After several months of deteriorating relations, the city’s Police-Community Relations Council finally has the look of a failed experiment. Last month's news that community activists were prepared to walk away from the table has been anticipated for some time, and it seems likely that federal mediators will once again be asked to intervene in the process.

Interim Police Chief Tim Dolan has met with disgruntled PCRC members and vowed to continue working with them. But without a more visible commitment from Mayor R.T. Rybak, his efforts will probably not be sufficient to save the process.

Community leaders have long been critical of Rybak’s unwillingness to participate personally in the PCRC. The mayor has claimed that he doesn’t want to “politicize” the process with his presence. But with that process on the brink of collapse and public safety issues supposedly at the top of his agenda, Rybak needs to begin playing a more active role.

He can begin by making it clear that he expects Dolan and the police department to take seriously the federal mediation agreement and the 82 action items that have been hammered out by the PCRC over the past three years. These actions are not “voluntary,” as Dolan asserted recently; they should be seen as mandatory. Then he should make a point of attending the monthly meetings and demanding to see some progress.

There’s plenty of reasons why the PCRC has been bogged down for so long. Some community representatives have used the process as a soapbox for their own personal political agendas and the police department has generally seen the group as more of an annoyance than a path toward healing relationships. Despite these obstacles, some real progress has been made. But it’s going to be up to the mayor to assure that progress continues.