A white police officer in Colorado has been placed on leave while authorities investigate why he detained a black man holding a trash clamp in front of the man’s home.

The man, who repeatedly told officers that he had been picking up trash in front of the building where he lives and works, was not taken into custody or booked on suspicion of a crime, the police said, but the episode late last week has caused anger and concern in the liberal and largely white city of Boulder, Colorado.

At a City Council meeting on Tuesday, residents reportedly clacked trash grabbers as Chief Greg Testa of the Boulder Police Department briefed officials on what had happened and announced that the officer had been placed on administrative leave.

“This is an extremely concerning issue and one we are taking very seriously,” Testa said.

The college town’s population is about 100,000 — 81 percent white and less than 2 percent black, according to census data. And at Tuesday’s meeting, city officials — most of them white — found themselves grappling with issues of structural racism, bias and restorative justice.

Video footage of the episode posted on social media begins when the situation is already underway and does not show the entire encounter. A police spokeswoman said on Thursday the footage is of the incident. In a statement on Monday, the police department said the encounter took place Friday around 8:30 a.m. in front of what the property owners call a “cohousing community.”

The police said one of their officers, whom they have not identified, “observed a man sitting in a partially enclosed patio area directly behind a ‘Private Property’ sign and initiated contact with the man to determine if he was allowed to be on the property.”

The man “gave the officer his school identification card,” the statement said. “The officer detained the man to investigate further and made a request over the radio for additional assistance to respond indicating that the person was uncooperative and unwilling to put down a blunt object. Several officers responded including a supervisor. The object the man was holding was used to pick up trash.”

The video footage, about 15 minutes long, shows a man, who also has not been publicly identified, exclaiming: “I don’t have a weapon! This is a bucket! This is a clamp!” Throughout the footage, an officer demands that he drop the “weapon,” and that he sit down; the man refuses, telling the officer that he is a university student.

“You have a gun in your hand!” the man yells at the officer.

“Yes I do, because you’re not listening,” the officer responds.

In a matter of minutes, several other officers — the man counts out eight — arrive.

“You said this is a weapon,” the man says, clacking the trash grabber in the air.

“It can be used as a weapon,” an officer replies.

“Do you feel like this is threatening?” the man asks.

Eventually, the voice of another man can be heard on the video footage telling officers “he works for us, he’s our work stay. He’s out here picking up trash.” The officers then gathered and appeared to be in discussion. Then the officer who first approached the man says, “We’ve decided that we’re going to end things at this point.” The officer appears to explain that the man had been “moving” the trash clamp “around” before handing the man a card and departing.

“Officers ultimately determined that the man had a legal right to be on the property and returned the man’s school identification card,” the police statement said. “All officers left the area and no further action was taken.”

The statement said the department opened an internal affairs investigation the morning of the episode that will result in a report to a panel and ultimately a recommendation to the chief of police. In an email on Thursday, Shannon Aulabaugh, a spokeswoman for the Police Department, reiterated that the department was “very concerned” about the episode, but declined to comment on it further until the investigation is complete.

At a City Council meeting days later, residents held signs that said “Doing Yard Work While Black” and “Black Lives Matter.” As part of the department’s investigation, Testa said officials would interview all of the officers involved and review body-camera footage.

That footage showed that one officer had revealed his handgun and it was “pointed to the ground,” the chief said.

“I am not making excuses,” he said. “I am just trying to add some needed context.”

In addition to asking the chief about issues of bias and racial profiling, members of the City Council pressed him on whether the man had been given an apology.

“My plan is to have a personal conversation with him when the time is right and hopefully sooner than later,” the chief said.

A man at the meeting identified by The Daily Camera as Sammie Lawrence told the Council that as a young black man from Sacramento, who has followed the case of Stephon Clark — who was fatally shot by police in his grandmother’s backyard — the confrontation in Boulder was “terrifying.”

“This is very scary,” he said. “I really hope we take this seriously, because I deserve a peace of mind as part of this community.”

A recent survey of Boulder residents found disparities in how residents viewed the city, including the quality of public safety services. Nonwhite residents viewed police and sheriff services as less positive than white people, according to survey results presented to the City Council this year.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.