An attempt by Portland Police to recolor the thin blue line to green was gently swatted down this week by a Multnomah County judge. The Coalition of Communities of Color mounted a legal challenge against a Portland Police union-backed ballot initiative that would divert 25 percent of the monies from the groundbreaking climate initiative, Portland Clean Energy Fund (PCEF). Why? So they could hire 400 more cops, which left many to wonder, “How exactly is that supposed to stop climate change?”
In any case, Judge Eric Dahlin ruled that the initiative’s language was too ambiguous to come before voters in November.
The response of its backers—it shall live:
“We will quickly file a new initiative to fix a single typographical error and nothing more in the initiative. We are confident we have the time and resources to collect the required signatures to qualify for the ballot,” a spokesperson for the measure’s petitioners said.
Just a single typographical error, huh?
For now, we all wait with eyes fixed toward November and the months between to see how this saga unfolds.
But in the meantime, a closer look at this Public Safety™ attempt to take money from a progressive climate fund could not be more laughable if they were going to use the money to feed its K-9 unit organic Kibbles ‘n' Bits from Whole Foods.
Alas, the Portland Police union, which has been campaigning for years to beef up its rank-and-file at a cost of millions for taxpayers who have witnessed a flurry of cuts to social services, sees no need to sneak this idea in with a Trojan Horse—they’re proudly parading the idea for the press as if it were “dope on the table” following a drug bust.
To be fair, there are plenty of hands vying for the growing Monopoly bag that has become PCEF. The program, which levies a 1 percent annual tax on big businesses, was originally expected to generate about $60 million annually, but has quadrupled those earnings since launching in 2018.
Since then, PCEF has fueled projects that help kids use non-vehicular modes of transportation to school, new street lighting, electrified people’s homes, made much needed citywide pedestrian improvements, and more.
During the first budget cycle under the new City Council last fall, PCEF’s desirability was on full display. With the city facing a $150 million budget shortfall, Mayor Keith Wilson urged the Council to make hard cuts across most bureaus—except for the police—and some councilors proposed using PCEF to fill the massive budget holes.
In a somewhat unlikely alliance, Portland Metro Chamber (formerly the Portland Business Alliance), submitted a joint letter to the mayor, along with culturally-specific nonprofits APANO and Verde, stating in part, “Diverting these funds undermines the integrity of the democratic process and the community trust that made PCEF possible.”
Now, if any bureau had a claim to divert PCEF funds in support of its work, one might imagine that Portland Parks and Recreation, which manages nearly 300 world-famous parks and natural areas, would be first in line.
Such a world does not exist. Nonetheless, when Councilor Candace Avalos proposed reallocating $2 million from Portland Police Bureau (PPB) to Portland Parks and Recreation, which is facing an $800 million maintenance deficit, fireworks ensued.
Critics framed her proposal as an attempt to “defund the police.”
In an exhaustive hourslong vote last May, the council approved its $8.5 billion budget—and with it, Avalos’ proposal. But as the vote drew to a close, police leadership warned that the decision would imperil its efforts to fill dozens of positions—a goal the Bureau has historically struggled to accomplish.
Polling, funded by wealthy business owners and published last year, found that nearly 70 percent of those asked would support a ballot initiative to “require the City of Portland to maintain a police force size no smaller than the average for large cities in the United States.”
Currently the city maintains a force about half the national average.
Rest assured there is seemingly no limit to the “right sizing” of the American police force. The Notorious N.Y.P.D. is the largest department in the country, in the country’s largest city. They boast a $6.4 billion budget—more than 90 percent of which is put toward personnel costs like staff time, pensions, overtime, and their heavy, heavy artillery. Former NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg once boasted (albeit incorrectly) that his police department was the “7th biggest army in the world.” That was 15 years ago, and their budgets have steadily grown since. However, you can count on them to continue the campaign to grow their 35,000 rank-and-file, while citing the most gratuitous (and low-level public nuisance) crimes from the most recent news cycle. However, New York, like Portland and the rest of the nation, has been experiencing a decline in violent crime for years. But alas, sentiments often eclipse facts.
For folks watching at home, there’s another impossible-to-miss strand of dots to connect here. PCEF, of course, was championed by Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty—arguably the most ardent and effective critic of PPB to ever sit on Portland City Council. Her critiques were highly unwelcome by the establishment, as evidenced by the police union’s president leaking a false claim to the media alleging the councilwoman had been involved in a hit-and-run. While this moment was catalytic, it was not isolated, and was emblematic of a strained relationship she would maintain with the Bureau all the way until she was unseated by conservative Rene Gonzalez in 2021.
Since her ousting, there has been a mice-to-a-cornfield trend instigated by law enforcement and its allies to upend Hardesty’s seedlings. The Community Board for Police Accountability that she championed, for example, was finally stood up this month, more than five years after its overwhelming passage. The Police Accountability Board’s first meeting followed the police union’s many failed attempts to stifle and Frankenstein the program into what would have been a group of toothless, friendly onlookers.
And now, the cop's union is attempting to steal clean energy money.
Smells like a vendetta to me, is all I’m saying.
While there is surely crime in the city, few are as brutal as this obvious insult to our collective intelligence—one that’s a bald-faced attempt to pickpocket PCEF in order to plant more money trees for the Police Bureau.
At the same time, it’s right on brand.
Donovan Scribes is an award-winning writer, multimedia producer, and communications consultant. He is a former vice president of the Portland NAACP. Follow him on Instagram @donovanscribes. Want to keep the conversation going? Email him at donovanscribes@gmail.com.
