Portland observer., March 13, 2019, Page Page 5, Image 5

March 13, 2019
Page 5
Activists with the group “Disarm PSU” demonstrate during a break
at a Portland State University Board of Trustees Meeting Thursday.
They read the names of people killed on college campuses across
the country, chanting “Jason Washington, say their names! Disarm
PSU! Disarm PSU!”
Emotionally Raw
C ontinued froM P age 3
when it originally implemented its
policy to arm officers almost four
years ago, such as not maintaining
a mixture of unarmed and armed
officers.
Healy said the inability to re-
spond to a potentially violent sit-
uation in a timely manner was the
highest risk if the school chooses
to disarm completely. They rec-
ommended reducing the amount
of armed officers the school has,
and making the primary respon-
dents to crises be unarmed.
The firm also offered alterna-
tives, such as staffing solely un-
armed officers. That was a recom-
mendation in line with the student
union’s counter-proposal, which
also included dissolving the ex-
istence of campus officers all to-
gether.
“[We have] the need to disarm
campus police because of the dan-
ger it poses to houseless people,
people of color, trans people,” Ol-
ivia Pace of Disarm PSU told the
Portland Observer. “We are very
dissatisfied with the report,” she
added.
The group also criticized the
way Margolis Healy, which they
said employs many current and
former police officers, was select-
ed.
Many faculty members said
they found fault in the consultant’s
research. For example, more than
one professor said the consultants
used a confusingly worded sur-
vey question that seemed to ask
whether there should be armed
officers on campus--but used the
phrase “trained and armed” in its
wording.
Dr. Marisa Zapata who teaches
urban planning at the school, said
the consultants’ recommendations
seemed to contradict each other,
and according to criteria she uses
to grade students, failed complete-
ly as a piece of social science re-
search.
“How can you recommend an
entity maintaining lethal weapons
of force when they lack a coher-
ent policing strategy?” Zapata lat-
er recommended using a mixture
of the Margolis Healy report and
other research done on campus to
draw assessments from “and see
which ones line up.”
Not all who testified were in
favor of disarming the campus po-
lice officers. One student testified
fearing for his life when he was
confronted with a knife and could
not receive help. A few others ar-
gued in favor of keeping armed
officers. At one point, a student’s
testimony brought tears to many
members of Washington’s family.
A new bill in the Oregon leg-
islature, introduced by Rep. Di-
ego Hernandez, and co-sponsored
by Oregon Student Association,
would effectively nullifying the
university’s deliberations as it
would disarm both PSU and Uni-
versity of Oregon security officers
if passed.
A separate independent inves-
tigation concerning the details
of Washington’s death, commis-
sioned by PSU and conducted
by a separated consultant firm--
OIR Group out of California--has
been delayed indefinitely, PSU
President Rahmat Shoureshi an-
nounced late last month.