Columbus Mayor Jim Lienhoop has appointed six civilian community members to serve as voting-eligible members to the newly established civilian oversight committee, the Community Police Review Board. Mary Ferdon, the city’s director of administration, says that these appointees “reflect the diversity of the community, including but not limited to, representatives from different neighborhoods, socioeconomic backgrounds, religions, ethnicities, races, ages, gender, experience, and other backgrounds reflected in City ordinances.” She adds that these six individuals will serve staggered terms during the transition from the Audit and Review Committee for Citizen and Police Relations to the CPRB at the discretion of the mayor. Appointed were:

Annette Barnes is a community volunteer and serves as a chaplain to the Columbus Police Department. In addition to serving on the CPRB, Barnes is a member of the Columbus Human Rights Commission. She has served as a Mayoral appointee on Audit & Review since 1992. Barnes’ term will expire in December 2018.

Olisa Humes is a graduate of Columbus North High School and the University of Evansville. She currently works as a division administrator at Diversified Management, and she is actively involved with the Bartholomew County chapter of the NAACP. Humes’ term will expire in December 2020.

Fred King is a native of Birmingham, Alabama. He is a graduate of Tuskegee University, former mechanical engineer at Cummins Inc., and a former adjunct professor of math at Ivy Tech. King is an Elder at the Calvary Community Church and is an active member of the African American Pastors Alliance. King’s term will expire in December 2020.

Ric King is a Columbus native. He has worked at Cummins Inc. for almost 49 years and is currently a metrology lab technician. In addition, King is a member of the Emergency Response Team at Cummins. He has served as a Mayoral appointee on Audit & Review since its inception in 1992. King’s term will expire in December 2018.

Joseline Medina is a longtime resident of Columbus and is currently a college student at IUPUC. Medina is bilingual in Spanish and English. She has volunteered her time in organizations such as the Latino-American Organization of Volunteers in Education (“L.O.V.E.”) and the Columbus Youth Development (“CYD”). Medina’s term will expire in December 2019.

Dan Mitchell serves as the senior pastor at The Sanctuary Church, where he has served for more than 38 years. Mitchell served as a Mayoral appointee in Audit & Review for several years and played an integral part in organizing city-wide training on implicit bias in 1991. His term will expire in December 2019.

Ferdon explains that the CPRB was formerly the Audit and Review Committee of Citizen and Police Relations, which was created in 1992 with the goal to foster transparency, gain community trust, and respond to the needs of residents. After bench-marking civilian oversight committees in other cities and examining the effectiveness of Audit & review, the Board of Public Works & Safety voted to reshape the committee to reflect the current needs of the community.