February 19, 2004
(Updated) More Reaction To The McCollister Posters
Mayor Continues Overwrought And Hypocritical Response
Note: This post has been updated. Any and all updates appear at the end of the original post.
First off, Oregonian columnist Steve Duin weighed in today:
Tagging McCollister a killer who has been "re-armed and released to your community" is vicious, incendiary and counterproductive, provoking more of the police paranoia that got us here in the first place.
But the fliers are a dishearteningly accurate expression of the growing gap between the police and the public they serve. That is a breach the cops have openly and relentlessly encouraged.
On the culture that often keeps the Portland Police Bureau walled off from the community, Duin says: "They are no more interested in a candid discussion of their ways and means than the bitter souls who are looking to harass and humiliate Scott McCollister with a Xerox machine and a staple gun."
Meanwhile, Mayor Katz continues to use rhetoric every bit as careless as she claims are the actions of Rose City Copwatch.
"They need to be part of the value of community policing," said Katz in the report aired by KOIN, "not running around and being their own police force."
And over on the report aired by KGW this evening, Katz said: "What they are doing is vigilante policing." And: "Being a watchdog is one thing, but running a vigilante operation is another."
Now, strictly speaking, if we look at the dictionary, it could be argued that Rose City Copwatch indeed is acting as a "vigilance committee" of sorts. That term being defined as "a volunteer committee of citizens for the oversight and protection of any interest, esp. one organized for the summary suppression and punishment of crime, as when the processes of law appear inadequate." Or more simply as "a volunteer committee to maintain order where an efficient legal system does not exist."
But you know, and we know, and Mayor Katz knows, that the term is loaded with a much more violent connotation that these strict dictionary definitions would suggest. So, while she may have an "out" by turning to the dictionary, it's nonetheless clear that she's merely being inflammatory in her zeal to protect her beloved Portland Police Bureau.
We reiterate our earlier point: Zeal is nice. But it would be even nicer to see it applied to accountability and transparency at the Portland Police Bureau as strongly as it's being applied to expressions of contempt for Rose City Copwatch.
Further: In a City where relations between the community and the police are nearly always strained for one reason or another, the proper and rational response to inflammatory posters by an activist group is not inflammatory rhetoric from City Hall.
Update
Over in today's Tribune, there's little we haven't heard already by now, except for the comments of Jo Ann Bowman:
Community activist and former state legislator Jo Ann Bowman, who last year called for McCollister to be fired, also criticized the fliers.
"It's definitely the wrong approach to take. We have to create a community where the police and the citizens are equal," she said.
Bowman also criticized the group for using the James shooting to justify its attack on McCollister. Bowman was deeply involved in the community protests sparked by the shooting. She spoke out at public forums, worked on an Albina Ministerial Alliance report that reviewed the incident and helped start a new watchdog organization, the Alliance for Police and Community Accountability.
Bowman does not recall anyone representing Rose City Copwatch participating in those efforts.
"These people, as far as I know, didn't have anything to do with all the hard work the community did after the shooting. It's wrong for them to use James to justify their attack on McCollister," Bowman said.
Other than that, only thing worth mentioning is that the article gives the last word to the police union, speaking (in some sense) on behalf of McCollister, which gets to close out the story by linking the posters with the idea of "threats" -- which of course they aren't.
Comments (3)
Worldwide Pablo on 19 Feb 2004
Headline from the Portland Police Association newspaper [The Rap Sheet, January 2004]:
"New police force badgered by media"
Date: September 12, 1870.
Some things never change. But then, neither do the source causes...
Noah Brimhall on 20 Feb 2004
Ooohhhh . . . subheads. Nice touch. On a more serious note, I have really appreciated your even handed stories on the McCollister posters.
The One True b!X on 20 Feb 2004
For what it's worth, the subheads are created using the MTEntryKeywords tag as an extra content field, and then wrapping that tag in an MTIfNotEmpty container.