Police call communication key to convention peace

About 10 police officers--all schooled in hostage negotiation techniques--met with U.S. Justice Department officials and a handful of community peace workers Wednesday at a police academy in north Minneapolis to review the strategies.

The officers, dubbed "dialogue officers" or "free speech liaison officers," have been asked to open communication lines with activist leaders at the convention, which will be held Sept. 1-4 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul.

The hope, in part, is that the officers will be able to stay on top of any escalating violence or other problems and alert other officers or peaceful demonstrators.

"The whole goal is to try and reach out to groups that are going to protest. We recognize their free speech rights, but the concern on our end is that we don't want anybody to get hurt or have any property damage," said Bill Blake, a Minneapolis officer taking part in the initiative.

Blake said officers have been contacting groups they believe are planning to demonstrate. He said he went to a meeting of the Welfare Rights Committee, explained the initiative and handed out his card but was rebuffed.

"There's a lot of anger out there," he said.

Indeed, activists said they were skeptical of the approach.

Meredith Aby, who plans to march with the Coalition to March on the RNC and Stop the War, said the group was contacted by police but refused to participate. The group's planned march on the first day of the convention is expected to attract 30,000 to 50,000 protesters.

"We're interested in doing our own marshaling and peacekeeping. We're not interested in exchanging our phone numbers or doing joint training with police," she said.