A national organization dedicated to equity in law enforcement brought one of its community listening sessions to Kalamazoo on May 19, filling the meeting room at the Douglass Community Association with community members, faith leaders, nonprofit representatives, and law enforcement officials from across the region.
The session was hosted by the West Michigan Chapter of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives — known as NOBLE — and facilitated by Chief Mitchell Davis of Hazel Crest, Illinois, who will be sworn in as NOBLE’s national president on July 28 during the organization’s 50th anniversary conference. National President Renee Hall joined the session via Zoom from Johannesburg, South Africa. The Detroit Metropolitan Chapter traveled to Kalamazoo in support.
NOBLE was founded in 1976 by 61 members who gathered to address issues facing Black communities and Black law enforcement professionals. The organization now has nearly 60 chapters and approximately 5,000 members nationally. As part of its 50th anniversary, President Hall called on chapters across the country to hold community listening sessions — Kalamazoo’s session was one of those.
The West Michigan Chapter was reactivated a couple of years ago with support from the Detroit chapter, and is led by Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety Assistant Chief Victor Green. Stacey Ledbetter, Executive Director of the Douglass Community Association, helped organize the event and hosted it at the historic facility, which is named in honor of Frederick Douglass.
The Conversation
Attendees broke into diverse mixed groups to discuss what they saw as the top public safety priorities in Kalamazoo. Each group reported back, and while the tables brought different perspectives, common themes emerged across the room.
Participants raised the need for better collaboration between law enforcement and mental health professionals. Multiple groups emphasized equitable policing across neighborhoods — including explicit comparisons to how residents of color experience policing differently in surrounding areas like Portage and Gull Lake — along with calls for reduced surveillance stigma and consistency in who receives charges versus grace. Several groups called for free public access to police reports and videos, noting that fees can be prohibitive for people who want to contest an incident. Others raised the need for a truly independent body to hold police accountable.
Representation in law enforcement was a recurring theme: participants called for active recruitment and retention of officers of color, with attention to the safeguards needed to support them once hired. One participant noted that officers from the local community are sometimes discouraged from drawing on those community ties in their work — and that their knowledge and relationships represent real value that should be respected.
Community engagement came up at nearly every table: regular listening sessions between police and youth, officers attending community events beyond the same recurring roster, and visibility that is proactive rather than crisis-driven. One group called for community engagement to be treated as a required part of an officer’s work week, not an optional add-on.
Who Was in the Room
The session drew local and regional law enforcement leadership alongside community voices. KDPS Chief David Boysen, himself a NOBLE member, welcomed the organization to Kalamazoo and mentioned that KDPS holds quarterly community conversations — inviting anyone with ideas from the session to connect with KDPS Community Collaborator LaTonya Turner to get on the invite list. Kalamazoo County Sheriff Fuller attended, as did leadership from the Michigan State Police the City of Portage Public Safety department.
Kalamazoo City Manager Malcolm Hankins spoke briefly and directly. He told the group that he sits in a position where what he hears can be turned into action — and that the issues discussed are personal to him. Raising Black children, he said, he wants them to have “an experience with law enforcement that I can only dream of.” He added that he was not speaking about his experience in Kalamazoo specifically, but about what he has carried through a 30-year career in public service.
Chief Davis, who has spent 36 years in law enforcement, put the stakes plainly: “I’ve been in law enforcement for 36 years. I’ve been a black man for 63.” He shared that his two worst experiences with law enforcement both came when he was a police officer — and in both cases, the other officers knew he was the police. In one instance, he said, he was a chief at the time, and the officer told him, “I know who you are and I don’t care.” Davis said that officer later went to federal prison — not for the encounter with him, but that the behavior reflected how that officer was allowed to operate. He framed the story not as an indictment but as a reason why organizations like NOBLE matter and why reform is not a threat to law enforcement: “The definition of reform is change for the better.”
A Conversation That Continues
NOBLE’s listening sessions are designed to feed into the organization’s broader advocacy work, and the notes from each table were collected at the end of the session. Chief Davis emphasized that the goal is not just conversation but action, and that it takes both the community and law enforcement working together to get there.
The West Michigan Chapter has indicated interest in returning to Kalamazoo in the fall for continued engagement.
