June 14, 2017
Page 11
Mississippi
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Beaverton
Photo by M otoya n akaMura /M ultnoMah C ounty C oMMuniCations
Multnomah County Commissioner Loretta Smith and Los Angeles-based filmmaker A.J. Ali shake the hands of young members of the community attending a town hall to
discuss solutions and best practices to address racial disparities in the county’s justice system.
Youth and Justice Focus
Town Hall looks for
solutions and best practices
M elissa n avas
While African Americans in Multnomah County make
up less than 6 percent of the population, they make up
about 22 percent of the jail population.
That overrepresentation – while not new – prompted
County Commissioner Loretta Smith to bring together lo-
cal youth, community members, law enforcement officials
and black elected county officials from across the United
States to discuss solutions and best practices to address
racial disparities in Multnomah County’s justice system.
Smith hosted the Black and Brown Boys and Men
Town Hall May 31 as a precursor to a meeting in Portland
of the National Organization of Black County Officials.
Emceed by author and actor Hill Harper, the session in-
cluded Multnomah County District Attorney Rod Under-
hill; Multnomah County Sheriff Mike Reese; Multnomah
County Sheriff’s Office Capt. Derrick Peterson; Los An-
geles-based filmmaker A.J. Ali, and Alameda County, Ca-
lif. Supervisor Keith Carson.
Smith said that many of the racial disparities in Port-
by
land are issues mirrored in communities across the nation.
“We need to get to the bottom of it,” she said. “We need
to figure out how can we decrease some of those dispar-
ities.”
Harper, who has authored books and starred in televi-
sion and film, highlighted the current climate for address-
ing racial disparities and the key role that access to public
education plays.
“It seems the political debate has become more and
more preoccupied with power maintenance with very few
real solutions ever offered,” Harper said. “Meanwhile mil-
lions of young men and women graduate from the streets
and matriculate to prison rather than to college.”
Hill shared statistics on what he called a “hyper incar-
ceration” crisis. About 2.24 million people in the United
States are now held in federal, state, and local jails, repre-
senting one-quarter of the world’s total prisoners. Another
4.8 million people in the U.S. are under parole, supervi-
sion or probation. In 30 years, the United States’ prison
system has quintupled.
Harper asked the panelists to address topics like sen-
tencing disparities, law enforcement living in the com-
munities in which they work, fear of police, and police
training and recruitment.
District Attorney Underhill spoke about his office’s
work to identify root causes of racial disparities in the
criminal justice system. A Racial and Ethnic Disparities
Report from last year found that black people are overrep-
resented at every stage through Multnomah County’s adult
criminal justice system - from arrest through sentencing.
“We need to sink our teeth into what we’re seeing here”
to make policy adjustments, Underhill said.
Smith highlighted a Coalition of Communities of Color
report which identified social, economic and educational
barriers faced by people of color.
“You can’t achieve equity when you face challenges
like this. Education should offer a pathway out of poverty
but all too often it doesn’t,” she said.
Smith, who has championed jobs for young people in
Multnomah County, focused on how a community sup-
ports its youth.
“Until we give our young people an opportunity to have
an opportunity there are going to be high disparities in the
jail system, there are going to be long sentences longer
than anyone else, there are going to be folks who live in
communities who are highly policed,” Smith said.
Melissa Navas is a communications advisor in the of-
fice of Multnomah County Communications.