If you’ve missed the drama that’s unfolded around Baruti Artharee—the policy director for Mayor Charlie Hales who’s accused of making inappropriate remarks to a county commissioner last week—you haven’t been paying attention.

Willamette Week on Sunday night broke the story that Artharee shocked Multnomah County Commissioner Loretta Smith with an offhand remark during an event at the Quartet Restaurant on Thursday.

According to the newspaper, Artharee acknowledged remarking to a crowd: “Here’s our beautiful commissioner, Loretta Smith—mmm, mmm, mmm—she looks good tonight.” Apparently a certain measure of hip movement accompanied the words, which offended some people—Smith included.

The news took off yesterday, drawing limited acknowledgement from the mayor’s office but prompting Oregonian columnist Steve Duin to draw a puzzling comparison between Artharee’s comment and the well-publicized anti-Semitic and racist screeds of Mel Gibson and comedian Michael Richards.

Anyway, we were content to stay out of the fray, but the mayor’s office has just issued its first press release on the incident, indicating an official investigation has begun.

“As we said from the start, we are treating this issue seriously,” Hales is quoted as saying in the release. “We are treating it as a complaint regarding actions in violation of the city’s anti-harassment policy. We now are going through the appropriate steps, as laid out in city policy.”

Hales Spokesman Dana Haynes this afternoon declined to say whether any sort of censure is possible for Arthuree, saying the mayor’s office and Smith’s staff are keeping in touch on the incident.

In thinking about this story, I realized Artharee’s comments took place Thursday night, and that he was conspicuously absent the following morning from a meeting of the city’s Gang Violence Task Force. That meeting was attended by Hales and a representative of Smith’s staff, and led by Portland Office of Youth Violence Prevention Director Antoinette Edwards, who was apparently standing near Smith at the time of the remarks.

Mind you, I have no idea whether Artharee’s absence was connected to the incident.

UPDATE, 5:30 pm: In a twisty bit of irony, Portland’s Office of Equity and Human Rights just issued a statement in support of the investigation into Artharee’s conduct.

It makes no mention of the fact the incident took place at an event to introduce Dante James, director of the office, to members of various minority communities.

“Our role is to advise city staff and commissioners on equity issues,” James said in the release. “And we will continue to recognize and help the city address historic inequities that reinforce rather than challenge non-inclusive behavior toward all.”

Regardless of his intent—Artharee has indicated it was a bit of levity that misfired—an event for the director of the Office of Equity and Human Rights has to be one of the poorer places he could have made the gaffe.

By the way, here’s the policy Artharee’s being investigated under.

I'm a news reporter for the Mercury. I've spent a lot of the last decade in journalism — covering tragedy and chicanery in the hills of southwest Missouri, politics in Washington, D.C., and other matters...

13 replies on “Hales’ Office Launches Investigation into Advisor’s Comments”

  1. What the hell is there to investigate? Either what he did was unacceptable and he should be fired or punished some how, or it wasn’t. What is an investigation going to uncover, the pace and rhythm of his pelvic thrusts?

  4. Absolutely ridiculous. Anyone in any professional capacity in the public (and most private) sector would be terminated. Here comes a lawsuit! Which the taxpayers pony up for. Thanks a lot, asshole.

  5. This is the mayor’s public safety advisor? The same person who advised to cut police and fire positions? It’s obvious that he has poor decision making capabilities due to the ‘alleged’ harassment complaint against him, and we are supposed to trust that he made wise decisions for public safety cuts? What other bags of tricks does he have up his sleeve? Was the appointment of his son to the Park Ranger Supervisor position a coincidence? Is the reduction of 9 highly trained and experienced Water Bureau Security Specialists and then the addition of new positions for the low paid Park Rangers to replace them another coincidence that cements his son’s job position? These ‘decisions’ don’t seem wise for a public safety advisor. Something stinks in stumptown, I just hope that it doesn’t turn out to be the water.

  7. “We’re launching an investigation” = “We’re waiting to see if this will blow over. Mmm-hmm, we sure hope so.”

  8. Commissioner Smith won’t sue the city, but maybe it’s worth whatever it costs to assemble every straight male in the county in a line, and shout in each one’s face, “ANY TIME YOU THINK IT MIGHT BE A GOOD IDEA TO PRAISE ANYONE’S APPEARANCE IN A PROFESSIONAL SETTING, MAYBE JUST COMPLETELY STIFLE THAT IMPULSE AND SUB IN SOMETHING PROFESSIONALLY PRAISEWORTHY INSTEAD.”

    Someone could tighten that up a bit, I suppose.

  9. Since a lot of you seem to favor pitchforks and torches over publicly-accountable and legally-defensible process, let me clear this up for you:

    An investigation will involve interviewing the people who were present and compiling that information into a report that serves as the official record of what happened. That document can then be used as grounds for termination. If they just fired him right now, he could sue the city for wrongful termination, claiming he was fired based on hearsay and defamation.

  10. Thanks for the Valium, D&W — I am quite fond of my pitchfork. It’s just that what Artharee did honestly shocked me; I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that someone would say something so objectively, wildly inappropriate. But it does.

  11. “If they just fired him right now, he could sue the city for wrongful termination, claiming he was fired based on hearsay and defamation.”

    He can sue the city either way. That’s my point: ain’t no “investigation” going to make a bit of difference.

  12. Yes, it is. The lawsuit is far less likely to succeed if you have an official record in which 40 people who were present say exactly the same thing: that he violated the city’s code of conduct. If you don’t have that record, he gets to claim that his character is being defamed and that he was fired for unseemly rumors.

    That’s just how the world works, folks. Now I was raised that Christians don’t sue other Christians, but apparently this is a brave new world.

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