Third installment of the series, funded by the Open Society Institute’s Baltimore Justice Fund, to air Wednesday morning
Media Advisory
Contact: Amy Burke Friedman, WYPR
410.243.3790
Evan Serpick, Open Society Institute-Baltimore
410.234.1091
Tomorrow morning at 5:51 a.m. and 7:51 a.m., during Morning Edition, WYPR will air the third installment of its year-long series, “On the Watch: Fixing the Fractured Relationship Between Baltimore’s Police and Its Communities,” which explores the practices and culture of policing in Baltimore. Listen to the first two installments here: http://news.wypr.org/topic/watch#stream/0.
Freddie Gray’s death from injuries sustained while in police custody in April fanned the smoldering anger and frustration with police practices in Baltimore into a conflagration of protesting, rioting and looting. In “On the Watch,” WYPR’s Mary Rose Madden looks at how the relationship between officers and citizens reached that tipping point and reports on racial and class tensions, and probes how complaints against officers are handled. She looks at past attempts at police reform in the city, how they compare with other cities with the same problems and how police officers are responding to calls for community-oriented policing.
The first installment looked at Baltimore’s Fair Policing plan; the second examined how Baltimore police respond to calls for help. The new installment, a seven-minute segment, reviews what the Baltimore Police Department has done since April to hear and understand the concerns of Baltimore citizens.
Half of the funding to produce “On the Watch” comes from the Open Society Institute’s Baltimore Justice Fund, founded in May to address the root causes of inequities and harmful policies and practices in Baltimore that became broadly apparent with the killing of Freddie Gray. The grant to produce “On the Watch” was the first grant made from the Baltimore Justice Fund.
Other grants for the series came from the Bendit Family Foundation, Sig and Barbara Shapiro, and The Zanvyl and Isabelle Krieger Fund.
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WYPR is an NPR station. The station produces and broadcasts local programs including Midday with Dan Rodricks, Maryland Morning with Sheilah Kast, and The Signal, as well as news coverage and special editorial programming. As a listener-supported radio station, all contributions to the station are tax-deductible to the fullest extent of the law. For more information, visit www.wypr.org or call 410-235-1660.
Open Society Institute-Baltimore is a public charity and the sole field office of the Open Society Foundations’ U.S. Programs. We focus on the root causes of three intertwined problems in our city and state: drug addiction, an over-reliance on incarceration, and obstacles that impede youth in succeeding inside and out of the classroom.
OSI-Baltimore’s Baltimore Justice Fund supports focused interventions to improve police accountability and police-community relationships, reduce the number of Baltimoreans caught up in the criminal justice system, and engage Marylanders, especially young people, in advocacy for programs and policies to increase opportunity and racial justice. To give to the Baltimore Justice Fund, visit our donate page.
