Site Navigation

Mayor Wheeler Calls BS on Police for Blaming
Crime on Lack of Officers

It's about time. The Portland Police Bureau (PPB) and the rank-and-file officer collective bargaining unit the Portland Police Association (PPA) have been complaining for years about needing to have more money to fill holes in their staffing. At a City Council hearing on the Bureau's Annual Report, when Chief Chuck Lovell spoke about needing more cops to address increases in crime such as shootings, homicides, and auto theft, Wheeler told him to stop blaming staff shortages, calling it "bullshit."The usually conservative Oregonian even printed his quote online on August 31. Although Wheeler came back from a break apologizing and saying he hadn't had his coffee (uh, huh), it is still true that even a broken clock is right twice a day. The fact is that even with 20 new officers being hired in September, bringing the total up to 793 (Oregonian, September 25), there are still existing funds to hire over 80 more cops. Street Roots published an excellent analysis on August 3 pointing out that the "defunding" that occurred in 2020 has been erased, with the budget now up to $249 million, ten percent higher than the $225 million budget that was approved in the wake of the George Floyd uprisings of 2020.

The fact that the Bureau can't hire officers to fill the empty positions doesn't prevent the powers- that-be from using all sorts of tricks to push for more. As the fall election got into full swing, the Oregonian published a poll saying that 82% of voters wanted the City to hire more officers (October 14). City Council squeezed in an emergency item onto their August 24 agenda-- a week before the pushback to Chief Lovell-- to specifically bend the rules of the retire/rehire program so that three officers including Sgt. James Nett would be able to come back to the Bureau despite being away for longer than their agreement with the PPA allows. Nett, by the way, killed Duane Novak in 2005.* They also pushed through an item amending the PPA contract on November 16 which set the standards for (mostly) unarmed Public Safety Support Specialists to allow them to be hired even if they fail the psychological exam given to police officers. They can then apply to be officers, but if they still fail the exam, well... they can take another try in six months.

Lovell gave another run at pitching to engorge the Bureau's budget even more as he announced efforts to address gun violence at a special news conference in October, saying the mayor's call to stop advertising to criminals that there aren't enough officers was "taken out of context." For real context, the Chief and the Mayor (who serves as the Police Commissioner) should take a look at the study about crime published by the Oregon Justice Resource Center in May. By examining longterm trends, it shows that there is no correlation between crime rates and the number of officers. Maybe the City should stop listening to those who decry "defunding" and instead put more money into addressing the societal conditions that push people to commit crimes. And while they're at it, stop having police model that the way to solve problems is to shoot and kill people-- after all, of the record 90+ homicides in Portland so far this year, the PPB has committed four of them, roughly 4%.

*- Records show that Nett resigned anyway on October 14.
Return to text.

January, 2023
Also in PPR #88

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.

People's Police Report #88 Table of Contents
Back to Portland Copwatch home page
Peace and Justice Works home page
Back to top