The Independent Monitoring Team’s fourth semiannual report (IMR-4) details the significant progress that the Chicago Police Department (CPD) and City of Chicago have made to accelerate compliance and implement meaningful reform. Since the consent decree became effective in March of 2019, the City and CPD have successfully implemented a host of significant reform measures, illustrated in this report. 

During the IMR-4 monitoring period, CPD achieved the highest increase in compliance compared to previous monitoring periods, achieving notable progress with 52% of assessed paragraphs that came into some level of compliance.  

Additionally, the department doubled secondary compliance during this same period. This fourth semi-annual report also marks a noteworthy milestone for Chicago’s consent decree, as the CPD now has more paragraphs deemed as having some level compliance than any other American city under a consent decree after the two-year mark. 

This most recent report highlights commitment to implementing policies and systems that will help build trust between police officers and residents.  In particular, this report includes key accomplishments in the area of use of force reform. These accomplishments include: 

• Revising CPD’s suite of use of force policies multiple times, based on extensive dialogue with the community.  
• Increasing the number of mandatory annual training hours for in-service officers from 0 prior to the consent decree to now 40 hours in 2021.  
• Expanding the Neighborhood Policing Initiative, which emphasizes problem solving and relationship building, to 10 police districts.  
• Piloting a new staffing model that limits the number of officers per supervisor and ensures consistency of supervision day-to-day.  
• Expanding clinical capacity from 3 full-time clinicians to 11 full-time clinicians.  
• Revising the Department’s policy on interactions with Transgender, Intersex, and Gender Non-Conforming individuals based on extensive community dialogue.  

During IMR-4, the Independent Monitoring Team found the Department to be in preliminary compliance for its suite of use of force policies for the first time. The creation of the Force Review Division to review and analyze all use of force incidents has been instrumental in this progress and has allowed the Department to identify patterns and areas for improvement in both community and officer safety. This ongoing analysis informs the Department’s mandatory annual use of force training. 

While there has been progress in the CPD's reform efforts, we know there's more to do. The City and CPD remain committed to fulfilling not only the requirements delineated by the consent decree but will go above and beyond what is outlined to Create transformative and lasting reform within the Department.  The consent decree is meant to serve as the floor, not the ceiling, for Chicago’s police journey to true reform. Our shared efforts to achieve compliance with the consent decree is not just about checking off boxes and fulfilling the minimum requirements, it is about creating a better police department, one that the people of Chicago can be proud of.   

We look forward to continuing our work alongside the Independent Monitoring Team, the Office of Illinois Attorney General, and our many community partners as we continue our critical efforts toward making the CPD a betterDepartment for all of Chicago.  

###