No Portland is mot too broke.

After all, we have money to give 7/8 of the force a bonus for taking a blood test.

One eighth of them are too stupid to show up for a finger prick to earn a bonus.

Daryl Turner is a piece of work. It takes huge cojones to ask for more money for raises for mid contract after the physical phhhftness test farce.

The source of funding could be from the money we won't pay in the future for excessive force and wrongful death lawsuits at the hands of the police.

But I suppose that's from a a different pot of money that isn't available for police staff.

ALready sounds like a winner, the police get to tinvetigate themselves about outside complaints.

Any "settlement" by the city to cover for thuggery must be coupled with a demand that the thug's continued employment be conditioned on full payment of the settlement, including the attorney fees for private use of the City Attorney's office.

Supervision and Zero personal accountability will not fix the repeat offender problem.

Supervisors received training the first two weeks of this month to learn how to secure or photograph evidence, obtain statements from officers and witnesses and document it all...

Aren't these extremely basic investigative techniques that all cops - and at the very least, supervisors - should already know? What exactly do they learn in training if not these types of skills? I know I learned this stuff in a Criminal Justice investigation course in community college several years ago. $85,000 a year and they don't know how to secure evidence or take a statement? Geesh...

bartender - While the investigative technique is basically the same as other investigations, there are several things that impact police misconduct cases that make them very different animals.

This comes out of NLRB arbitrations that have made case law, statute, and contractual obligations of the employer stipulated in labor agreements.

There are 4th Amendment issues in any complaint against a police officer. The primary reason for this is that police, unlike any criminal suspect, can be compelled to speak in a disciplanary investigation.

Criminal investigations of an officer have investigative priority, and the rules of what an you can require of an officer in such cases are very different than what an investigator can do in an administrative investigation for simple misconduct.

The best book on this subject is "The Rights of Law Enforcement Officers" by Will Aichtison, a Portland Labor Attorney.
I went to DPSST's 40 hr. Internal Affairs course, the instructor was a Captain from Broward County, FL. They used the book in the course.

My guess is that PPB is more than willing to take the DOJ's advice on how to improve things; However, Given their absymal record I don't think it's going to save them from having a Consent Decree imposed on them for their civil rights issues. It is a problem of their own making.

Hope that explains a bit...

Oooops...read "Fifth Amendmendment". I gotta remember to get my coffee before I post...

Too broke in the sense that we don't have enough money to do it? No

Too broke' in the sense that our city government's funding priorities are out of whack? Absolutely.

Our current regime seems totally disinterested in providing basic municipal services. Maybe we need some sexy new buzzwords for things like roads, schools, police officers, firefighters, clean and affordable water, etc. If there's one thing the CoP loves it's hip new buzzwords they can use liberally in their tweets.

I wonder if this is a pre-emptive effort to try to ensure the DOJ doesn't continue to find ways to "help" them much longer--after all, they PPB sergeants will take care of all levels of investigations now. The professionals are in charge.

How, exactly, does this idea solve their problems of excessive force and covering up for complaints of excessive force? I smell a red herring.

We can still spend $500 million on bike paths, right?

I don't care what happens so long as we guarantee funding for more bike paths and the Tram runs on time.

Thank you HMLA-267, that was helpful.

HMLA-267 your Fifth Amendment argument is a bit simplistic. Any private employer can require cooperation and truth in an investigation of on the job wrong doing and terminate employees for failure to cooperate or for lying even if self-incrimination is involved.

Quite frankly, the Fifth Amendment applies to criminal proceedings NOT employment matters. And that is not a nuance.

And the porkers get to have union representation while be investigated, while employees of private entities who are not union are allowed no representation.

And unlike most of the rest of employees in America, the porkers have made themselves exempt from drug testing (the irony in that is huge).

Two points are implicit in Reese's proposal, clearly a response to the ongoing DOJ investigation of the PPB for killing too many persons with mental illness. (At least there is supposed to be an DOJ investigation - some may only believe what they see...)

First is if a number of supervisors are now required to parse use-of-force events, it seems that is to learn from mistakes. All good. But the now acknowledged absence of supervision implies the PPB currently does not learn from its mistakes.

And that problem has been played out on the front page for over a decade now. My organization, the Mental Health Association of Portland, has tallied over 200 persons shot or shot and killed by local area police officers in since 1970. Many, perhaps most, were impaired by mental illness, addiction, alcoholism.

So it would be cause considerable relief to us if the PPB would learn from mistakes. The $1 million probable cost of nine new sergeants is cheap if they could continue to not kill people (no person has been killed by the PPB in over a year).

So the second implicit point of Reese's proposal is nine new sergeants is the right remedy and not just fluffing the payroll. This is something worth doubting if only because of 70+ years of fluffery on the part of the PPB / PPA. The question from Council to Reese should be, what assurance can you give the city, in escrow, nine new sergeants is the right solution? Seems the only object of equal value is a signed resignation.

Jason... I think the deal should be that one supervising sergeant and officer(s) who committed the homocide or assault all resign and are on the hook for the civil suits that arise out of the tortious behavior.

Never too broke to give Leonard and PWB what they want!

This Wednesday council agenda:
Water Bureau
88 Authorize a contract and provide payment for the construction components of the Forest Park Low Tank Project (Second Reading Agenda 69)

5) Expense: What are the costs to the City related to this legislation? What is the source of funding for the expense?
The estimated cost for the work under this construction contract is $5,400,000. The entire project cost is approximately $7,451,468.
Most of this cost is planned for FY 2012-13 and FY 2013-14 Budgets.