How States Are Responding to the Coronavirus and Policing Crises
In the middle of our country’s policing and coronavirus crises, the last thought on our minds is often “I wonder what the state legislature is doing about this?” Luckily, at Civic Eagle, state legislatures rank a little higher on our list of mental priorities, and we’ve identified two important trends in state houses across the country. On the coronavirus front, states are moving to enhance liability protections, while their response to police has been rather tepid.
The Federal Government’s abdication of responsibility has given states a wide latitude in choosing how to respond to coronavirus. However, we have found that despite vastly differing reopening plans, a common thread has emerged among state legislatures: coronavirus liability protections. The goal of these bills is to prevent someone who contracts COVID-19 from suing the person who gave it to them, as long as the virus was not spread intentionally or through negligence. While all liability protection bills share this basic premise, they differ in who they give this protection to. For example, A 10887 from New York extends liability protection to nearly every type of business, while Massachusetts’s S 2644 includes only the state’s key industry of higher education. Given the constantly shifting nature of the pandemic, states are often intentionally keeping their language vague in order to remain current to whichever businesses are allowed to reopen. However, critics say that this vague language is protecting industries where even honest mistakes can be deadly. Elderly Advocates testified against HB 606 in Ohio, arguing that the bill would prevent elderly nursing home residents from holding their facilities accountable. While the bill’s short title states that it is providing protections for “essential workers”, it includes athletic trainers and chiropractors! In total, we identified at least 9 states with bills establishing some form of coronavirus liability protection.
If state governments are front and center in responding to coronavirus, their place in the national policing crisis is far less clear. States direct far less of their spending towards policing than county and municipal governments, so they have managed to avoid much of the defunding ire aimed at city governments. However, states have their own police forces, as well as a wide range of powers over local governments. Some states have begun to take advantage of these powers to reform, Nebraska is considering denying funding to local police departments who do not release police racial profiling data (LB 924). On the other hand, HB 2345 in Missouri tries to prevent reform by weakening police officer residency requirements. Yet for the most part, the response of states to either conservative or liberal pressures on the police has been to form toothless commissions to “investigate” and “report” their findings once police reform is out of the news. Additionally these commissions are often looking into policies that already command wide support from the public, like increased officer training and data reporting. At least 7 states have bills establishing new committees or studies, and 5 are only considering changing the makeup of existing commissions.
In short, states are moving quickly to implement legal protections for those who unintentionally spread COVID-19, while they are far more hesitant to consider any real actions on policing.
If you want to see all the bills we are tracking related to COVID-19 click here
If you want to see all the bills we are tracking related to Policing click here
