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Jan 28 -“I think Rosie’s wanted to close North Precinct since she got in,” said Sgt. Ron Berry, a 25-year veteran of North Portland’s signature police station, about Police Chief Rosie Sizer. “I don’t know why. But now it looks like she’s got an excuse.”

Sergeant Berry stood outside the Kenton Firehouse this evening as Portland Police Bureau officials and about 70 neighbors met this evening to hear a PPB proposal that would cut both North and Southeast Precincts in order to save money during the current city budget crisis. 

The officer was admittedly upset about the latest proposal to close the precinct. “I wanted to retire out of that precinct. I’ve been over to Northeast. I like it here.”

The officer was an outspoken opponent in 2007 when Sizer attempted to close the precinct under then-Mayor Tom Potter. “You got to speak up for yourself or she’ll roll right over you,” said Berry. “Right now it seems pretty sedate in there.”

Inside the firehouse, North Precinct Commander Donna Henderson was present. The proposed details were outlined by Assistant Police Chief Brian Martinek. A number of North Portland activists were in attendance, including representatives from University Park, St Johns, Piedmont, Kenton and the St Johns Boosters.
The proposal call for the closing of the two precincts. North Precinct would be converted to the offices for the PPB training division and Southeast Precinct would become the new traffic division headquarters. The total number of Neighborhood Response Officers for the district would go down from 20 to 15.

"In 1994 we had three precincts and we went up to five," said Martinek. "We didn't have any extra resources to add to the precincts at the time. We've suffered a number of different problems since then and we've never really recovered from them."

Martinek said that this proposal would reduce overhead, and force some demotions that would have a net result of putting as many as 20 officers back on the street.

Neighbors were markedly sedate, even though many have all ready responded to the new proposal with a mixture of concern and incredulity. The PPB is responding to requests from the council to reduce budget expenditures by all bureaus by up to 5 percent.  The PPB currently makes up 30 percent of the City budget. 

“What do you hear from the front line officers?" asked one neighbor.

"They're human beings," responded Martinek. "They're unhappy about it.  But they see the sense in it as well."

Berry, for one, does not see the sense. "They could close the traffic division and put those guys in all the precincts and save money that way."

However, when asked directly Martinek stated that a traffic division closure would only save $250,000. "It wouldn't come close. But we studied that idea."

Other neighbor reactions and questions were:

Community activist Pam Arden said that she felt that North Portland was very connected to their precinct and that “we will be losing something” when the precincts are redistricted.

Martinek responded “It's a different time” and explained that with the mobile computers carried by police officers in their cars, they are not as dependent on the physical location of the precinct building since they track calls remotely.

St John's Neighborhood Chair Thomas Ebert asked if this proposal was more driven by efficiency than money. He also expressed frustration over what he called a “lack of transparency” with how the proposal was formulated.

Martinek responded that he would personally take responsibility for any lack of transparency and for not having more specific information on the web site. He said that the this all happened so quickly they may not have gotten information out as well as they should have. “We don't control our destiny, we get direction from the city.” To answer Ebert's first question Martinek said “Efficiency is money. We are trying save people's jobs.” And that this proposal was designed to keep as many police on the job as possible.   

 One man asked if PPB was told that they did not need to reduce their budget, would they not make these changes.

Martinek answered “If we had no cut we would still propose this (redistricting plan).” He later explained that this was because of the current state of the economy. If the things were to turn around and revenue were stable they would not make this proposal. “The last thing Chief Sizer and I want to do is have this conversation again.”

After Assistant Chief Martinek finished taking question, the police provided attending community members with several kinds of pizza from Sparky's. Many people stayed and chatted with the officers. The tone seemed more cordial than two years ago and more resigned. The reality of the current revenue shortfalls seemed to create a sense of inevitability that was lacking the last time precinct merging was proposed.

Asked for her reaction to the presentation, Kenton community activist Doretta Schrock said that she wanted details such as what the new supervision ratio will be and what the command structure will look like. “These things are important, and they haven't given us this information.”