The city had several days of protest with few arrests, all police should have body cams by the end of the year, and the Vigo County casino should be up and running by the end of 2021.
On this week’s installment of Ask The Mayor, Terre Haute Mayor Duke Bennett addresses these issues and more. Listen to the full conversation with Indiana Newsdesk anchor Joe Hren by clicking on the play button above, or read some of the questions and answers below. A portion of this segment airs 6:45 and 8:45 a.m. Wednesday on WFIU.
This conversation has been edited for clarity and conciseness. Due to Zoom internet connectivity, some audio is missing.
Hren: Let’s get into this past week’s protests over the death of George Floyd, but it’s also a bigger issue - systemic racism, police brutality, and Terre Haute residents came out too - what’s the scene been like there?
Bennett: We had several days of protests. The first one was a week ago Saturday. And then we had some tense moments Saturday evening. But I think everybody did a good job. People were frustrated and I get that, there was a lot of emotion. And we had some verbal confrontations with police and some blocking of roads and things like that, but it wasn't terrible. And I think everybody just wanted to be able to say their piece. And so we did our best job to keep them safe, you know, from that environment.
On Monday night, we had a few issues and we had to make some arrests. And from that point on, all the protests were very well behaved. We didn't really have no vandalism, no damage to property. And then on Saturday, we had our last big march from City Hall, basically to the police station. And it went very well.
Hren: What’s your protocol for public protests, rallies - do you activate some sort of plan?
Bennett: So after that first Saturday when we kind of got a pretty good feel about the typical size or what we thought would be the typical size and about 300 people that first Saturday. And so the police did a really good job of just making sure we protected them, even though they were moving down the street, we closed the streets ahead of them, behind them so we didn't have any traffic coming in. We kind of just worked with the group to kind of try to figure out, you know, what they might do, where they might march to and what kind of issues we might have.
There were some potential issues with maybe some counter protesters, so we had to be ready for that. So the protocol was really a law enforcement driven thing to just be prepared to make sure no matter who shows up, that we keep everybody safe and we allow everybody to, you know, exercise their first amendment rights, and I feel like it worked out great for everyone.
Hren: The protests are about change, what will Terre Haute residents be able to point to the change that was made there from these rallies?
Bennett: Well, I think when I say that being heard, I think that's kind of the first step. I mean, obviously, there's a reaction to a bad, bad thing that happened up there in Minneapolis, that nobody can justify. And so I think immediately, then you'd begin to look within and say, okay, does this apply to us specifically. There's always things that can apply to us. But when you're talking about the police department, what have we done to ensure that we're positioning ourselves to not let those things happen?
And so back in 2016, we became accredited. That was the first time the Terre Haute police department is going through an accreditation process. We reaccredit in 2019. And a lot of these things apply directly what we've already done. We've got the bias training in place, we have diversity training in place, we have de escalation training, and we have a new deescalation training that we're going to be taking all of our officers through in October. This has already been set up and already scheduled, but we're taking them through a whole other phase of that.
So now we're kind of looking beyond that to say, okay, how do we ramp this up even more? What do we do? Where's our weak spots? And so one I feel really good about what we've done over the last four years. One of the biggest things we're looking at right now is body cams. We started earlier this year. We actually started about two or three years ago, but it was gonna cost us a million and a half dollars and we didn't have it, no property tax caps and all the issues that we faced. Well, pricing has come down. There are more programs in place to pay for this over time versus having to pay for it up front with the ongoing costs.
And so it looks like we can get into two body cams for all of our uniformed officers for about $150,000 to $200,000 a year for a five year agreement, and hopefully have body cams in place by the end of this year. All of that was already underway. It's a perfect thing to to open up accountability and let people know and we'll be able to do so much more with the body cam.
Hren: From what I know Indiana State University hasn’t rolled out a plan yet to reopen - are you in talks with the university on fall semester?
Bennett: Yeah, not directly. And I've had many conversations with Dr. Curtis and her staff about kind of where this is going. I think they're trying to develop their plan and then that will engage us more with that, because when you're bringing people in from hotbeds as an example, you could be bringing more of the COVID-19 here. And so we all have to kind of be working together from the perspective to ensure that when people are traveling to another community that we're, you know, doing all the precautions we can to keep a new, you know, second wave or whatever you might want to call that, because of that exact thing.
READ MORE: Here Is How Indiana Colleges And Universities Are Planning To Reopen This Fall
Hren: How do you deal with asymptomatic students coming from all over the world?
Bennett: Yeah, you know, that's really difficult. So anybody you talk to whether you're talking about the college environment or not, when you have people who a lot of people, I think, have had it and had no symptoms. I think if we ever get testing, where you're really going through this, and you get all these people to give their blood and you can find out if those antibodies are there. I think we're going to find out that a much bigger percentage than what anybody thought was exposed to it.
But the problem is, you don't know that and you don't know who could get it again or not. So I think there's still so many unknowns about them. I have no idea how you really address that. Because unless you test everybody, there is no other way. And I think you just have to be cautious. If you've come from a community where there's a lot of it going on where they've got a spike, then we got to be a little bit more cautious with those folks. And they need to be more upfront with us as a community to say, hey, you know, can I get tested here? What do I need to do to help ensure that I'm not bringing it to the community?
I just think this is something that a year from now we're probably going to know a ton of stuff. But even today, it seems like every day I hear some new piece of information that contradicts something we thought or something that makes me feel better about what they did. Here's the way it was gonna play out. I don't think anybody has all the answers.
Hren: Last time we talked, you were optimistic over a meeting on the proposed casino investigation, and you were right, all went as you thought and with some changes in administration with Spectacle Entertainment, they can now move forward with the casino, what are those changes in ownership and does that effect what kind of casino the city wants?
Bennett: So the previous owner and legal counsel for Spectacle group prior to the local Spectacle group, they were going to be a part of that and when that investigation came about, the only way to separate this was to have those two to step out of this casino. And so the local owner, Greg Gibson, bought them out. They're still part of the Gary casino, because that license already been issued in this case in order to issue a license.
READ MORE: Federal Probe Prompts Indiana Casino Ownership Change
The state, you know, they didn't want that kind of a issue or conflict to be on the table, which makes perfect sense. I get that. And so in order for that, to take the next step, great. You had to become the sole owner plus his other investors, not including those two that were identified as part of that investigation, doesn't mean they can't rejoin later when all that shakes itself out. And that was mentioned during the call, you know, the vote and everything that one of the commissioners asked that very question, but it has to go back in front of the Commission, if they ever want to be a part owner of this or, you know, majority owner or whatever.
And so we can move forward now and construction can begin. So his plan is to break ground in September. And by the end of next year, we'll have a casino up and running.
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