City Commission Acts on Data Showing Black Residents Stopped at Twice Their Population Share

Riverside's Community Police Review Commission voted Wednesday to forward a set of policy recommendations to a City Council committee after extensive discussion over racial disparities in police stop data.

The recommendations, approved unanimously, focus on how the city analyzes and responds to data collected under California's Racial and Identity Profiling Act, commonly known as RIPA, enacted in 2015 under AB 953.

Commissioners stopped short of concluding that Riverside police officers are engaging in racial profiling — but said the city should adopt clearer standards and more detailed analysis to better understand persistent disparities affecting the city's Black residents.

"We're trying to keep the recommendations focused on a little bit further research and further analysis to help us get at a better understanding and answer to what we're seeing here," Commissioner Jeffery Ward told commissioners during Wednesday's meeting.

Under state law, police departments must report demographic information from traffic and pedestrian stops to the California Department of Justice.

Riverside's data drew scrutiny because Black residents accounted for a disproportionately high share of police stops over the past three years.

According to the commission's report, Black residents make up 6.6 percent of Riverside's population but accounted for 14.46 percent of police stops in 2024, 13.85 percent in 2025 and 15.02 percent in 2026. The three-year average was 14.44 percent — more than double the city's Black population share.

"All other races are stopped at a rate at or below their percentage of population," the commission's report stated.

The commission recommended the city pursue four key actions: conduct additional data analysis, establish standards for interpreting disparities, create a formal audit process when data exceeds certain thresholds and set reduction goals if profiling is identified.

As part of data analysis, the commission suggested the city manager's office analyze whether certain categories — including calls for service, "flag down" encounters and stops involving non-residents — might be skewing the data.

Riverside police officials previously argued those factors could affect the numbers, according to the commission report.

Ward said the commission wanted the city to test that explanation rather than rely on assumptions.

"We want to have some statistics behind what is being suspected in terms of influencing the numbers," Ward said.

The proposal also recommends creating a framework for determining when disparities should trigger further investigation.

An example included in the report suggests categorizing data deviations into "green," "yellow" and "red" ranges depending on how far stop rates exceed census demographics.

Commissioner Eileen Teichert said other California cities have already begun taking action after reviewing similar RIPA data.

"A good dozen cities throughout the state have actually taken those steps and have made recommendations about different actions that should be taken in order to reduce this disproportionate stopping of African Americans," Teichert said.

Commissioners also emphasized that the commission was not attempting to make findings of misconduct.

"The committee tried to be very constrained in what our recommendations were," Teichert said. "We felt that it was part of our duty under the city charter to make policy recommendations and after having three or four years of data being produced about the number of these stops, it I think has risen to the point where it's incumbent upon us to raise it to the attention of the subcommittee for the city council to take a look at for them to decide if this is a problem. It isn't something that the committee felt comfortable in making a conclusion that it means this."

No members of the public spoke on the item Wednesday.

The recommendations will next go to the City Council's Safety, Wellness and Youth Committee for consideration.