In the Press: New police stops data shows stark racial disparities in these wealthy Bay Area enclaves

Despite large police departments across California ramping up their efforts to stamp out racial profiling, those initiatives have done little — if anything — to close the vast gap between Black and white people who are stopped and searched by officers.

Data reported by smaller law enforcement agencies, released for the first time, showed the problem is even worse in some wealthy enclaves, like Piedmont and Los Altos, that recorded higher disparities than larger, spotlight-grabbing cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Disparities in the number of Black and white Californians stopped by police remained virtually unchanged among 17 of the state’s biggest law enforcement agencies from 2020 to 2021, according to a Chronicle analysis drawing from data the agencies are now required to collect.

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“It tells us that, to truly move towards greater racial equity, we must take a transformative approach,” said Chauncee Smith, senior manager of the Reimagine Justice and Safety program at Catalyst California, a racial justice-oriented nonprofit. “Rather than continuing to tinker around the edges with very minor piecemeal policy changes, we have to reclaim community safety by no longer relying on law enforcement to be a solution to every social problem.”

Read the full San Francisco Chronicle article by Susie Neilson and Dustin Gardiner