Following 70 nights of protests, Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell is turning to the community to stop the violence following $15 million in defunding of police efforts.
“We’re 70 days into it and we still have violence taking place almost on a nightly basis,” Lovell said Wednesday. “So, I think it’s really going to be a community-led effort where people just say ‘enough is enough and we’re tired of it’ and we get the violent actors to stop coming out, because they feel that – you know what - this is not going to be tolerated by the community.”
KGW-TV reports that crowds have gathered late each night outside the Justice Center, federal courthouse, and Portland police precinct and union buildings causing destruction and fires.
The chief also said that directing so many officers to the downtown protests takes away from the work police need to be doing, especially as the city has seen a large increase in homicides and shootings in the past month. Police said Wednesday that there were 99 shootings in Portland last month, up from 35 in July last year.
'Redirecting officers to crowd control at protests leaves very few cars in the precincts to answer 911 calls. Sometimes just two or three cars,' Lovell said. 'That's the real issue.'
This past June the city defunded the police by $15 million dollars, leading to cut funding for the city’s Gun Violence Reduction Team. Chief Lovell has expressed a desire for the specialized unit to return.
“We hear from a lot of people in the community saying hey we need the Gun Violence Reduction Team back,” Lovell told KGW. “We need these officers that know our community, that know this issue of gun violence, that we really relied on to help stay safe."