Cops and Community Standards
The truth about Portland police reform
The city of Portland loves police reform more than it likes law enforcement.
As a result, the city’s new Police Accountability Commission is currently building the framework for Portland’s latest iteration of police oversight.
At 20 members, it could be unwieldy and talkative. Like the city’s other past and current oversight groups, members of the Police Accountability Commission represent various identity groups. Many members cite an allegiance to social justice or make reference to interactions they have had with police. This is what’s referred to as “lived experience.” Check out the bios here:
How will reformers’ backgrounds stack up to years of actual police work? We’ll find out.
A subcommittee of eight commission members met Jan. 13 to hammer out some bylaws and will meet again tomorrow, and another subcommittee will meet Jan. 20 to talk about community engagement, and the full board will meet Jan. 27. They have 18 months to accomplish their goal of creating a new police oversight system for Portland.
Portland has so many police oversight groups and their related subcommittees, they compete with one another. Last Thursday’s meeting conflicted with the Portland Committee on Community-Engaged Policing (PCCEP). Earlier this month the Citizen Review Committee met.
“You know, the (Police) Bureau has lots of openings right now,” said a Portland police officer. “If these people are so interested in police work, why don’t they apply?”
This officer will not be putting that question directly to any member of the Police Accountability Commission, because he has no intention of ever attending or watching its meetings.
Since this officer, who obviously doesn’t want to be identified, will not watch any of the commission’s meetings unless forced to, I gave him a partial rundown of Thursday’s meeting to get his impression.
First things first, the commission started with a Reminder of Community Standards – “how we treat each other and want to be treated” as facilitator Ayomide Nikizi put it.
A recitation of community standards at the start of some police oversight meetings has become as ubiquitous as an acknowledgement of ancestral land grabs.
Here are some of the Police Accountability Commission’s Community Standards and the officer’s response:
– Keep the needs of the community at-large in the forefront.
“We deal with lots of communities. Does a drug dealer have the same needs as the guy who just OD’d? You got homeless people stealing from homeless. Whose need comes first? We work for the community, but don’t kid yourself that everybody’s needs are forefront.”
– Keep multi-tasking to a minimum.
“Good advice when you’re driving.”
– Find ways to participate that meet your needs.
“I go to work. That’s how I participate.”
– Be positive.
“That’s hilarious. Be positive, but don’t make a joke or smile or laugh. Somebody will get suspicious or offended.”
– Keep in mind that everyone has their own truth.
“People lie, especially if they’ve just run over someone or raped a gal too drunk to say yes.”
– Listen without agendas and refrain from interruption.
“Cops can’t have hunches or act on prior information? If I’m contacting a subject who has a history of violent assaults, I’m keeping that in mind. Not interrupting is good advice. Let people talk. They might say something they shouldn’t.”
– Be polite, courteous and thoughtful.
“The rule is be polite as you can for as long as you can.”
– Assume good intentions.
“That’s a good way to get hurt. Some guy charges at you, his intentions are not good.”
This Portland officer thinks the city’s myriad police oversight groups are window-dressing by politicians. Cops are easy targets for activists and the media.
“I don’t hate my job. The work is still interesting. You’ve got people and all their issues and stories. It’s not boring. The public thinks we’re on strike. We’re not. We aren’t allowed to work. We got a long list of don’ts. Do something and somebody complains, you get another don’t. It’s safer to do as little as possible.”
The city has a history of police oversight groups dating back at least two decades ago. If cops were the problem, the reformers could point to excellent law enforcement as an accomplishment.
Could it be the Portland Police Bureau isn’t as bad as the reformers want the public to believe?
When Police Chief Danielle Outlaw became chief in 2017, police reformers and activists seemed initially pleased. She was black and had replaced Chief Mike Marshman, who was white.
Then at her introductory press conference, Outlaw said she wasn’t coming to Portland to “reform” the department: “I’m here to strengthen the good work that’s already been done.”
That bothered activists like Gregory McKelvey, black co-founder of Portland Resistance, who told the Portland Mercury he thought her performance “was pretty bad. … She should be here to reform because our police desperately need reform.”
Shortly after Outlaw became chief, I shared a coffee break with a few officers who seemed to like her. They predicted she wouldn’t last more than two years – not because of any failure on her part but “because of the community.”
Their prediction came true. She was gone in a couple of years.
It helps to remember that Portland’s population is roughly 660,000. The turnout at all these police oversight meetings rarely breaks 100. Many of the same faces have been showing up at these meetings for years. Yet the word “community” is freely tossed around as if a small band of cop critics represented everyone in the city. They don’t. Their influence has been amplified by City Hall and the media.
The biggest hit against the Portland Police Bureau was a finding in 2014 by the U.S. Department of Justice that officers used excessive force against the mentally ill. As part of a settlement with the DOJ, Portland City Council established an earlier police oversight group called the Community Oversight Advisory Board (COAB) to oversee reforms in how the police dealt with the mentally ill.
That 20-member oversight board was hailed as a potential national model for police reform. It was disbanded after two years when activists – some of them claiming to be mentally ill – sabotaged the meetings.
Board members included Dr. Rochelle Silver, a retired clinical psychologist, who had worked at Dammasch State Hospital; Dr. Alisha R. Moreland-Capuia, a psychiatrist, and Dr. Sharon Meieran, an emergency room doctor and member of the Multnomah County Commission. These three highly-trained women were unable to handle the mentally ill agitators. Yet this board was supposed to give police guidance on how to deal with the mentally ill.
Five Portland police officers were allowed to sit on that board but could not vote. When the meetings were hijacked by protesters in the audience, the officers sat and watched along with the other members.
Police departments reflect the communities they are located in. Portland politicians and civic leaders regularly tout the city’s progressive values. Perhaps the Portland Police Bureau represents what progressive law enforcement looks like.
That could explain why the police department in the state’s largest city seems passive in the political process.
Last week, in preparation for the legislative session in February, several legislative committees met to preview proposed concepts that could become law. The House and Senate Committees on the Judiciary considered Legislative Concept 94 which, among other things, would make it even more difficult for police officers to pull over traffic violators, and make it harder for cops to search vehicles for guns.
Rep. Janelle Bynum (D-Happy Valley) chairs House Judiciary and took credit last year for many of the dozen new laws directed at police reform. Sen. Floyd Prozanski (D-Eugene) is the long-time chair of Senate Judiciary.
The guests invited to Bynum’s and Prozanski’s committees to testify on LC 94 were Elona Wilson, whose lived experience includes being the daughter of former prisoners and who now runs a couple of nonprofits to help inmates exiting prison; Paul Solomon of Eugene, whose lived experience includes being in prison and who now runs a nonprofit called Sponsors to assist ex-inmates and Lamar Wise, who serves on Gov. Kate Brown’s Racial Justice Council’s Criminal Justice Reform and Police Accountability Committee (not to be confused with Portland’s Police Accountability Commission – see how this process works?)
This trio of guests, two of them black, all supported LC 94.
“Every Oregonian deserves to feel safe …,” said Wise.
He added that when police pull someone over because their brake light is out, it can make them feel unsafe, because the stop could be a pretext for something else.
Rep. Kim Wallan (R-Medford) inquired: Why do we have such traffic laws if police cannot pull anybody over?
Rep. Bynum answered: “Because black and brown people die, and we need to interrupt that cycle.”
Black and brown people are dying – but not at the hands of police. There were 92 homicides in Portland in 2021, more than half of the victims were what’s called “people of color.” Blacks exceeded all the other skin colors. The year 2022 got off to the same start with a black man and his nephew the victims of a double homicide on New Year’s Day.
Yet it appears no one from the Portland Police Bureau was invited to testify before the House and Senate Judiciary Committees on a legislative concept that would be particularly relevant to the state’s largest city.
The officer I talked to regarding the Police Accountability Commission has never heard of Rep. Bynum or Sen. Prozanski. This officer has never set foot inside the state Capitol building.
He's probably not unusual among police officers -- in Portland or elsewhere. Many cops seems to reserve their "political activity" to irreverent humor and smart-ass comments on social media. In Oregon, that is increasingly risky behavior for a cop.
Last legislative session the BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) caucus took credit for the passage of House Bill 2936, which restricts what police officers can do on social media.
Perhaps it's time police learned to exercise their free speech as effectively as their reformers. There will be public hearings during the legislative session in February. The usual suspects from the progressive, social justice nonprofits will be there offering their lived experience.
Think of the lived experience some cops could share.
Pam, thanks for the educating look into this subject. I learned a lot! You have created new suspicions in my mind about how this all works, and why things don’t get any better.
The activist community has helped elect several single social issue candidates who have not only been failures at correcting the several crises we are embroiled in, they are personally responsible for most of the unrest, the criminal activity in and around our homeless camps, the vandalism, arson, destroyed storefronts and Government Buildings , and the unbelievable fall in Portland’s standing as the very best place in the Country for young professionals and families to live!
Thanks to their ineptitude at their jobs, and their decisions that hinder our professional public servants from doing theirs, we are now at the very bottom of every list of Places to Visit, Places for Conventions and Business Meetings, and Cities where your College Student will be safe while getting an education.
My heart is broken 😞. I am angry 😡, I will work very hard 😓to get all incumbents out of Office!!!
I found you on Dr Malone's Substack (i think), even though I don't live in Portland, your Substack is informative and well written, so I subscribed. Good luck with it.