AUSTIN, Tex. — After decades of lawsuits and mass protests failed to radically reform the troubled Police Department, we tried a new tactic a few years ago: Targeting one of the most problematic police union contracts in the country. As a result, Austin went from having a retrograde contract to one that offers transparency and accountability. Others cities can follow this route as well.

For years, the Austin Police Department’s contract limited civilian oversight, allowed police misconduct records to basically vanish and kept certain important internal affairs files under seal. This lack of oversight, accountability and transparency was linked to the over-policing of Austin’s black community.

In Austin, black people represent only 8 percent of the population yet are subjected to 14 percent of stops, 26 percent of searches, 24 percent of arrests and 31 percent of officer-involved shootings.

For us, the tipping point came in 2016, after a police officer killed David Joseph, an unarmed, naked black teenager. Around then, a video circulated showing Breaion King, a slim, young black schoolteacher, being violently and needlessly arrested at a traffic stop. When she tried to file a complaint about a year later, a statute of limitations on misconduct negotiated in the police contract prevented the police officers from being disciplined.