Cambridge Councilors Propose Funding for Local Police Alternative

Cambridge city councilors presented a policy order on Monday calling on City Manager Yi-An Huang ’05 to fund Cambridge’s Holistic Emergency Alternative Response Team.

HEART, a non-police public safety alternative independent from the city, does not currently receive funding from Cambridge. The policy order, which was introduced at Monday’s city council meeting, would direct Huang to fund HEART as well as negotiate a contract to allow HEART to respond to certain 911 calls.

The policy order comes in the wake of the killing of 20-year old Sayed Faisal by a Cambridge Police Department officer on Jan. 4. Faisal’s killing has led to two months of protests and renewed calls for Cambridge to explore public safety alternatives.

In an emailed statement, HEART Co-Director Corinne Espinoza addressed the policy order.

“We were heartened to learn that city council members wanted to put forth a policy order to fund our work because it makes specific strong asks of the new City Manager,” Espinoza wrote.

Last year, the council allocated $3 million in funding for 2023 to a newly created Community Safety Department — a non-police emergency response program — that is run by the city rather than existing independently.

The policy order notes that the Community Safety Department has yet to hire responders. Espinoza wrote in an emailed statement that HEART has already trained seven responders.

“Neither HEART nor CSD are ready to take 911 calls tomorrow, but our community wants to understand why the City trusts its unstaffed department and not HEART,” Espinoza wrote.

Councilor Quinton Y. Zondervan, who is one of the sponsors of the policy order, spoke in support of funding HEART at Monday’s meeting.

“The intent of this policy order is simply to put the council on record in support of the HEART initiative,” Zondervan said. “To quote Martin Luther King, ‘Justice delayed is justice denied,’ and here we are going on almost three years after the murder of George Floyd and mere weeks after Arif Faisal was killed by our Cambridge Police.”

Councilor Patricia M. Nolan ’80, who is also a sponsor, opted to use her charter right to postpone a vote on the policy order, citing concerns on interpretation of its wording.

In May 2021, Cambridge passed a similar policy order calling on then-City Manager Louis A. DePasquale to consider funding for HEART — though none materialized. Cambridge’s police alternative initiative originated in June 2020, after the city adopted a policy order calling on DePasquale to consider non-police public safety alternatives.

Espinoza wrote that they hope Cambridge passes the newly proposed order and it leads to city funding for HEART.

“The biggest barrier to HEART’s ability to take 911 calls at this moment is a lack of funding,” Espinoza wrote. “We hope the policy order will translate into funding.”

—Staff writer Yusuf S. Mian can be reached at yusuf.mian@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @yusuf_mian2.