From the Ground Up: The Importance of Community Policing within the Chicago Police Department

Anthony Driver is President of the Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability. He is a lifelong southside Chicago resident, Bulls fan, and seasoned political strategist. Politically active since his youth, Anthony has experience in municipal, state, and federal politics as well as in both the private and public sectors. He is a graduate of Howard University and an advocate for Historically Black Colleges and Universities. After receiving his degree in Political Science and History from Howard, Anthony went on to serve as a Policy Associate for the Estell Group, the first and only Black woman-owned full-service government relations firm at the national level. He later would hold research and consultant roles that examined the juvenile incarceration rates in the US and how they are influenced by state policy.

He is currently the Executive Director of the SEIU Illinois State Council , where he is responsible for leading policy initiatives, organizing campaigns, and advocacy work on behalf of the 160,000 + SEIU members. Under Anthony’s leadership 92% of all SEIU endorsed candidates were successful in the February municipal elections.

In his previous role at SEIU, Anthony served as lead strategist on winning campaigns that raised the minimum wage to $15 per hour in Chicago and created a Civilian Oversight Board over the Chicago Police Department. In August of this year, Anthony was appointed as a Civilian Oversight Commissioner for the City of Chicago, and subsequently selected as president of the Commission. As president of the Civilian Oversight Commission, Anthony has worked to end the racist gang database, ensure transparency, and is currently leading the search for the next police superintendent of Chicago. Using a combination of skills and relationships developed as a lobbyist and strategist, Anthony has successfully secured over $100 million in federal, state, and municipal funds to be redirected to support marginalized and disinvested communities. He has worked to successfully build bridges between residents and the local, state, and federal officials elected to serve them, as well as to increase African American voter turnout. With several electoral campaign victories under his belt, he is looking forward to contributing to building a more just and representative society in Illinois and beyond. He is a former Chicago Federation of Labor Delegate, an inaugural Black Bench Cohort member and serves as a board member of the Peace and Education Coalition of the Back of the Yards.

Mecole Jordan-McBride is the Advocacy Director for the Policing Project at NYU School of Law, where her work centers community perspectives in the organization’s research and demonstration projects. Currently, she leads the implementation of the Chicago Neighborhood Policing Initiative (CNPI), to establish community leadership in the development of public safety priorities and transform how Chicago Police Department officers engage with residents. 

She is the former coordinator for the Grassroots Alliance for Police Accountability, where she led the coalition’s early community engagement efforts and development of what would later become the Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability.

Beginning her organizing career in Chicago in 2006, Mecole has significant experience building broad-based coalitions for reform efforts in Chicago and across Illinois, particularly around Police Reform and Racial Equity. She is passionate about and dedicated to addressing the racial inequities and structural racism that consistently inhibits the success of communities of color.

Robert Boik is the Vice President for Public Safety at the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago. In this role he is responsible for executing a five pillar strategy that will propel Chicago’s business community into the public safety ecosystem as it strives to work with an extensive network of partners to make Chicago the safest large city in America.

Prior to this role, Boik served as a senior official in a variety of public sector roles including with the Chicago Police Department, the 2nd largest police department in the nation. Within CPD, Boik served as the executive director for constitutional policing and reform where he managed more than 500 employees and led the implementation of the Department’s police reform efforts. In doing so, Boik developed the “Roadmap for Operational Compliance,” which is a strategic plan and performance management roadmap designed to achieve cultural change throughout the Chicago Police Department. He also led the development of several key Department policies on topics such as use of force, 4th amendment stops and foot pursuits.

At CPD Boik also served as chief of staff to three different police Superintendents. In this capacity, Boik negotiated the Department’s consent decree with the Illinois Attorney General’s Office. He also built the operational infrastructure that was essential for managing the Department’s reform efforts including creating teams devoted to strategy, project management, data analytics, and auditing.

Prior to his roles at CPD, Boik’s career focused on education policy matters including serving as the chief of staff for operations for the Chicago Public Schools, chief of staff to the state receiver overseeing the Detroit Public Schools and as chief of staff to the State Superintendent of Education in Washington, DC.

Boik holds a Master’s degree in Public Policy from George Mason University where he was a Bryce Harlow Foundation Fellow and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from Western Michigan University. He and his wife Nicole live in the City of Chicago and are the proud parents of two children.