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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 21, 2016)
Page 4 December 21, 2016 Drawing on Experience C ontinued froM f ront especially with people of color. She believes more people with backgrounds in criminal justice and sociology are needed in Port- land and on police forces nation- wide. Jackson also has experience working in schools. She was a former school resource officer at Grant High School in northeast Portland. Her youngest son is about to graduate from PSU. “Portland State University has a very excellent safety team, very capable,” she says, describ- ing the challenges of working with students and staff to build trust. “There’s an opportunity to bridge. I believe I’m a con- nector, a bridger. I help bring understanding. I am who I am. I treat people fairly, with dig- nity, and respect at all times. Most young people are support- ive, some scowl. I can’t change their hearts. I give them the same smile every day. We’re coming in very ginger, not blockbuster.” Elmore worked for the Portland Police Bureau for 26 years before joining the PSU force. An Afri- can American who came of age in the South during the Civil Rights movement, he says he understands where groups like Black Lives Matter and Don’t Shoot Portland are coming from. Elmore has su- pervised police officers during protests. He believes in the role of the officers, but also thinks that conversations between the people behind the uniform and citizens are important. After a report issued in 2013 revealed the need for more se- curity measures on the PSU, faculty, students and civil rights groups were vocal in their op- position against having armed officers on patrol. The fierce ob- jection came in the wake of Mi- chael Brown’s death in 2014 and Portland’s own history of police shootings. Portland State students of color worried about the impact of hav- ing deputized officers placed in their learning environment with the potential for police profiling. Also raising tensions on campus has been the racism el- evated during Donald Trump’s The Law Offices of Patrick John Sweeney, P.C. Patrick John Sweeney Attorney at Law 1549 SE Ladd, Portland, Oregon Portland: Hillsoboro: Facsimile: Email: (503) 244-2080 (503) 244-2081 (503) 244-2084 Sweeney@PDXLawyer.com campaign for president and un- leashed even more since his election in November Last May, when students or- ganized a walkout event calling for campus security disarma- ment, it was organized by stu- dent and Black Lives Matter activist Olivia Pace and was met by a handful of pro-Don- ald Trump students. In the days before, the pro-Trump students posted mocking flyers around campus reading: “Thug Lives Don’t Matter.” The Southern Poverty Law Center has reported an increase of hate crimes across the coun- try since the election. In Oregon alone, 900 incidents of hate have been reported with local authori- ties, which put the state in the top 10 of states with such incidents. PSU Police Chief Philip Zer- zan told the Portland Observer, “There’s been an increase in bi- ased based graffiti, swastikas on campus.” Last year, PSU recorded in- creases in the crimes of rape, robbery, burglary, arson, domes- tic violence and stalking. Two reports of hate crimes described as intimidation were also found in the report. Zerzan says another campus safety concern is a high rate of suicide in the student popula- tion. Across the nation youth sui- cide rates have remained fixed, but have been on the increase in Oregon since 2010. Addressing all these concerns, PSU police and school leaders are counting on the experienced new police officers of color and other members of the depart- ment to build relationships with the school’s student and activist population, rather than depend- ing upon Portland Police Bureau officers to come in from the out- side.
