And yesterday in SE Portland driving down Division between 122nd and 112th, I witnessed a scene of approximately 25 marked and unmarked cop cars, the PPD's Command bus, and some sort of armored tank that had cops dressed in black army fatigues standing at the ready with M-16's. All supposedly for a man with a gun report. All that personell and firepower, and they didn't even catch anyone! Lovely scenes for our children this holiday season.

I think Multnomah County Sheriff Bernie Giusto should've read this before making the decision to not report Goldschmidt's repeated rape of his 14 year old babysitter while Mayor of Portland.

CODE OF ETHICAL CONDUCT-OREGON STATE POLICE

The Superintendent acknowledges that the citizens of the State of Oregon rightfully expect and demand that the Oregon State Police epitomize the highest ideals of ethical and professional conduct. As an employee, I subscribe to and adopt the ideals set forth in the Code of Ethical Conduct.

As a peace officer, I am the image of penal law and its warden. If I am to be esteemed and the law I typify respected, I must know my authority well and use it wisely. I shall neither exceed nor abuse it.

D uring my private and public life, I shall conduct myself with the highest degree of integrity and honesty. I shall at all times conduct myself in a manner which consistently maintains the public trust.

I shall be intolerant of dishonorable or unethical conduct by any person in the criminal justice community. As an Oregon State Police officer, I shall strive to be courageous in my professional and everyday life, and will take prudent and judicious action when faced with danger, scorn, or ridicule.

Although the way I choose to conduct my private life is a personal freedom, I accept responsibility for my actions while on or off duty. I will not become a party to conduct that is likely to, or does bring disrespect to myself, my fellow employees, or the Oregon State Police. To that end, I shall not engage in personal conduct that affects, or could be perceived to affect, impartiality in my official capacity.

I shall not use my position or authority for any personal gain or benefit. I shall refrain from seeking or accepting any gift, gratuity, or favor that is tendered, or could reasonably be perceived as being tendered, as an attempt to influence impartiality in my official capacity.

As an Oregon State Police officer, I acknowledge the authority and responsibility entrusted to me and will use only the amount of force reasonably necessary to accomplish and fulfill my duties. I consider the use of deadly physical force as the final option to protect myself or another person from what I reasonably believe to be the infliction, or threatened infliction, of serious physical injury.

I shall bear faithful allegiance to the State of Oregon and the Oregon State Police and shall be loyal to the highest ideals of my profession. I will serve the public with due respect, concern, courtesy, and responsiveness without prejudice. I recognize the service to the public is beyond service to myself. As a police officer, I consider it a privilege, and the greatest honor that may be bestowed upon any person, to defend the principles of liberty.

Do people in this city not realize that we have one of the safest central cities in this country? Phoenix, LA, San Francisco and Seattle, just to name a few west cost cities, all have had more than two shootings in their respective downtowns in the last two years. This is only the second fatal shooting in downtown Portland in three years, not a bad track record I'd say, just awful timing.

Although Vera had her faults she also had a lot of "out of her control" problems. The economy, no matter how you look at it, hasn't been kind to this region for about four years now and significantly hampered Vera ability to put the final touches on her overall dream.

It's amazing to me that even with our failing schools (state budget), traffic issues(state budget), and our "liberal" label(thank God for progressives), we are still able to attract investments into our city. Maybe we should look at Vera and thank her for maintaining our top notch credit rating, our considerably safe downtown, and continued investments from the private sector.

Our commission form of government here in Portland designates the mayor as little more than a regional cheerleader. Even despite health issues, and her relentless focus on city issues, she has been a damned good promoter too! Vera: I and many other will dearly miss you and we thank you for what you have done!

Although I'm not necessarily disagreeing, I'm curious how the shooting outside of Meier & Frank is part of Katz's legacy.

Is a decision that she made (or failed to make) to blame for this event?

And what do you mean by "we continue to have festive holiday scenes like this [the shooting]"? What are the other similar "holiday scenes"? Granted there's a lot of violence in the world this holiday season, but how much of it has to do with Katz?

The deterioration of downtown Portland into an unsafe place to shop and work is a direct result of the mayor's policies (or lack thereof) and mismanagement of the Police Bureau.

People have been complaining about the aggressive panhandlers for a long time. Maybe this will slow them down.

A man is shot to death in a bloody scene in plain view on a crowded city street, and John is quick to highlight the good that may come to us as a result???????

And Jack uses it as a platform to reiterate his dissatisfaction with a popularly elected official???

Where is our decency? Our compassion for the deceased? Oh, I forgot. He was only one of "the homeless."

:(

Seasons greetings.

I mourn for the dead man. But I also mourn for a city in which homeless people and the more fortunate are so in each other's faces that one kills the other. A situation that's totally out of control, and it's been building for years. Maybe if a few more members of the public would call out our illustrious city officials for letting things get to this point, the man's death might mean something.

Here's a carrot for your high horse.

"we are still able to attract investments into our city."

I wonder what the real back-door deal is here- I'm sure there'll be some sort of "urbane renewal funds" made available or "tax-increment financing" going on to sweeten thepot and help this little un-needed project along. Meanwhile high unemployment, streets full of homeless people, poverty, crime, drug addiction continue to be the norm.
How can anyone pat themselves on the back for putting together a deal for another un-needed boutique hotel when so many human beings here in Portland are hungry, cold and homeless?

Jack. I agree with you regarding our treatment of the homeless and mentally ill, but to call downtown "an unsafe place to shop and work" is preposterous. I work and shop downtown every day and don't feel unsafe. Foot traffic is up downtown. The retailers are doing well. The rhetoric is based in fact. Sometimes this is the indirect result of being a large city. I remember similar shootings in downtown Seattle during my 5 years living there and working downtown. That doesn't make it right, but it is what it is. We need to address the mental illness situation in all big cities.

Guess you don't walk near Pioneer Courthouse Square much. And don't mind being brushed up against by gangsta guys. And are happy to be panhandled literally every other block. And think that broad-daylight drug deals on the transit mall are just part of the "big city" life.

Downtown doesn't look healthy to me. Partly it's the lack of there ever, ever being a police officer on foot there any more. And part of it's the migration of groovy shops to places like the Pearl.

Foot traffic is up downtown. The retailers are doing well.

I challenge both of those statements. And now they're going to tear up the mall for another year or two. Good luck. And be careful down there, Ken. I'm serious.

I try to avoid downtown, so I am biased, but I guess for the amount of public money and effort that they throw into the area between the Willamette and I-405, was expecting something a bit better than your typical mall experience albeit with bad parking. However, this is about as visionary as Portland can get I guess. If you do like the stank of an urban decaying funk, though, my vote does go for downtown!!!

"I wonder what the real back-door deal is here- I'm sure there'll be some sort of "urbane renewal funds" made available or "tax-increment financing" going on to sweeten thepot and help this little un-needed project along."

For whatever it's worth, this is from the press release:

"The developers will pay the bulk of the renovation costs and will utilize their recent allocation of New Market Tax Credits from the U.S. Treasury. Other proposed financing tools for this project include: PDC seismic loan; federal Historic tax credits; Business energy tax credits; and Historic property tax assessment based on improvements made."

Jack- Here's the bottom line:
Until you can experience what it is like to be a woman in every other major city's downtown in this country and then compare it to our city's downtown, you have absolutely no real understanding of what 'feeling safe' means.

So for whatever many faults Vera Katz may have had in leading our city these last few years, creating a degraded unsafe downtown as you claim is certainly not one of them. Our downtown is incredibly safe comparatively per capita.

re: pdxkona - Sorry, I know women with children who are, if not afraid, uncertain of why go downtown when the same stores are at Washington Square. Being accosted by agressive panhndlers is not unsafe - just unsavory.

If you look around some of the most interesting areas (SE Hawthorne, NW 23rd, N Alberta, etc.) happened without Vera and the PDC. The Pearl District is still waiting to happen, if you take out the expensive restaruants, not much advantage to visit there. So back to my original comment why did we spend all the money on downtown?

If you look around some of the most interesting areas (SE Hawthorne, NW 23rd, N Alberta, etc.) happened without Vera and the PDC.

In the midst of a thread in part about aggressive panhandling and how Vera is at fault, you point to Hawthorne as an example of a non-Vera place that's better? Are you visiting some other Hawthorne, or do you smoehow just happen to miss all the panhandlers there?

Sorry, I get the same mothers complaining about downtown who have no problem with Hawthorne. My point is that all of those CoP $ have not really created any value-add for downtown.

While I can't say it is any less/more safe, I know merchants who are not crazy about:
1) Panhandlers / homeless
2) Special taxes to pay for some more transit mall stuff with no guarantee the area is going to be any more of a magnet for people with $ to spend.

In sum, it is just not been a very good investment (tax break for the new M&F hotel) for City of Portland, so maybe they should just stop with the investments and let things grow organically like the other neighborhoods I mentioned.

Nevertheless, I still feel safe downtown. So safe that I took my wife and daughter to Santaland right past the crime scene on Friday.

Lloyd Center on the other hand ... I'm not quite sure of.

Lloyd Center on the other hand ... I'm not quite sure of.

Another vote of confidence for the Tram Lady.