Officials in Oak Park are eying a policy that would restrict police traffic stops related to vehicle equipment violations and other non-safety related reasons such as broken tail lights, missing or expired registrations, and license plate tags that are not completely visible.
The Oak Park Village Board on July 21 directed staff members to work with the village’s Citizens Police Oversight Commission and Pivot Consulting Group to draft a policy within 60 days that would limit what it called pretext traffic stops, which often are used by officers as an way to investigate for more serious crimes.
The motion and approval comes after the death of Christian Wallace, a 38-year-old Chicago resident, who was fatally shot by an Oak Park police officer in May after he was pulled over for failing to use his turn signal while changing lanes.
Wallace was asked to exit the vehicle, the officer found a weapon in Wallace’s waistband and the two struggled for possession of the weapon before Wallace was fatally shot four times. Oak Park officials released footage of the traffic stop in June.
Trustee Derek Eder, who made the motion that was seconded by Trustee Chibuike Enyia, also recommended that the Oak Park Police Department create an internal policy that restricts the use of pretext stops.
The department policy, Eder said, “should state that stops, for whatever reason, should focus on the infraction and clarify and that expanding the scope of the initial stop is not allowed unless there are specific articulable facts developed within the scope of the initial contact that prompt additional inquiry.”
Time spent by police on minor violations could be better spent on preventing more harmful driving situations, Eder said.
“Traffic safety is extremely important, and I want to be clear that this is not for stopping people for speeding, running stop signs or any other traffic violations that help keep drivers and bicyclists and pedestrians safe,” Eder said.
According to the American Civil Liberties Union, he said, traffic stops prompted by minor violations such as broken tail lights and tinted windows rarely make roads safer, but instead can lead to violence, racial disparities and loss of trust in the police.
Eder said Oak Park police conducted 569 field contact stops in 2025, and approximately 74% of those pulled over were Black people, according to a police department report. Of those stops, only 101 of the encounters lead to arrests, he said.
Eder said he wanted the policy to include consistent reporting on traffic stops and violations, to track the impact of it.
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“I think this is an opportunity to do some things that we should have done already,” said Trustee Jenna Leving Jacobson.
Kevin Jackson, Oak Park’s village manager, said a draft of the policy is ready.
In 2022, the BerryDunn national consulting group worked with Oak Park officials on improving public safety, examining several aspects of the Oak Park Police Department, including its overall operations, internal and external race equity issues and other aspects that addressed policing equity issues. Officials on July 21 said the new traffic stop policy would further move the department into alignment with the BerryDunn public safety assessment recommendations.
Tristan Rogers, an Oak Park resident, spoke in favor of the draft policy.
“Pretextual stops disproportionately target Black and brown drivers, and, too often turn violent, even deadly,” he said. “Restricting those stops is the single most concrete step we can take to ensure we never lose another community member to a police encounter over a routine traffic violation.”