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The council’s 4-3 vote on the resolution came one day after the Ethical Society of Police, an organization that represents minorities in the department, issued an ultimatum to Chief Mary Barton to take immediate action to address racism in the department.

The efforts appeared to be in tandem, with the majority of the legislative body now appearing to put ESOP — a group that has been active in the county police for years but only formally recognized by the department this year — closer to an equal footing with Barton’s administration and the 1,000-member St. Louis County Police Association.

Hours before the council vote, the legislative body’s two Black members, Rita Heard Days, D-1st District, and Rochelle Walton Gray, D-4th District, held a closed meeting with at least one ESOP member and a member of the Board of Police Commissioners. Gray declined to say with whom they met.

The events on Tuesday came at the end of a year in which every serious conversation about systemic changes in the department between those who wield the power to make them has occurred outside the public realm. Meanwhile, the department is facing complaints of racial discrimination and retaliation from Troy Doyle, a Black lieutenant colonel who was passed up for the job of police chief, and two Black lieutenants.

Barton, who is white, was the police board’s unanimous choice for chief to succeed Jon Belmar, who retired at the end of April. Weeks after she was sworn in April 30, Barton told County Council members that systemic racism did not exist in the department.

The council members’ private meeting took the place of a public meeting of the council’s Justice, Health and Welfare committee — of which Gray is the chair and Days is one of its three other members — which had been removed from the council schedule. During the full council’s regular meeting later, Days referred to the earlier meeting as a committee meeting, raising questions from another committee member, Tim Fitch, R-3rd District, who said he hadn’t heard about it.

Memos obtained by the Post-Dispatch indicate the councilwomen initially asked members of the department’s Diversity and Inclusion Unit to attend, then asked them on Tuesday not to attend. ESOP has routinely criticized the unit for failing to have leaders who are properly trained in diversity and inclusion.

Meanwhile, another closed-door effort to reform the department is wrapping up. Consultants working for Centene Corp. and other St. Louis-area companies have been reviewing the department’s policies and procedures and directing the precinct in the city of Jennings in a cross-jurisdictional effort with a police district in north St. Louis. The consultants have said they plan to release their report later this month.

The vote on the council resolution fell along party lines, with Clancy, D-5th District, and Kelli Dunaway, D-2nd District, joining Days and Gray over Republicans Fitch, Ernie Trakas, R-6th District, and Mark Harder, R-7th District.

The resolution says that while groups such as Forward Through Ferguson, the St. Louis Violence Prevention Commission and the NAACP have pressed for the need for interactions between officers and residents to be “rooted in mutual trust and respect,� mistrust of police puts cops and civilians in harm’s way because it could reduce cooperation with law enforcement and lead to people taking justice into their own hands. It said police unions “have a history of using their influence to establish protections that have the impact of helping officers avoid accountability.�

The resolution says the council expects the police department and police union to agree to a contract that “removes barriers to effective misconduct investigations� and “provides civilian oversight by allowing for accountability mechanisms to work in tandem� with the Board of Police Commissioners.

The resolution also calls for making officers’ disciplinary histories accessible to the public and for a more transparent discipline process. It also calls for releasing the names of officers involved in uses of deadly or excessive force unless the officer’s safety would be jeopardized and to give the public some access to officers’ personnel records.

It would also remove contract provisions that allow officers to get paid leave or paid desk duty after being charged with a felony offense.

The resolution comes as the department seeks to renew a two-year contract with about 100 sergeants, which expires on Dec. 31.

The resolution notes that the council “is empowered to reject the proposal� or to direct the county to enter a contract with terms modified by the council.

Joe Patterson, executive director of the police association, said in an interview, “While we are encouraged that the County Council is taking active steps in being involved with the collective bargaining process, we also look forward to an opportunity to help educate them on the process as a whole. ... The union has zero control over discipline in the police department. We do have due-process language but no control of discipline. That’s strictly and expressly a management right.�

As for the meeting between the council members and ESOP, he said the union is the sole bargaining unit recognized by the county “and when we’re left out of these key conversations, that’s very discouraging.�

A spokesman for the department said he did not immediately have a response from Barton to the council resolution.

Fitch, a retired county police chief, told his colleagues on Tuesday that much of the resolution called for actions that were not legal. As for civilian oversight, Fitch said the county already has that: the police board. And he said the department already withholds pay from officers who are charged with felonies. “That’s nothing more than an eye poke,� he said. As a whole, the resolution was a “slap in the face to every hard-working police officer out there.�

Days told her colleagues on the council “this resolution makes a statement about how we want the interaction between our law enforcement, Black officers and citizens, and the community as a whole.�

She said the department has had several opportunities to reform. “We’ve had task forces. We’ve had strategic plans. We’ve had the ... consent decree. We’ve had all these reports, but we do not have action.�