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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 14, 2016)
Page 10 Commentary Street Roots • Oct. 14-20, 2016 Failure of leadership, lack of accountability, in police contract BY JO ANN HARDESTY being brought out of mothballs, to confine itself to re-organization, and - as with the Citizen Review Committee - it plans to ver the past year we have heard a lot reduce public participation. about Portland’s desperate need to All bodies, purportedly designed to hire more police officers. Due to an gather public testimony on civil rights and absolute lack of transparency, we don’t even policing, are effectively suppressed. It is know whether this is true; and we certainly within this environment that I tried to don’t know that low pay is the root cause for intervene on the mayor’s return to secret recruiting problems. negotiations for another expensive, long Readers may indeed be experiencing poor term bargaining agreement with the police police response. Crime is down: the Police union. Commissioner (our On O ct 5, a police union contract Mayor) is quick to proposal emerged from back rooms for open point out that calls for discussion in City Council. I value public service are up. It’s processes and community engagement darn difficult to get Community “input” might, for the first time, this bureau manager to draw a fact-based accounting, about the very post metrics on call premises behind the police contract I was response times, and troubled when the city clerk set out no sign- whether the 2011-era in sheets: it’s standard practice, precursor practice of cops self- to public participation. It became apparent Jo Ann Hardesty initiating calls has been that no public testimony would be heard: reined in. No When democracy enthusiasts understood independent assessment of solve rates to their exclusion, uproar followed. Correct crime is available. observation of parliamentary procedure had At the 2012 U.S. Department of Justice to be yelled to the Council. I was press conference announcing an agreement (inconvenienced and) shocked as free had been reached, in United States v. City of speech was quelled in earnest: arrests Portland, to resolve unconstitutional began and the mayor fled from civic policing, someone asked the assistant engagement. In the midst of an occupation attorney general if he was concerned by of chambers, word came: Council would ‘depolicing.’ Sometimes called “selective re-convene the following day. disengagement,” or “tactical detachment,” I was outraged by the mayor’s heavy- it’s a work slowdown, almost always in handed call for excessive police presence at response to civilian directives that police City Hall when I arrived early to convey to change their practices, and often associated commissioners my concerns, both about in particular with attempts to end racial contract failures and public meeting profiling. Seattle, which also settled with the procedure. Fifteen to 20 armed police DOJ in 2012, discovered it in 2014: “I officers were present. Their overwhelming believe depolicing is an issue,” said their presence was intimidating. It didn’t stop me, City Council Public Safety Chair Bruce a former state legislator, from seeking out Harrell on the news site Crosscut Unlike my elected representatives. The police secretive Portland, Harrell called police undoubtedly had a chilling effect on free leaders to testify about it at the Council’s speech, for those who are just now coming Public Safety Committee. into the #BlackLivesMatter conversation. Portland City Council has long been I was surprised to find all incurious about police oversight. This commissioners’s offices on lock down, staff persistent failure led to plea deal provisions fearful that the public sought influence. requiring better data collection and Commissioner Nick Fish finally emerged: I reporting. Among other offerings, eventual asked him directly if whether the public demographic disclosure is intended to would be allowed to participate. He provide racial breakdown in use of force and responded, “I’m not the presiding officer racial profiling. We’ll see: Cops remain in and the mayor has decided that only people charge of gathering the data; oversight who are on the list will be able to testify.” remains minimal in regard to veracity of “What list?” I asked. In a rush through their analysis. The police-centric Community bedlam to chambers, Fish requested the Police Relations Committee and a federally mayor let me speak, as “invited testimony.” mandated Community Oversight Advisory I found myself in a dilemma: I detest secret Board have been granted authority to controlled-access police negotiations. How “consult on enhancements” to police data could I speak, without others from our collection efforts. community being able allowed to weigh in, I In the past year, the city has “recessed” wondered. both of these bodies. The city’s volunteer Many came for two days to City Hall, Human Rights Commission is only now intending to testify, and they were met with C O N T R IB U T IN G C O L U M N IS T O forceful opposition. It no doubt frustrated those who took time from work, school and life pursuits; a trip downtown, at personal cost, was a sacrifice. Paid government workers didn’t want to hear them. A public building was locked. Signage directed those who sought to express grievances to the Portland Building. The mayor, architect of subversion, never called for that testimony. Contract deficiencies result from secret bargaining Another data set that’s difficult to obtain, is the precise expenditure the City Council committed to legal appeal to fix an arbitration process - embedded in the union contract - that repeatedly returns to duty police officers who had been ordered fired by that body. Never has a Council order of officer termination been upheld in arbitration, and the process has been going on from the turn of the century. Council walked away from an appeal of an initial decisions process; the state legislature never acted on a bill to make such bargaining illegal. Only broad discussion can lead to restoration of civilian authority: this sneaky, back-room process leaves cops’ self exoneration scheme intact It also fails to address long-held demands from police accountability activists, for whistle-blower protections, drug testing violent officers, and an effective employee evaluation system, one which is directly tied to officer discipline. Union grievances have continuously hampered bureau management: only a systemic investigation into their cause and concerns can produce contract improvements. There is no need to rush through a contract that does not expire until June of next year. After years of receiving in-house police accountability contractor reports to do so, by the OIR Group, Council responds to a DOJ call for removal of a “48-hour” rule. (After killing Kendra James in 2003, involved officers used this time period to convene at an Applebee’s restaurant and produce a police narrative.) Portland Police are about to be offered an unspecified, “reasonable amount of time” to review body camera video, before giving written report. This “end of the 48-hour rule” is as likely an undefined time extension as not. Unlike the Oregon Legislature, Council seeks to fuse two, disparate legislative actions in a single conversation. It’s a general deficiency that Council continues to embed policy in police bargaining. Employment can be a stand-alone issue. Whether cops get 48 horn’s to cook up after action reports is a distinct and separate matter. A broader discussion is warranted on the ability of video evidence to change police behavior. Studies indicate behavior change only occurs when cops fear detection and consequences for misconduct. Portland’s oversight and accountability structures do not offer th a t Language that prohibits even police themselves from randomly reviewing video fails the “sniff test” any corporation or organizational designer would give, in relying on such practice for performance improvement among employees. Transparency is known to restore public trust in policing. More important than discussion of camera “on-off” switches, is an end to secrecy. Our mayor joined law enforcement lobbyists to make access (even by the press) more difficult for bodycam video than it ever was for dashcams. State legislators must revisit loopholes they put into our open records laws: these are public records, made at public expense, by officers in public performance of their duty. I also remind readers that it was recording of police roll call, by valiant officers, which led to an end of stop-and-frisk practices in New York City. Improved justice delivery requires broad discussion of just what evidence do we want cameras to produce. We’re being encouraged to spend millions of dollars on coaches and rehiring strategies, without having any mechanisms for improving police culture. How do we select who gets merit pay? What performance improvements do we expect? The federal plea deal set out expectations for community outreach and engagement strategies, specifically improving development of police policy. The city has instead wandered back to secret deals, and springing 70-page documents for quick “input” just prior to passage. We can only hope for judicial intervention. City contractors, the Compliance Officer Community Liaison in Chicago, cannot be counted on to describe the suppression of all government bodies established to solicit community input; they were not on the scene, feeling intense fear as law enforcement dampened testimony by justice advocates opposing their police payout at City Hall. We can only hope the U.S. District Court makes these observations, and that it values justice and plea deal provisions to rule in annual review on Oct. 25, that Council’s crude contract with the police union is invalid. Jo Ann Hardesty is a former state legislator and principal partner with Consult Hardesty. She is also president o f the Portland chapter o f the NAACP.
