two other council members.
At a press conference on Friday, Youngblood revealed that a fourth member had also resigned from the council, but he did not specify who that person was.
Waller was a founding member of the CAC, saying in her resignation letter that during recent meetings about the formation of bylaws for the council, it became clear that the council's "original mission is being subverted by politics and bureaucracy."
Youngblood also made note of disruptions during the meeting, saying members of the ACLU and, to a lesser extent, the Dolores Huerta Foundation were responsible.
"It was almost accusatory. Every line of the bylaws we were talking about, every line of the bylaws, they were objecting. They interjected. Quite frankly, in an hour there was nothing done," said Youngblood. "When you have a committee that gets nothing done, pretty soon your committee members drop off just like they did yesterday."
Tiara King, one of the four who resigned Thursday, said the environment at the meetings no longer felt professional.
"I am interested in pursuing work for this community, and I will continue to do that," said King. "So the Sheriff's office, myself, Dr. Waller, Dr. Lawol, will continue this work, we will. Coming back under those circumstances, with the hostility that was provided, I mean, we are all professionals and we should respond as such."
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Youngblood says that over the past 2 years, the council was achieving its mission of bridging the gap between the community and law enforcement.
"Most important, when we first formed this committee, which was before we signed an agreement with the DOJ, there was a lot of mistrust between the members and the Sheriff's office. We worked very hard to tear those walls down and build trust, which I think we accomplished," said Youngblood.
King agrees.
"We have made some tremendous strides. We have been able to work with Chief (Erik) Levig in revising policy and reviewing the use-of-force policy, looking at various search and seizure policies," said King. "We've also met the community on several different occasions, not just here locally in Bakersfield."
KCSO is waiting to see if any more council members come forward to resign, and according to Youngblood, they will decide what to do from there.
"We are certainly not giving up. If we have to start over, we will start over. But we want to build a relationship with the community. That's our job. We've done that our entire careers, and we haven't always done a great job at it. I think the communication between the community and sheriff personnel is extremely important, and we've really come a long way in that communication aspect," said Youngblood.
Youngblood says he believes something that would help the council is to establish bylaws that would allow for disruptive parties to be removed from council meetings.
23ABC reached out to the ACLU for a response to Youngblood's claims. Rosa Lopez, senior policy advocate and organizer for ACLU Southern California told us, in part:
"It's unfortunate that the members of the leadership felt they had to exit. I think it's good to discuss disagreements and ensure we get on the same page and we refocus, because at the end of the day, this space came together to respond to a need from the community."
We have not yet heard back from the Dolores Huerta Foundation.
