TAMPA, Fla — Tampa's current citizen review board is on its way to being formally dissolved.
That decision comes after a recommendation from the Tampa city attorney, Andrea Zelman, at Thursday's city council meeting.
"It is our recommendation to repeal our ordinance. Obviously, we would have to come back to you with that, that's a legislative action. But it's clear as of July 1st that we can't enforce it as it's written," she said.
It's all connected to House Bill 601, which was recently signed into law.
Related:
- Confusion over recently passed bill still plaguing Tampa Citizen Review Board
- Newly passed bill leading to confusion for local citizen review boards
The law essentially says cities and counties can't "create or enforce any ordinance" that would allow civilians to have oversight of law enforcement investigations of misconduct.
That said, the law does provide guidelines for Florida sheriffs and police chiefs—who may want to create an "oversight board" of their own.
That language has led to months of confusion and speculation about whether or not both types of boards could co-exist.
ABC Action News spoke to local attorney James Shaw who said the city's interpretation of the law is wrong.
"The bill doesn't say that municipalities can't have their own CRBs it just says that a police chief can have one and codifies authority that they already had. A police chief already could appoint a board to give advice to him."
But ultimately the city council decided otherwise.
The council will start the process of repealing the ordinance that created the CRB at its August 1st meeting.
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