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Portland Fattens Police Salaries Portland Police rarely, if ever, support union campaigns but in January the police officers' "union," the Portland Police Association, launched its own full throttle campaign for higher salaries. Off- duty cops attempted to employ grassroots organizing tactics and took to the streets to meet the public face-to-face (weapons and uniforms were set aside). Cops saturated key public places with saccharined propaganda bemoaning the poverty of the Police Bureau and framed by noble portraits of the mounted patrol in full regalia. On February 17, to the satisfaction of the leadership of the Portland Police Association, City Council agreed to give 10.7% raises over three years, on top of annual increases for inflation, which they receive already. Now, conveniently after that settlement, the public has been confronted with the news that the new police labor contract will put the city's general fund half a million dollars in debt, ostensibly due to spreadsheet miscalculations and compounded by a higher Consumer Price Index [CPI] than City Hall had anticipated for this year (3.7% rather than 3.2%)--adding about $1 million in projected wage costs for next year (Oregonian and Willamette Week, February 23). Top-level police officers in Portland are already the highest paid in the state ($51,372 salary), and officers reach this level after serving only five years. However, as they lobbied City Council, the Portland Police Association insisted that Portland lacked financial incentives for recruiting and keeping high quality officers. Well, we wouldn't want our 975 members of the Portland Police to suffer stagnant salaries and comparably lower compensation, but the argument that they do is a gross distortion. Attorney Garry Bullard, in a February 8 letter to the Oregonian, asserts that police raises amounted to a cumulative 81% across-the-board salary increase over the past 15 years (he figures the cumulative CPI increase for the same period was 63.5%). Under the proposed contract, Portland Police will get: Three cost-of-living adjustments, "Longevity pay increases," and a 2.7 percent across-the-board pay increase for all officers effective July 1, 2002 (Oregonian, February 19). This would result in top-step officers, earning a hefty $56,820 a year, $5500 more per year than at present. To illustrate the extraordinary impact of these changes, the Oregonian reports that "a 25-year veteran would get a 16.7 percent wage increase by the end of the contract [two years from now]." Entry level officers' salaries would rise 23% from $31,308 a year to $38,652 a year. The public should note that entry level police officers earn considerably more than entry-level public school teachers, and are roughly on par with college professors just starting out. Better to police the youngsters than to teach them?!
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April, 2000
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Portland Copwatch Portland Copwatch is a grassroots, volunteer organization promoting police accountability through citizen action.
People's Police Report
#20 Table of Contents
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