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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (March 2, 2012)
Street roots March 2, 2012 H A R D E S T Y fro m page 4 community profiling. members . ... about tactics J.T.: How do you rank current crop o f mayoral or about activities or about what they’d been involved candidates on issues o f police accountability? in. The people on the committee, because they didn’t know police other than from that committee, believed J.H .: I think they’re all bad, and they’re not bad them. because they’re bad people, they’re bad because they They were not getting to the problem because it was don’t know what they don’t know yet. So I don’t think a police-led kind of effort, and the police got to frame that there is any one candidate that stands out that’s the conversation. They didn’t want anyone to talk about going to do a great job reforming the police bureau. But anything that was going to make the police what I’m hoping is that during this campaign season the uncomfortable. Well, it’s community will ask these uncomfortable when police candidates that want to be mayor, shoot people in our community. what is your vision of true That’s uncomfortable. When 1 dea^t th in k that there Is community policing? What do you they racial profile people, that’s think the role of a police chief any one candidate that uncomfortable. So it didn’t should be? Do you like the one we stands out that's going to matter to me that people who have? Then based on those are paid with taxpayer dollars do a great job reform ing answers, pick the best person that are going to be uncomfortable in the police bureau® But what we think is going to move the a meeting. They need to get over police bureau forward. I guess the T in hoping is that during that. good news is that all three this cam paign season the candidates, because they’re not J.T.: Do you have any thoughts com m unity w ill ash these insiders to City Hall and downtown, on how racial profiling has could make the changes, but the candidates that want to be affected police work, specifically question is if they will have the mayors What Is yonr vision with gang violence? political will to make those changes. J.H .: Keaton Otis is dead of true com m unity policing? What do yon th in k the role of a police chief should be? because we had ill-trained gang officers riding the streets of Northeast Portland. That young man is dead because someone looked at him and thought he was African American and is between 14 and 24, therefore he must be a gang member, right? That moment when that officer made that decision to pull that young man over, they just escalated everything up until the point where they shot and killed him. I think the police have a huge challenge because the community distrusts them because of their experience being stopped and searched just for walking down the street in their neighborhood. The police don’t get a lot of African Americans saying, "I know so-and-so is a gang member, and so-and-so has a gun.” They are not getting th e com m unity cooperation from people because people have observed over and over again this behavior. When my office was on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, I can’t tell you how many times I saw the police pull over young African-American men, search them, search their car, search their back packs and then let them go. Now the interesting thing about that is there is no record of those stops. Even though the Portland police keep records of traffic and pedestrian stops those aren’t captured because they don’t call that a traffic stop. They call that a “walk and talk.” They’re just trying to find out what they’re doing in the neighborhood, even though they’ve searched them, and they’ve stopped them and limited their ability to move freely, they don’t consider that a stop. So the data doesn’t tell us how bad the situation is. But if you observe it, you can see this happens over and over and over again in certain communities. This police chief doesn’t even mention racial profiling or the plan to reduce racial profiling that former Chief Rosie Sizer actually produced a year late. It certainly doesn’t come up during budget times because there were some very specific recommendations that Chief Sizer developed that had financial implications. We’re in the budget season now; I’ve heard no one talk about how we are going to fund the plan to eliminate racial I Love, Therefore I Am By Aaron Randazzo Trees sway, graceful attention radiating with purpose This acknowledgment spell blesses the air Appreciation: washing our eyes, brightening the surface Willfully shatter these routines we declare Divine connections unwind the chattering Mind, a mystical moment murmuring merrily Art; scribbles intertwine to reveal an eternal being Consciousness, etched on star dust nightly A howl of Mothers fills this eternal ocean New life emerges, amply ready to add meaning To a hungry dream; what an explosion Variety fills the emptiness, gently glowing Birds drift across a shimmering river Serenely imprinted on the cosmic memory; listen, Be potential’s choosing, a silent giver At one with totality; the spirit shines within Grazing elk, mystic waterfall, silent rock, teach us Your oneness with the moment, your grace We’ve forgotten ourselves in this dream of rust; Society, a tradition ready to recycle and replace A new beginning emerges soon? J.T.: What would prove to you that we have police accountability? J.H .: This is the first time in over 20 years that a Portland police officer has been indicted for using deadly force on duty - the cop who shot the guy with a shotgun using real bullets and not bean-bag rounds. Real police accountability would say it’s impossible to think that out of 5,000 employees that nobody ever does anything wrong. So I would suspect that there are officers that would be fired, there would be officers that would be demoted, officers that would have to go through some kind of supervised training. And right now, I don’t believe that any of this happens. For me, real police accountability would mean that periodically that a police officer would be fired, or demoted or sent back to retraining and that would be public knowledge. We’ll remember humility, love, and compassion Songbird, lead us in our dream, to utopia here Erase this fantasy; material wealth and fashion We open our hearts and relinquish the fear To start a new collective dream A dream of home. J.T.: What is the police bureau doing right? J.H .: (Pause) There are a lot of good men and women in the police bureau who go to work every day and do their job in a respectful, thoughtful manner, and I don’t think there’s a lot of police officers that misuse their power. But I think that police become more empowered to misuse their power when they’re not held accountable. They answer over 40,000 calls a year and they don’t kill 40,000 people a year, so that means most of the time they get it right. When they don’t get it right, the problem is they don’t say, “yeah, we messed up that one.” They say it’s the person that they killed who is at fault because they didn’t follow directions, which I ’ve never heard of anyone in a mental health crisis following directions. We certainly know that there are some police officers whose names show up in excessive force complaints. But we have no certainty, quite frankly. I don’t know who is a good police officer. I would hate to be in a position where I needed a police officer, and I was unsure if the one I got was the right one. That would petrify the daylights out of me. That’s why so many community members are petrified of calling the police. Toxic By Jason W olf The persistence of life is water down the drain I only ask of you a moment while I recollect Instead you choose to suck the essence out of my soul You drain me within an inch of my being Our relationship is explosively toxic You poison me yet you keep me alive To confront you is to confront a ghost You are a whisper in the wind Without you I am mere flesh With you I am mere flesh shosoxsa@gmail.com Copyright Jason Bogdan aka Jason Wolf good, local, food. ALBERTA COOPERATIVE GROCERY 1500 NE Alberta St. Portland, OR 97211 503.287.4333 www. a I be rtag roce ry. coop open to everyone 9-10 daily M ir a d o r COMMUNITY STORE a' n*. * rjr* ♦ "T - *» *nr. ’ * Canning jars & equipment, cookware, kitchen tools & appliances Organic cotton sheets, towels, , yyj-,, N atural Kitchen Honte 2106 SE Division 503*231*5175 m iradorcom m unitystore.com M on-Sat 10-6 • Sun 11-5 Food dryers Juicers Books on meat-free cooking, gardening & sustainability
