Commission and POST craft hate‑incident training for officers; debate continues over collecting non‑criminal incident data

Commission staff and commissioners reviewed a multi‑day training developed with POST (Peace Officer Standards and Training) aimed at law enforcement line officers. The training focuses on why bias incidents matter even if they do not meet the criminal threshold, how officers can connect survivors to resources (including California Versus Hate), and why better incident recognition can support later investigations.

Deputy director Monroe and Commissioner Damske described participants in the training development process — community groups, former federal civil‑rights staff, police chiefs, and subject‑matter experts — and outlined plans to certify curriculum components through POST. The training will highlight survivor testimonials and explain how a no‑wrong‑door approach can reduce harm.

Commissioners then debated whether law enforcement should record and retain non‑criminal bias incidents. Some argued incident records help identify serial perpetrators and support future prosecutions; others raised privacy and profiling concerns and recommended scrubbing personally identifiable information or routing survivors to California Versus Hate rather than creating mandatory law‑enforcement data sets. Staff emphasized survivor agency: officers should provide resources and not force report transfers.