Members of DeKalb’s peace coalition are distributing a racial-profiling survey aimed at pinpointing discrimination by DeKalb and campus police.

University Police reported 2,703 routine traffic stops last year. Of the drivers pulled over, 65 percent were white and 21 percent were black, with 4 percent Hispanic, 3 percent Asian, 1 percent Indian and the remaining 5 percent of unknown race.

Cecile Meyer, coordinator of the DeKalb Interfaith Network for Peace and Justice, said the survey is designed to make minorities aware of what racial profiling is & that is, stopping drivers specifically because of their race & and to gather complaints and criticisms of who they think might be biased police officers. It’s being distributed through local churches, CHANCE students and the Center for Black Studies.

The survey asks respondents to describe local police and their behavior on duty, with questions such as “Do you believe racial profiling occurs in DeKalb County?” and “Have you ever felt that you were stopped by police because of your race?”

It also asks for names and badge numbers of officers whom students believe treated them unfairly.

Meyer said the survey is modeled after a recent racial-profiling survey at the College of DuPage and encourages minorities to speak up.

DeKalb Police Chief Bill Feithen, however, believes there’s not much to speak up about locally. He acknowledges that racial profiling exists in some parts of the country, but said his department strives for fair treatment of residents, regardless of their race.

“Racial profiling is a sensitive issue and is viewed in many different perceptions,” Feithen said. “I do not want anybody to feel they have been treated unjustly or unprotected, but I trust my officers. If a problem ever arises, I hope people do not become misinformed and they feel free to talk to us anytime. We do not condone any discrimination.”

In recent years, racial profiling has been hotly debated and repeatedly addressed. Locally, Feithen has adopted programs and attended training sessions to reassure minority residents that they are in good hands.

“We have tried to be proactive and see experiences through other people’s eyes so that a problem does not even have a chance to start,” he said. “The department offers community groups and students to ride along in squad cars to see what goes on, and earlier this year I attended the nation’s first racial profiling symposium.”

Feithen and NIU’s interim police chief Lt. John Hunter agree that police often don’t have the means to identify race — or even gender — before they pull a driver over.

“To enforce the safety of the other drivers, many times our officers just run random license plate numbers they see on the road to check the background of the driver,” Feithen said. “They just concentrate on the number as it goes by, and do not even see who is driving.”

Hunter added that his officers make many of their traffic stops at night.

“At these times, it is hard to tell what race or sex the driver is,” he said.

Derrick Smith, an academic adviser at the Center for Black Studies and a member of the committee that issued the racial-profiling survey, believes it’s a good initiative to keep minorities on their toes.

Smith has helped organize forums and campus discussions on race relations. Through his affiliation with the CHANCE program, which allows students who don’t meet NIU admittance requirements to attend college, he counsels minority students with their concerns both inside and outside NIU — and said many are not aware that they can file claims against the police departments.

“Some of the students I have talked to said they have been victims of discrimination,” Smith said. “We are here to help them strive for justice, and work against and identify the police who have done this.”

Smith and Meyer want to tighten the data-collecting policies of the police departments, demanding that officers keep racial statistics and records of who is stopped for traffic violations and why. Because there are no statistics about racial profiling, there is no record, Smith said.

Hunter, however, insists that he has never been contacted for exact breakdowns about the races of drivers stopped for traffic violations.

“As a police force for the university, we have a responsibility to correct possible violations by our officers, but from what I have seen, there have not been any,” Hunter said.