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About The nugget. (Sisters, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (July 22, 2020)
Wednesday, July 22, 2020 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon 23 Oregon, other states putting names of ousted police online By Andrew Selsky Associated Press SALEM (AP) 4 In the aftermath of the death of George Floyd in police cus- tody, Oregon has released the names of over 1,700 offi- cers whose transgressions over the past 50 years were so serious that they were banned from working in law enforcement in the state. The online posting last week came after the state Legislature created a law requiring the Department of Public Safety Standards and Training to establish a state- wide public database of offi- cers whose certification has been revoked or suspended. <Those who are revoked have tarnished the badge and no longer have the trust of their community, their agency, or our agency as the certifying body,= department director Eriks Gabliks told The Associated Press. The web site includes a spreadsheet with the names of decertified officers going back to 1971. In at least SCHOOL YEAR: Plans may change as situation evolves Continued from page 1 can readily be traced. That creates challenges for deliv- ering different levels of instruction and providing electives. <To keep all those cohorts separate is almost impossi- ble on a comprehensive high school schedule. Math is going to be the biggest chal- lenge in trying to keep those cohorts separate,= Scholl said. That9s because differ- ent students in a cohort will need instruction at different levels. Keeping the cohorts sepa- rate is important, because state guidance requires that a cohort be isolated if a <clus- ter= of COVID-19 cases develops. <The biggest the cohort, the bigger the risk of one instance, a police offi- cer who was decertified in Oregon obtained employ- ment in law enforcement in another state, a situation that some say points to the need for a comprehensive, nation- wide database. Former Coquille, Oregon, police officer Sean Sullivan was convicted of harassment in 2005 for kissing a 10-year- old girl on the mouth. A year later, he became chief of police of the tiny town of Cedar Vale, Kansas. He quit that job while being investi- gated there. In the absence of an offi- cial nationwide database, a nonprofit maintains a website intended to be a national reg- istry of certificate or license revocations. The National Decertification Index pro- vides access to records from agencies in 44 states and was created by the International Association of Directors of Law Enforcement Standards and Training. Five states 4 Hawaii, Massachusetts, California, New Jersey and Rhode Island 4 do not certify offi- cers, and one, Georgia, does decertify but doesn9t contrib- ute to the registry, said Mike Becar, executive director of the nonprofit. <More needs to be done,= he said in an email. <First the NDI is voluntary so we have states like Georgia that don9t contribute and the ones that do could stop at any time. Second, many states can only decertify for crimes, some only for felony convictions, but many forms of miscon- duct conducted by officers are not crimes but need to be investigated.= The registry is for use by law enforcement agencies having to shut down the entire school,= Scholl said. Scholl said the schools recognize how important co- curricular activities are to students and families 4 and there9s just no clear mes- sage yet on how they will proceed. <We9re not sure what9s going to happen with bands, choirs, plays, athletics,= Scholl said. Surveys have gone out from individual schools seeking input from families, and a general survey is also available. Scholl encourages people to weigh in at the July 29 Superintendent9s Coffee via Zoom or contact him directly at curtiss.scholl@ ssd6.org; or call 541-549- 8521. (See the green box on page 2 for ways to weigh in.) The district is to receive additional guidance from the Oregon Department of Education this week and again on August 11, and will continue to develop plans that must be submitted to ODE by August 15. <Our plan is to have a really good plan going into the board meeting, which is (August 12) and then we have to submit it by the 15th,= Scholl said. An engaged and support- ive community has Sisters schools positioned to cope with the strains of what promises to be a complicated and challenging school year, but Scholl acknowledges that there9s no pretending things are going to roll along smoothly. <We9re better equipped (than many other districts) and we9ll be ready,= he said. <But it9s not going to be perfect.= ... many forms of misconduct conducted by officers are not crimes but need to be investigated. — Mike Becar SUDOKU SOLUTION for puzzle on page 20 34.33 Acres on Whychus Creek! — 69 6 69870 87 870 7 0 S TARDUST L ANE , S ISTERS — 1,500 feet of frontage on the creek! 2,718 sq. ft., 3-bedroom, 2-bath, home. 3,600 sq. ft. shop, paved RV pads, 2.7 acres water rights, 4+ acres irrigated grounds. Too many upgrades to list. $1,450,000. MLS#220104492 Sheila Reifschneider, Broker, 541-408-6355 Comments? Email editor@nuggetnews.com Licensed Broker in Oregon | sheila@reedbros.com Coldwell Banker Reed Bros. Realty 291 W. Cascade Ave. | 541-549-6000 but includes links, accessi- ble by the public, to records from 11 states, not all of which include names in their documents. Causes for decertification ranged from an officer call- ing in sick for his shift while drunk at a college football game to aggravated battery, drug use, and homicide. The national outcry after the killing of Floyd in Minneapolis has accelerated states moving toward greater transparency about bad actors in law enforcement, said Amber Widgery, who specializes in justice issues at the National Conference of State Legislatures. <We9ve seen unprec- edented, swift responses,< Widgery said. " In Colorado, a police reform bill just signed into law mandates creation of a database like Oregon9s by Jan. 1, 2022. " A bill working its way through the New York Legislature would require a public database contain- ing the names of any officer who has had their employ- ment terminated due to misconduct. " Ohio has pending bills that would establish a data- base of records of police officers9 use of force. State Sen. Lew Frederick, who was among lawmakers who sponsored the database bill in Oregon, said the push needs to go further. <The next step is to have information more broadly available about discipline and complaints,< Frederick said. <And have a robust sys- tem of effective community oversight boards watching use of force activities and hiring/transfer policies.= New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal tried to accomplish at least part of that last month, by ordering all state, county and local law enforcement agencies to divulge the names of law enforcement officers who commit serious disciplin- ary violations. The order is now on hold amid legal chal- lenges from several police unions.