From mid-March through the end of June 2021, Select Board members Joe Pato and Doug Lucente conducted small group discussions focused on the Town’s Police Station project and the future of public safety in Lexington. We received a wide range of responses from the community and appreciate the time and thoughtfulness participants brought to our process.
The newly published report was accepted by the Select Board at its October 25, 2021 meeting after the board had three deliberation sessions on the topic. The first session on July 12, 2021 outlined the authors findings and reported that we felt that the Board could proceed with refining the Police Station construction project. The Board requested a more detailed written report which was subsequently presented in two parts. Part one was presented at the August 30, 2021 Select Board working session and focused on community feedback specific to the construction of a replacement police station. Part two was presented at the October 13, 2021 Select Board meeting and examined feedback focused on how the police force operates in Lexington. After presentation to and deliberation by the Select Board, the final report merged the two parts into a single document and was accepted by the Board.
The strength of this report, we believe, is that it offers the Police Department, Town leaders, and the public the equivalent of a “listening tour” of candid remarks from a broad section of the community. We hope that this will help contribute to better policing, public safety, and justice in Lexington. We caution readers of this report to refrain from attributing comments to particular individuals or groups. Our experience with briefing this report to various individuals is that their assumptions about sources of comments were almost invariably wrong.