Portland Police Worry About More Unrest as Stress Grows and Resources Shrink. Protest-rattled department grapples with budget cuts, rising crime and a lack of support from other law enforcement in the region

Wall Street Journal ^ | September 18, 2020 | Zusha Elinson

[karpov]

After more than three months of daily protests, police in Portland are facing a rise in violent crime and say they are overstretched.

Some in the Portland Police Bureau say they expect protests, which have stopped in recent days as smoke from wildfires clouds the city, to resume. Shootings this year have injured 159 people, compared with 88 at this time last year. Only one is known to have occurred during a protest or march.

Budget cuts and a rise in retirements made it difficult for the department to find enough officers to handle daily demonstrations against racism and police violence. It paid out $6.8 million in police overtime from May through mid-August, a spokesman said. Neighboring jurisdictions that used to provide police to help with big protests refused, not wanting to become embroiled in the city’s divisive politics, law-enforcement officials said.

“I have never seen the police bureau so stressed, personal-strength-wise, never,” said Jim Ferraris, president of the Oregon Association Chiefs of Police, who worked for the Portland Police Bureau for nearly three decades before becoming chief in Woodburn, Ore.

U.S. law-enforcement agencies have been under heavy scrutiny since George Floyd was killed while in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25. An energized Black Lives Matter movement held protests across the country. Chiefs resigned or were fired. In many cities, under pressure to “defund the police” and suffering a drop in tax revenue during the Covid-19 recession, budgets were cut.

The pressure has been even more intense in Portland. Demonstrators were out every day after Mr. Floyd’s death, recently marking their 100-day anniversary. Protests were often followed by late-night violence and property destruction, some perpetrated by a local antifa movement.

[karpov]

Full article. If the riots were staged by right-wing groups they would have been quelled long ago.

[circlecity]

They made their bed now they can lay in it.

[Red Badger]

I sense a pandemic of ‘Blue Flu’ coming soon........................

[Bayard]

If Portland ever gets serious about it, they can always ask for Federal enforcement aid from the President.

[Seruzawa]

If these fools had come down like stink-on-Shyt at the very forst act of violence they wouldn't be having any trouble now. But they let these seditionist scum run riot.

[NonValueAdded]

Walk away, PPD.

[Rinnwald]

“...lack of support from other law enforcement...”

I don’t blame OSP and the Sheriff from not wanting to get involved. Why enter this meat-grinder not of your making?

[Freedom_Is_Not_Free]

It is not easy to put the genii back in the bottle. Pandora’s box. Whatever comparison you want to make.

Trying to maintain law and order in a city takes a lot of time, effort, and maintenance. Once you lose control and the inmates believe they control the asylum, it if very hard to re-establish law and order without going full on Medieval on the thugs and criminals. Portland does not have such will and I don’t know if anybody can be that harsh in this day and age of cell phone videos anyway.

I’m not talking about the police mowing down people in the streets, but re-establishing law and order means communicating strictness and then following through with firmness.

It doesn’t help if you have one of George Soros’s bought and paid for DAs who are part of the revolution and won’t indict the arrested criminals.

This doesn’t end well. Vigilantism will probably be the result, but that is lawlessness too and not the right way either.

Portland is screwed. Detroit, Oregon? I don’t know. It is looking bad for them.

[dljordan]

“If Portland ever gets serious about it, they can always ask for Federal enforcement aid from the President.”

I have a feeling that after a Trump win the hammer is going to come down.

[wildcard_redneck]

What sane politician would attack and defund a police department in the middle of a massive riot? this is not stupidity on the Democrat mayor’s part, it is fundamental to their goal of destabilizing the country in attempt to steal the election.

The Democratic Party is nothing more than a band of criminals.

[SkyDancer]

Be interesting to see what their city council/mayor would do if the whole PD just up and quit.

[Bonemaker]

[wildcard_redneck]

I disagree. It would not be hard to regain control of Portland, All it will take is one night of crushing the protests forcefully to end the problem.

[jonascord]

This article is 100% organic bullsh!t.

The good cops in Portland quit 3 years ago, when Red Ted Wheeler came in, and as Police Commisioner, started punishing anyone who did their jobs and arrested Antifa rioters.

Ted had cut a deal, with Rose City Antifa, after their first riot, when they torched a downtown BMW dealership, that he would make the PPB blind to Antifa, IF they wouldn't break glass, burn, or tag. Antifa could "bash the fash" IF they held the to the treaty. That treaty held until last April, when Antifa went off the reservation, and first started tagging, and then burning. They have graduated to death squads. Only federal deputizing the State Police has temporarily throttled the killings.

The PPB is 200 short of full staffing, with all the "retired" and demoted and quit. The only ones left are the thugs and stupids, who can't get a job anywhere else.

The surrounding suburban PDs aren't going to answer assist requests because if they arrest some punk in Portland, Schmidt, the Soros DA, will refuse to prosecute.

All the Conservative counter-insurgency groups have pulled out, since the PPB WILL arrest and prosecute them, for mopery and dopery, if they don't have another excuse.

[HartleyMBaldwin]

I heard that Detroit, Oregon got burned up in the recent fires, so yes, it’s looking bad for them.

[Starboard]

They made their bed now they can lay in it.

***********

Yep, elections have consequences and the people of Portland seem to be OK with the mayhem and violence. Otherwise, they would be demanding an end to it.

[Veggie Todd]

As you sow, so shall you reap.

[saintgermaine]

Just in case you ever wonder who supports some of these riots as well as the BLM group? You may not have heard about them until now, they go be the name of BLACK FUTURES LAB and guess who sponsors them? They are no other than the CCP Communist Chinese Party just a slightly different version from some of these dumb and ignorant socialists we have here in this country, who prefer to be called liberals or progressives as it has a better ring to it. And by the way in China everything is controlled by he CCP no exceptions, including the outfit listed below. And for what it’s worth, the CCP plays for keeps, they are THE BIG BROTHER you either fall in line or you are history.

The Black Futures Lab transforms Black communities into constituencies that change the way power operates - locally, statewide and nationally. The problems facing our communities are complex - the solutions require experimentation, innovation and political power. We deserve elected officials that represent us, policies that improve our lives, and politics that reflect our lives.

Are you ready to join us?
*Black Futures Lab is a fiscally sponsored project of the Chinese Progressive Association. CPA is a 501 (c) (3) tax-exempt organization. Our tax identification number is 23-7404756. This contribution is tax-deductible to the extent allowable by law.

[frank ballenger]

I have a feeling that after a Trump win the hammer is going to come down.

Yes. When Bill O'Reilly was first talking about his fine book The United States of Trump: How the President Really Sees America he was asked what the 2nd Trump term would be like.

O'Reilly said from talking personally to him and putting together various things he said to me, I strongly believe it will be a payback wave, especially against the West Coast states because he really resents what those mayors and governors have done, defying the law with sanctuary cities and the rest. They have mocked him and ridiculed him but he has always restrained himself. I think the other shoe will fall after this.

me again....

I really hope that is true. I was so disappointed when the people at the GOP convention in 2016 chanted Lock Her Up for Hillary and he smiled wryly, raised his palms outward and said "No, no. Let's just win this election and help our country."

I was crushed. I guess I depended on him for my personal fantasy of all being under one system of justice. How utopian of me./s

[Billthedrill]

Now why would Portland be abandoned by area LEOs? Hmm...could it be that of 550 arrests made the city declined to prosecute 500? That was, after all, what the Oregon state police stated publicly. Could it be that the city allowed the police union building to be specifically targeted by the mob with no consequences? Could it be that the arena is so hostile to police that even the Multnomah county deputies have opted out, not to mention neighboring counties? What could it be?

This story is stupidity on a par with the recent shock on the part of the Minneapolis city council that crime has skyrocketed there since they reduced police presence. If your head hurts, the first thing to try is not hitting it with a hammer anymore.