Potter nam ed liaison
b y W. C. M cRae
Recently, Deputy Chief Tom Potter of the
Portland Police Bureau volunteered to be
police liaison to the gay community. The pos
ition was created after concerned individuals
contacted the police after a scheduling mis
take within the department left the Lesbian
and Gay Pride parade without a police escort
The liaison was announced at a meeting
between Deputy Chief Tobbin and Deputy
Chief Potter, and members of the Lesbian
and Gay Pride Steering Committee, Cathy
Schmitz, Jerry Deas, Gail Schm idt and
Grace Schaefer.
As a volunteer to the liaison position, Potter
stresses that he has taken the position “not in
name only." A "strong believer in rights,” Pot
ter is a 19-year veteran of the Portland Police
D epartm ent and has lived in Portland most
of his life.
Although he has no written "job descrip
tion” as liaison, Potter is in the process of
writing to other cities whose police depart
ments have already instituted gay liaisons to
discover how they are utilized. Potter believes
that the police determining in advance what
th e y want from the liaison is “like the tail
wagging the dog." Potter wants input from
the community, to find out what gays and
lesbians want from him, to find out how the
police liaison can best be structured in order
to meet these needs.
Potter sees himself mostly as a facilitator.
His long term goals are to increase sensitivity
within the department, to reduce tension
between gays and the police bureau, and in
general, to put into motion the means for
continued and improved relations between
gays and lesbians and the police.
Although he is a liaison, Potter wants les
bians and gays to use the conventional chan
nels as much as possible in their dealings
with the police, since increased interchange
between individuals will help to put an end to
stereotypes and prejudice. Potter has claimed
he is available — “on call” — 24 hours a day,
but it is incumbent on the police bureau to
give equal protection and service to all. When
it is felt by lesbians or gays that their treat
m ent is not fair, Potter will facilitate the review
procedure. Potter reminds that if the ultimate
goal of lesbian and gay integration in our
society is to be “treated just like anyone else,"
then gays should share procedures with
everyone else. Potter does not want to
change existing structures just to accommo
date gays, but rather to make sure that exist
ing structure treats everyone — and in this
case, gays — equally. He doesn't mind being
used as a liaison for "special cases” — for
instance when individuals feel threatened by
direct involvement with the police — but be
lieves gays can trust that with his involve
m en t fair treatment will be extended to all.
Equally, Potter does not see the advantage
of the gay community appointing a "police
liaison" to him. Individuals come and go. He
wants instead to institutionalize acceptance
of gays by the bureau at large, and not simply
inaugurate representation. His role as a
liaison is to assure gays that they can get fair
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treatment, and to ensure that the police will
give fair treatment Increased familiarity will
help end the repressive stereotypes that can
determine behavior, he says.
According to Potter, the police department
has instituted a “value driven" organization:
"We want to change the way we do business.”
Values are driving the organization — "doing
things the right way” isfnow the criteria for
promotion and mobility within the force, and
everyone is involved, from the top down. Pot
ter admits that certain officers have "jaun
diced views" and "macho attitudes. But ag
gression must be balanced with considera
tion of people’s rights. If values can’t be in
stituted into structure, they can be built into
the individual. “And if the worst one can’t
change attitudes, one can at least change
behavior by making values and doing things
right the organizational expedient," Potter ncted.
Potter hopes that at the meet mgs in August
(see Out About Town) the gay community
can come together on the issue of what it
wants from a police liaison. Potter reiterates
that he is “really open to input" and that he
will himself be attending the meetings. He
wants to get to know individuals as people,
and, as much as possible, develop shared
values with the community in general.
Potter stresses, though, that there are
"more avenues of exchange" open for gays
than just the liaison. He hopes that openly gay
people will volunteer to serve on civilian pre
cinct councils, especially in the central pre
cinct (to do so, contact Captain Aichele).
Also, anyone can go on "ride rounds" with
patrol officers — if representatives of the gay
community would “ride around" with offi
cers, increased understanding — at the beat
level — would result
To change the way gays are treated by the
police is Potter’s long term goal as liaison. I ie
does not see his office as the sole conduit
through which gay issues are to be addres
sed by the police force. Rather, he wants to
facilitate the functioning of the force so that
fair teatment of gays is assured. To ensure
this, cooperation, input and interaction with
the gay community is essential.
The politics
of lesbian and
gay resistance
b y W.C. McRae
The "failure of mainstream solutions to
right wing tactics has contributed to recent
F O R
WARD
= G
EAR
electoral losses for the gay community, ac
cording to Sandy Nelson, a lesbian activist
from the Seattle area. Nelson, speaking in
June at a forum sponsored by Radical Wo
men on gay and lesbian rights, reminded the
audience that “it is important every year (dur
ing Gay Pride week) to take inventory," to see
what went wrong, and what could have been
done differently. Lesbian and Gay Pride Day
ought to be a “celebration of gay lifestyles,
and a rally against right wing tactics.”
According to Nelson, moderates and con
servatives in the gay and lesbian movement
have allowed themselves “to be deceived
about the nature of the beast that oppresses
us." The tactics currently used by conserva
tive gay and lesbian leaders are not appro
priate or effective in dealing with the new right
wing," says Nelson. In Houston, for instance,
a gay rights bill was lost last year due to the
failure of established leadership. According
to Nelson, organized gay and lesbian groups
took a deliberate low-key approach to the
referendum initiated by the right wing to
overturn the existing ordinance. No attempt
was made to address the right wing directly
on the issues of rights for gays and lesbians,
but rather Houston gay leaders centered their
efforts on non-confrontation and on mobiliz
ing those voters who were already sympa
thetic. No organized attempt was made to
counter the misrepresentations and lies
made by the right about gays and the gay
community, and even when the KKK marched
through a gay area of Houston, gay leaders
counselled nonconfrontation. Houston’s gay
leadership allowed itself to be lulled into a
“false sense of security” by failing to correctly
appraise the mobilization of the right
An analogous situation occurred in Seat
tle, Nelson said. Sympathetic straight politi
cians and mainstream gay leaders “secretly”
put a rights bill through the county council.
By not announcing its intentions, gay leaders
hoped, by their secrecy, to avoid any right
wing reaction. If no one knew about it— gays
included — then it could pass quietly. But
Nelson c laims that it was in fact a "set up" for
the gay and lesbian community at large. While
the right wing is organized and ready to
mobilize, the lesbian and gay community is
not By not notifying the gay community —
“keeping it secret" as a political strategy —
the advantage is instantly given to the right
wing. When indeed the right wing did attack,
the mainstream gay leadership pursued their
rights by appealing to “an individual’s rights
to privacy,” not directly to the issue of rights
for gays and lesbians. B ut says Nelson, a
coalition of socialist feminists did begin to
fight back “openly and aggressively,” and in
the process won the support respect and
friendship of other minorities.
In the discussion that followed, parallels
were drawn between the situations in Houston
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