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City Declared in "Full Compliance"
with Federal Oversight
Judge Forces Attention on Community Board

On February 25, Judge Michael Simon held yet another "status conference" about the US Department of Justice (DOJ) Settlement Agreement with the City of Portland, created after the DOJ found the police were using too much force against people, particularly those with mental illness. The DOJ and the Compliance Officer/Community Liaison (COCL) had each, prior to the hearing, declared the City had made all the changes outlined in the Agreement. Their analysis ignored that the number of people shot by the Portland Police has gone up since the Agreement went into effect, including the December death of Koben Henriksen, who was in mental health crisis (PPR #79 and this issue). Unfortunately, the Agreement establishes the DOJ as the final arbiter of full compliance, not the judge. Simon deferred accepting the 2018 changes made to the Agreement for establishing the Portland Committee on Community Engaged Policing (PCCEP). The judge noted he previously thought the Community Oversight Advisory Board (PCCEP's predecessor) was "fair, adequate and reasonable," but that body imploded after just two years. After protestations from the DOJ and the City, Simon challenged them to hold an evidentiary hearing prior to February 2021 (when he set the next status conference) if they wanted to prove that his failing to accept PCCEP's structure would hinder their abilities. For their part, PCCEP has continued to do work, though their membership has experienced massive turnover.

Judge Simon also encouraged the five parties to the suit (DOJ, the City, the Portland Police Association, the Albina Ministerial Alliance Coalition for Justice and Police Reform and the Mental Health Alliance) to collectively create metrics for measuring PCCEP's effectiveness. There was talk of quarterly meetings, but the future of those meetings is uncertain in the age of COVID-19. The determination sets in motion one year in which the City has to maintain compliance after DOJ approval, which occurred on January 10-- the day the DOJ received its last information, not the date of its compliance report. Four members of Portland Copwatch (PCW) testified in court. One member pointed out that January 10, 2021 is 10 days before the next Presidential inauguration, so if the DOJ were to begin taking police misconduct allegations seriously again, the City would be out from under the Agreement before a new administration came in. That said, the outcome of Simon's maneuver is the City will have to work extra hard to be sure PCCEP does not fail in the coming year.

PCW also pointed out: From 2005-09, 15 people were subjected to deadly force by on-duty officers. From 2010-14, while the DOJ investigation was initiated and the Agreement was being finalized, that number was 23, a 53% increase. From 2015-19, there were 27 deadly force incidents, a total increase of 80% since the late 2000s.

PCCEP met the night before court to vote on their presentation. Even though PCW outlined ways in which the PCCEP and the City are not yet in compliance with the "Community Engagement" section of the Agreement (for instance, the Bureau's poor public presentations of the PPB's annual report), the group voted to tell the Judge they felt the work meets the expected standards. PCCEP member Elliott Young proposed an amendment to clarify that the City has met the letter of the Agreement without meeting the spirit of it; that amendment passed 7-3. PCCEP co-chair Andrew Kalloch and Secretary Vadim Mozyrsky, two of the three people who voted against the amendment, spoke to the judge. Mozyrsky stated for the record he objected to the amendment. In fact, adopting the amended document passed 8-1 with him being the only holdout. But because their statement was sent in writing, they chose not to tell Simon about the substance of the PCCEP's analysis.

Other issues with the DOJ and COCL's analysis include:

--Racial profiling, the issue which precipitated the DOJ's involvement, is handled by the PPB delivering traffic stop data to PCCEP, with no public discussion or analysis (see article).

--The Agreement calls for all misconduct investigations to be completed in 180 days, but the Bureau and the "Independent" Police Review only met that standard 90% of the time.

--Neither the DOJ nor the COCL talked to a single complainant about whether they thought the oversight system gave them confidence that police are being held accountable.

--The Agreement requires a walk-in/drop-off center for people in mental health crisis. The DOJ and COCL have contended for years that this exists in the form of the Unity Center, a project of various area hospitals to centralize urgent mental health care. However, the Unity Center is facing problems for the staff and financial woes, and never really met the criteria in the first place.

Despite their inadequacies, the DOJ and COCL have occasionally prompted immediate corrections by the Bureau; for example, they both called attention to PPB training on the use of knives even though no policy existed to guide those classes. PPB halted the training immediately. PCW raised the question, once the DOJ and COCL are gone, who will be able to do this? Institutionally, the police cannot be left to police themselves, otherwise it would not have taken over five years to reach so-called substantial compliance. The volunteer members of PCCEP do not have the time or bandwidth to monitor the Bureau's ongoing compliance with these requirements.

Meanwhile, several more members quit PCCEP, including Patrick Nolen, the Subcommittee on Mental Illness Chair, who resigned after speaking to Judge Simon about ways the full committee sidelined his group. This leaves just two original members-- Kalloch and co-chair Lakayana Drury- - of the original 13 seated in November 2018. That is at least an 85% turnover in 15 months.

Mayor Wheeler and Chief Resch appeared at PCCEP's January meeting to declare support for PCCEP and its work. The renamed Racial Equity Subcommittee proposed, and the group passed unanimously, a recommendation for police to approach people at traffic stops calmly, stating their name and ID number, the reason for the stop, and asking what they can do to make the person feel at ease. At the Subcommittee's February meeting, a Bureau representative said the Chief did not oppose the recommendation but might have some disagreements with it.

On December 19, City Council adopted changes to PCCEP's founding document to make it easier to appoint new members, by essentially eliminating a community body to screen applicants. They also made it easier for new members to start voting so long as they have basic training and can attend the Bureau's community academy soon after being seated. Council also broadened the definition of youth members to include people up to 23 years of age rather than just 16-18 year olds.

See Portland Copwatch's analysis about the DOJ and Compliance Officer's reports on "Substantial Compliance" at: portlandcopwatch.org/COCL_DOJanalysis0220_pcw.html.

May, 2020
Also in PPR #80

Portland Copwatch
PO Box 42456
Portland, OR 97242
(503) 236-3065/ Incident Report Line (503) 321-5120
e-mail: copwatch@portlandcopwatch.org

Portland Copwatch is a grassroots, volunteer organization promoting police accountability through citizen action.

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