Portland Police Too White, New Report Says It Needs To Get Better

PORTLAND, OR – When you compare the racial background of Portland to the racial makeup of the police bureau, one group is over-represented in the bureau while every other group is underrepresented. The Portland Police Bureau is too white.

That's the conclusion of a new report from the Independent Police Review Board..

The board studied the bureau's hiring over the past decade and found that over that time, the bureau hired 379 officers, 292 or 77 percent of whom are white.

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That only made a small dent in the makeup of the bureau, around 83 percent of which is white. The city of Portland is only 77 percent white.

The board concluded that things haven't changed despite efforts by the bureau.

"The Police Bureau has struggled for yers to fill vacant positions and recently increased resources devoted to background investigations to bring officers onboard in a more timely manner," according to the report. "Yet as this work has been done, the demographic makeup of the Police Bureau still does not reflect the diversity of the city.

"White officers are over-presented compared to the population while all other categories are under-represented."

The report concludes that while the bureau's intentions have been good, they have several obstacles of their own creation including the fact that they don't even have a system in place to track the progress of candidates.

As a result, the bureau has been unable to figure out what barriers exist to hiring more candidates of color.

"The Police Bureau does not track enough data to identify where in its hiring process such barriers exist," the report states.

The report concludes with four recommendations:

• Engage with the Bureau of Human Resources management and the Police Bureau's Equity and Diversity Program to discuss how applicant datat can be provided to bureaus to meet racial equity goals and mandates;
• Purchase or create a databse capable of tracking candidates throughout the hiring process;
• Creat a data-informed review process to egularly review steps of the hiring process through an equity lens; and
• Survey applicants to identify potential equity-related barriers.

Chief of Police Danielle Outlaw said the bureau welcomes the report and agrees with the recommendations.

She wrote a letter to the board stating that bureau has made advances in how it collects and analyzes data and while those were in ways not connected to hiring, that progress will help them implement the board's recommendations.

The bureau, she wrote, "must strive for excellence and continue to build trust in the community. Then it will be a more effective partner in helping make Portland the city we all wish it to be and establish itself as an organization that inspires people from all walks of life to join."

Photo via Colin Miner/Patch.