Street Roots • February 20-26, 2015
Commentary
grievances against arbitrary authority or
contract violation by management.
As I look over the current (2013-17) labor
agreement between the PPA and the city of
Portland, I see the majority of the articles deal
with precisely those kinds of issues: seniority,
vacations, leave for sickness, death, education
and military service; compensation; hazard
premium; allowances for clothing and
equipment; insurance; legal fees; funeral
expenses; safety and performance evaluations.
Clearly the police heed these assurances.
N.D.: And some of those provisions were
hard-won; clothing and weapons, for
instance. Initially, police had to provide their
own. It took collective pressure by them,
along with mobilization of community and
labor support, to win the provision that’s
now part of their contract.
Another notable issue early on was the
union, wanting to protect its members,
saying: If any of our members commits an
act subject to discipline, we want them to
have union representation. That’s
reasonable. Their claim was, cops have to
have the samé rights as anybody else in
society.
But then, with successive contracts, they
extended those rights beyond anything the
rest of us have. Now, in the event of a
shooting, you can’t question a police officer
until two days have passed.
Page 9
Upcoming events on
race, police and reform
here are five events this week,
■
including City Club’s Friday Forum
to gather in community to talk about
race and policing, and to observe these
last few days of Black History Month.
Saturday, Feb. 21: Oregon Humanities
Community Discussion on Race and
Policing, Conversation leader: Veronica
Dujon, PSU sociology professor and
associate dean of the College of Arts
and Sciences. Center for Intercultural
Organizing, 700 N K in g s w o rth S t,
1:30-3 p.m.; public welcome, no
charge.
Monday, Feb. 23: Arresting Power,
90-minute, locally made documentary.
Hollywood Theatre, 7 p.m. Tickets
available online and (while they last) at
the door: $6-8.
Tuesday, Feb. 24: Oregon Humanities
Community Discussion on Race and
Policing, conversation leader: Adam
Davis, executive director of Oregon
Humanities. Mount Hood Community
College Student Union, 26000 SE
Stark S t, Room 1051, Gresham; 5:30-
M. G.i Who can’t?
7 p.m.; public welcome, no charge.
N. D.: Their superiors can’t. The district
R E U T E R S /S T E V E D IP A O L A
experience with unions composed of police
officers is that they’re ambiguous
institutions, sharing much in common with
many other unions and yet decidedly
different. Their relation to labor is both
touchy and problematic.
M. G.: And they’re under scrutiny in many
cities right now. B ut let’s start with a little
local history. The Portland Metropolitan Police
Force was formed in 1870, with six patrolmen,
a lieutenant and a chief. This is from the
Portland Police Bureau (PPB) website, by the
way. Their first contract was 1942.
N. D.: No, not a contract with the city.
1942 is when they organized, which makes
the Portland Police Association the longest
continuously functioning police union in the
country. That year they received a charter
from the American Federation of State,
County and Municipal Employees
(AFSCME), a national union. But, they did
not succeed in vanning a contract with the
city until 1970.
Even lacking a contract, but as an
AFSCME affiliate, they participated with
other unions in the State Federation of
Labor and the local Central Labor Council.
When they pushed for a pension plan in the
late 1940s along with the firefighters, their
speakers were welcomed by nearly every
union meeting in town and their outreach
won them strong labor backing. They owe
their first contract, as well, to the support.of
other unions. Specifically the ILWU and
Teamsters, who shut down the Port of
Portland for three days until the city agreed
to. recognize the police union.
Then, after winning that first contract,
the PPA disaffiliated from AFSCME. Other
than a brief attempt to create a national
union of police officers, the PPA has stayed
independent since 1970. By and large
they’ve gone their own way not identifying
with other unions unless they needed
something.
In the early 1980s, I used to have regular
meetings with representatives of the PPA to
encourage their labor identification. For a
while their offices were in the same building
on Southeast Morrison Street as the
Northwest Labor Press, and Gene Klare,
editor of the Labor Press, hosted monthly
lunches for me and Jeff Barker, editor of the
PPA’s newsletter The Rap Sheet, who later
became PPA president. Occasionally Stan
Peters, their president at that time, would
join us.
M.G.: Full disclosure, Norm: I was a
deputy sheriff for Marion County, in Salem,
back in the ‘70s. And looking at your deep
past, I know that back in 1988, you and Bill
Bigelow wrote that wonderful high school and
adult education text, The Power in our Hands.
Your handbook includes this introductory
list of what unions do: negotiate wages,
benefits and working conditions; set up
committees to strive for worker health and
safety; promote legislation favorable to workers;
represent and defend workers in disciplinary
proceedings within workplaces; likewise,
represent and defend them when workers have
attorney’s office can’t. And that’s part of the
labor contract. So they have a chance to
meet with other officers involved in the
shooting to get their stories straight and go
over everything with their lawyers. And
then, after two days, they can bring back
what becomes the official version. It’s a real
distortion of what was initially a valid
concern to gain equal rights.
MiG.: OK, I see we’re talking about Article
61.2.1.3: “Whenever delay in conducting the
interview will not jeopardize the successful
accomplishment of the investigation or when
criminal culpability is not at issue, advance
notice shall be given the officer not less than
forty-eight (48) hours before the initial
interview commences or written reports are
required from the officer. The advance notice
shall include whether the officer is a witness or
a suspect, the location, date and time of the
incident, the complainant’s name, and the
nature of the allegation against the officer. ”
N.D.: What we see historically is the
police functioning first as a union with many
similarities to other public Sector unions,
and then increasingly narrowly-focused and
becoming a powerful political force in
Portland. But what’s important in
understanding the PPA or any police union
is not in their contract.
M. G.: One step at a time. Are they a real
union?
N. D.: So first, we need to talk about what
unions are. The term represents a vast
range of existing types of organizations.
Within that range many are hierarchical,
narrowly self-interested and also politically
active. In those respects, police unions fall
within the normal range, albeit having won
some concessions beyond what other unions
Friday, Feb. 27: T a n Portland’s
Police Really Change?” City Club’s
Friday Forum, 614 SW 11th Avenue,
doors open 11:30 a.m. for 12:15 p.m.
program. Advance registration required;
$30 admission for non-members
includes lunch.
:
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Saturday, Feb. 23: Oregon
Humanities Community Discussion on
Race and Policing, Conversation
leader: Wendy Willis, executive director
of the Policy Consensus Initiative.
Rockwood Library, 17917 SE Stark S t;
public welcome, no charge.
have, that: may even be thought of as worker
control issues, such as their resistance to
civilian oversight.
M.G.: That resistance is evident in press
releases issued by Daryl Turner, who is
currently president of the PPA. In his
statement from Oct. 23, 2013, for example,
where he is pushing back against proposed
expanded powers of the Independent Police
Review’s regarding disciplinary investigations.
“IPR’s proposed code changes trigger a
number of collective bargaining issues that
must be addressed before the City can
implement the code changes,” Turner writes.
“These mandatory subjects of bargaining
include, but are.not limited to, discipline; job
security, and minimum fairness. Our collective
bargaining agreement also contains a number
of provisions regarding the discipline process.
IPR’s proposed changes will also impact those
contract rights. ”
N.D.: Right. He’s reminding us that this
See FORCE, page 10