HomeMy WebLinkAboutAgenda Item - 2020-11-17 - Number 7. - K. Inman Berens Comment Simpson, Anne-Marie
From: Kathi Inman Berens <kathiberens@gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, November 17, 2020 11:58 AM
To: CityRecorder
Subject: Community Policing in LO
Categories: Testimony
Dear Councillors and Neighbors,
I appreciate living in a community where police have a chance to integrate with neighbors. In many ways, the kind of police reforms that people are calling for all
around the U.S. are to make police departments more like what we have in Lake Oswego: where most neighbors don't fear engaging with the police.
But there are some important exceptions to that general well being.As a member of Respond to Racism, I've heard with empathy how some of my Black male
neighbors have been subject to stops and questions that feel like racial profiling. Many people are drawn to L.O. because it's "the bubble." When neighbors put
BLM signs in their yards or march with BLM, it bursts the bubble. L.O.'s problems with race are the same as those of any other community. I've personally
experienced angry taunts from some white people to silence BLM as we marched through in L.O.
I was sad to read that LO Police minimized the severed deer heads and stolen BLM and Biden/Harris signs as hate crimes.
As Clara Howell reports in the Lake Oswego Review(Nov. 5):
"[LO Police] didn't seem too concerned about it," said [resident] Cliff, adding that the officer suggested it may have been children playing a prank on Halloween.
"That was also disheartening." LOPD Sgt.Tom Hamann said the officer may have suggested that because there was an incident where kids had stolen one
another's signage and dumped them. He said with incidents like these, it's difficult to know the cause."
I don't think it's difficult to know the cause of these incidents. Severed deer heads are meant to be a threat: this could happen to your family. Watch your back.
When Proud Boys gathered at the parking lot of the Rite Aid on B Avenue on the day of a scheduled BLM protest (it might have been Saturday 31 October?), I
was scared there would be violence. I was glad that LO Police were there to observe and let white supremacists know that their interference would not be
tolerated. It made me nervous to think that police officers might feel any sense of divided loyalty:they might feel attacked by calls to "defund the police," and
that the Proud Boys have it right.
LO Police need to feel the support of our community for their work, and the gratitude we feel for keeping us safe.Trust is essential to that.There's some repair
and mending to do. I'd like to help with that process because I like living in LO. I'd like to be part of the conversation between LO Police, neighbors of color, and
neighbors who remove political signs or remain silent when hate crimes occur.
Thanks for your time!
Best wishes,
Kathi Inman Berens
1