The Portland Police Bureau has recently found its name on the headlines far too many times for their liking, especially since most of the news has not been necessarily positive. Earlier this year, the police’s own data revealed that officers stop and search African-American and Latino drivers at much higher rates than whites, even though whites are found to have contraband more often than either minority. A few months later, police officers were involved in the death of James Chasse, a man suffering from serious mental illness, prompting a discussion about the ability of officers to handle such situations. Chasse’s was the fifth in-custody death for the police bureau this year alone.
In each case, quick action and leadership have assuaged community concerns, at least for the time being. At the urging of various community organizations in Portland, including Oregon Action and the NW Constitutional Rights Center, Police Chief Rosie Sizer has led the bureau in a long-term conversation with the community on how to eliminate racial profiling. She has agreed to present the bureau’s plan of action to the community in the coming weeks. In response to Chasse’s death, Mayor Tom Potter earmarked nearly half a million dollars to train all officers in the bureau in the basic principles for dealing with people with mental disabilities. Yet, the Independent Police Review division and the Citizen Review Committee appear to be taking a back seat to these efforts because the community does not see either body as a resource for tackling police-related issues as fundamental as these.
The IPR and the CRC were originally established to “help improve police accountability, promote higher standards of police services, and increase public confidence.” Among the four key functions of the CRC are to “gather community concerns about police services” and to “help the IPR Director develop policy recommendations to address patterns of problems with police services and conduct.” But the vast majority of community members I spoke to during the racial-profiling listening sessions that took place this past summer either did not know that they could file such complaints with the IPR or felt like it was pointless to do so. The public’s confidence on the IPR is reflected in its own statistics: more than half of the people that filed complaints with the IPR were dissatisfied with the complaint process and the results, and a full two-thirds were dissatisfied with the fairness of the complaint’s outcome.
Not surprisingly, the CRC has not taken any action or proposed any recommendations regarding the bureau’s practice of racial profiling because it has not been effective at gathering the community’s concerns about police services. This is in part because the public has little confidence in the process even though the Portland community has been concerned about disparity in treatment due to race or ethnic background. This was clearly reflected by the more than 250 people who attended the listening sessions this summer. The 2005 Portland Police Bureau Community Survey also showed that African-Americans and Latinos were concerned about disparate treatment by the police. The CRC’s lack of action is also the result of the way the system is designed: currently, CRC only hears cases that are appealed by complainants, that is, cases where the Internal Affairs Division found no evidence to support the claim.
Clearly, the IPR and the CRC must significantly improve the community’s confidence in the process. One first step would be to make investigations free of any appearance of conflict of interest. Currently, any complaints against police officers are investigated by other police officers in the Internal Affairs Division. The IPR Director could start by assigning cases to its own investigators rather than IAD. City Council could later revise the IPR ordinance to require that all cases by investigated by IPR investigators, and increase the IPR budget to hire more investigators.
The other important step will be for the IPR to set a clearly defined mechanism for dealing with complaints involving racial profiling. Most such complaints are dismissed because so much of the time they involve the word of a complainant against the word of a police officer. One possible approach the IPR is considering would be to refer all such cases to mediation in order to give the complainant an opportunity to air her grievances. This is a good first step but IPR and the CRC must do at least three things if this approach is to succeed. First, IPR must engage in a comprehensive community outreach effort to educate the community about the police complaint mechanism and to clearly outline how racial-profiling cases will be handled in order to avoid misconceptions and falsely raise expectations.
Second, IPR must keep close track of the names of officers involved in any such complaints. It is imperative that such information be collected in order to evaluate whether the practice of racial profiling is confined to a few officers or is a systemic problem throughout the bureau. Finally, CRC must keep close track of all complaints filed so the committee is able to make policy recommendations based on the experience and needs of the community.
The community, Mayor Potter, and Chief Sizer have all made public commitments to eliminate racial profiling. This is a huge task that will be more effectively addressed if the public bodies created to deal with such important community concerns are actively involved in these efforts. The IPR and the citizen committee must take a greater leadership role in tackling this grave issue.
