April 08, 2003
Police Deem Response to Protests 'Success'
Today's Oregonian has a report based on the monthly Chief's Forum held yesterday:
The assistant police chief who was in charge during the massive March 20 antiwar march in Portland downplayed the rush hour disruption caused by protesters and called the overall police response a success.
Assistant Chief Derrick Foxworth, in his first public statements about police operations that night to the monthly Chief's Forum on Monday, said the Portland Police Bureau achieved its three goals: to protect citizens' rights to free speech and assembly, prevent traffic disruptions and limit injuries and property damage.
This determination comes, of course, in contrast to some Portland residents who criticized the response as too timid, and some protesters who criticized the response as too strong.
It's important to draw something of a distinction between the day-after protest, when passions were running high on the part of antiwar protesters, and later events over the past three weeks. Given how aggrieved the antiwar movement felt when the bombing began, and given how determined they were to engage in direct action the next day, I think we're being disingenuous if we assert that the day-after protests were not handled extraordinarily well compared to how things could have played out.
Despite the occupation of the Burnside Bridge, and despite a line of protesters attempting to charge through a line of police officers using banners as battering rams, there was a remarkable lack of overt confrontation.
That someone at the Police Bureau made the determination to allow a nine-hour bridge occupation simply cannot be dismissed as some sort of police brutality.
There are always incidents around the margins of these events. And during the day-after protests, there were any number of moments that could have escalated into very messy situations. Credit goes to all sides concerned for avoiding that sort of meltdown.
That said, there were clearly incidents of police officers abusing their authority during some of the later marches, just as there were probably incidents of demonstrators going out of their way to cause tensions.
Given what's transpired in some other cities, Portland has obviously done a pretty fair job of handling an ongoing protest atmosphere.
I do wish, however, that coverage of this story -- the question of how well protests have been "dealt with" -- would not focus almost entirely upon what the police did or did not do, and would include the efforts of the local antiwar community itself.
Over the past week and a half, there has clearly been a decided effort on the part of broader-based factions of the local antiwar movement to do all it can to avoid having rallies and marches turned into still more news stories on police confrontation. There's been a clear effort to hone the messages of these events, and an attempt to make that the focus.
That doesn't, of course, make for much of a story. Where's the conflict? Where's the drama? Where are the ratings?