The record · Transcript
Council Session — 2025-08-12
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Session summaryEditor-reviewed
The Community and Public Safety Committee met on Tuesday, August 12, 2025, beginning at 2:31 p.m., with roll call, a statement of conduct, and three agenda items: approval of committee minutes from May through July, a presentation on the Community Health Assess and Treat (CHAT) program, and discussion plus public comment on the Portland Police Bureau's Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) reporting. Minutes were approved by unanimous consent. The CHAT presentation covered the program's mission to respond to low-acuity 911 calls, its response and aftercare service lines, its MOUD/buprenorphine pilot program, staffing (24 total positions, 22 responders, several limited-term and with vacancies), partnerships with Health Share of Oregon and CareOregon, cost-savings estimates, and sustainability challenges including one-time funding and limited-term positions; a Health Share representative also spoke. Discussion included questions on outcome figures, sobering-center referrals, funding sources including opioid settlement dollars, and program expansion. The JTTF discussion, a follow-up to a February full council conversation, involved Police Bureau representatives addressing reporting practices, case criteria, communication with the FBI, and oversight questions, followed by public testimony from three speakers raising concerns about transparency, civil liberties, and immigration enforcement. Committee members requested additional reporting details for future JTTF reports. Any figures cited were stated inconsistently at points regarding case numbers and were clarified during discussion. Votes, where taken, are recorded in the vote ledger. The meeting adjourned, with the next session scheduled for September 9, 2025.
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0 Good afternoon everyone. I call the meeting of the community and public safety committee to order. It is 2:31 p.m. On Tuesday, August 12th. Diego, will you please read the roll? Morillo here. Novick here.
1 Zimmerman. Here. Smith. Here.
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2 Here. Craig, will you please read statement of conduct.
3 Welcome to the meeting of the community and public safety committee. To testify before this committee in person or virtually. You must sign up in advance on the committee agenda at. Agenda and public safety committee, or by calling 311. Information on engaging with the committee can be found at this link. Registration for virtual testimony closes one hour prior to the meeting. In-person testifiers must sign up before the agenda item is heard. If public testimony will be taken on an item, individuals may testify for three minutes unless the chair states otherwise, your microphone will be muted when your time is over, the chair preserves order. Disruptive conduct such as shouting, refusing to conclude your testimony when your time is up, or interrupting others testimony or committee deliberations will not be allowed. If you cause a disruption, a warning will be given. Further disruption will result in ejection from the meeting. Anyone who fails to leave once ejected is subject to arrest for trespass. Additionally, the committee may take a short recess and reconvene virtually. Your testimony should address the matter being considered when testifying. State your name for the record. If you are a lobbyist, identify the organization you represent. Virtual testifiers should unmute themselves when the clerk calls your name. Thank you.
4 Thank you both. At today's meeting, this committee will have three agenda items. First, approving the committee's minutes from may through July. Secondly, receiving a presentation on the community health assess and treat program or chat. And finally having a discussion on and also receiving public comment on the report for the Portland police bureau's the Portland police bureau's report on joint terrorism task force, which is a follow along to a conversation we had at the full council in February. That item is technically two items. There's a discussion and public comment. We may go back to discussion after hearing public comment as well. Diego, will you please read the first item?
5 Item one may 13th, 2025 to July 22nd, 2025. Community and public safety committee minutes.
6 Great. So yeah, approval of the committee minutes for the community and public safety committee. These minutes are available online as part of the meeting agenda. If there is no objection, the minutes will be approved by unanimous consent. Is there any objection? Hearing no objection. The minutes are approved. Diego, will you please read the second item?
7 Item two community health assess and treat program.
8 Thank you. Happy to hear this item today. To hear from the chat program, which is a critical piece of our first responder system. Chad's mission to respond to low acuity medical calls in the field has been instrumental in freeing up resources across our system and reducing emergency emergency department admissions as well. I'm looking forward to the updates we'll be hearing today, and I think I'll pass it over, I think to michelle, lavinia first.
9 Chief wilson.
10 Chief wilson first. Sorry, I wasn't sure.
11 That's okay. Thank you. Good afternoon, counselors. For the record, my name is corey wilson. I'm deputy chief of Portland fire and rescue's community health section and otherwise known as chat with me is nurse program manager michelle lavinia. And I also want to thank our partners that we have in the room for their support today. Today we're going to just give an overview of our chat program. We're going to discuss our mood or mood pilot program that is part of our program now. And then talk about some sustainability parts of our program. Next slide please. With that I'll go ahead and turn it over to michelle.
12 Thank you. Chat began in November of 2021 to meet the rising need of the high volume of non-emergent 911 medical calls plaguing our system increasing. These calls have been increasing for the last 10 to 20 years, and we all saw how the pandemic really pushed our public safety systems past their limits locally and nationally. So let me ask you a question. Does every 911 call really need a transport to an emergency department? Just think about that. Our health care and ems systems are set up this way. Chat is designed to be another ems tool to send the right responder to the right call, allowing fire and ambulance to be available for true emergencies. Our goal is to assess the true reason for the call treat in the field to prevent unnecessary transports to the editor. Provide real access to community members who need health care and other resources to remain healthy. We also provide education on how to access health care independently, rather than calling 911 chat aftercare teams follow up with a caller within 24 hours to assess if the needs were met, and identify and identify resource gaps. Kind of a little bit of a customer service. Our teams work with many other community partners, including hospital discharge planners, case management teams, tri county 911 shelter services, pcp offices, ohp insurance providers and many more. Next slide please. Chat. Teams are dispatched to low acuity 911 medical calls and overdose calls. We stay on scene longer than traditional ems responders and are trained in trauma informed care to foster a trusting relationship. While we aim to provide an individualized, patient centered treatment plan, one client at a time, once clients are enrolled in our after care program, we maintain engagement to ensure that they have the connections they need to be as independent as possible in navigating their own health care. This program is built on the foundation principles of the quintuple aim, and if you don't know that it promotes health equity in our community by providing better health outcomes and improved patient experience with the public safety system, improved responder well-being, and reduced overall cost to care. And first response next slide please. Chat operates two service lines aftercare and response. The numbers in the slide reflect teams at full staff. We currently have three vacancies. We have four response units which consist of two overdose response teams, staffed with a paramedic and an emt, and they provide als or advanced life support response. We have two bls units or basic life support units that are staffed with two emts. These teams are in service Monday through Thursday, 8 to 5 p.m. They are positioned to respond in targeted regions of the city to address areas of high call volume, and these areas include downtown, old town, southeast, north and northeast. Teams are integrated into fire stations one, eight, nine, and 12. All overdose response teams are dispatched to low acuity medical calls, but only overdose response teams respond to overdose call. Types chad has three aftercare units and one overdose support team that take referrals from chat response teams, community partners, and fire stations. These teams are in service Monday through Saturday, 8 to 5. Chat aftercare teams follow up on referred patients within 24 hours of the call to reassess for health related social needs, and they also schedule re-engagement visits as needed to promote health equity and coordinate a patient centered care plan. Teams consist of emts and paramedics, and each service line is supported by a supervisor and a nurse. Next slide. The work of the aftercare team is really key to chad's success. Referrals come in from response teams, community partners and fire stations. By focusing on building a trust relationship over time, we connect individuals to health care resources they need to stay healthy. The workflow is person centered and provides in-person support and engagement for clients to be able to go and see their health care provider understand if they have ohp, we can help them gain ohp. If they don't have it, we do. Social determinants of health screening, fall risk assessments and other assessments. We establish a whole person care plan in concert with other care coordinators and entities. We provide education on how they can care for themselves at home and be as independent as possible as possible, and navigate their complex case management. Next slide. Next slide. Since chat began, we have created innovative strategies to promote health equity in our community. Our overdose response and support teams began just before the emergency fentanyl declaration last year. Chad also started providing medication assisted treatment at the same time. January of 2024. Now, when I talk about medication assisted treatment, I'm also it is the same as saying medication for opioid use disorder. So I will refer to matt or mou in this discussion. Mode refers to our protocol of administering a medication called buprenorphine, and we also call this bupe for short at the 911 call. Buprenorphine is a medication used to treat opioid use disorder. It helps by attaching to the same brain receptors as opioids like heroin or fentanyl, but it activates them just enough to prevent withdrawal symptoms and reduce cravings without causing the same high bupe is safer due to its ceiling effect, meaning higher doses do not increase its effects. It lowers the risk of overdose overall, bupe reduces withdrawal and cravings, which lowers the repeated risk of opioid use, significantly decreasing the chance of overdose. I know I said that several times, but I just wanted to bring that point home. Mood is a service that chad provides. It involves chat, a chat, overdose response team responding to an overdose call, determining if the patient fits into the criteria for the protocol. We administer comfort medications to help with nausea and pain and support withdrawal symptoms. We also administer buprenorphine and administer it after assessments. If needed. We facilitate transfers to the clinic for acute prescription, and then the chat overdose support team meets the patient at the clinic to continue support. We do a warm handoff with the clinic provider, and oftentimes we're asked to remain with the client to support them at this time. If they need shelter, we stay with them and ensure that they have shelter and other supports to make sure that they're successful in their recovery path, and we follow up with them in 24 hours. Ems mood or ems programs are considered bridge to treatment programs. Mood is proven to save lives. Nationally, 18 states have adopted similar ems mood programs, and locally, Clackamas county has a program themselves. Various studies have shown that comparing people on bupe to people who are not on bupe decreases death by overdose. Up to 62%. In medicine. That's a pretty astonishing number. As you know, we see patients when they are most vulnerable and potentially most amenable to intervention. Patients achieve lasting change by being connected to wraparound services like substance use disorder counseling, social work supports and supports for basic needs. Next slide. This slide is the outcomes of our compiles the results of our 18 month mood pilot. This pilot highlighted the importance of building trust relationship with our clients as we meet them where they are. And as you read through the numbers, I'll read the quote at the bottom and it says, everyone who said that they would help us ended up not following through, but your team actually kept their word and provided the support my partner and I needed. And I just want to highlight a couple of the statistics there. 86% of our clients identified as houseless. We diverted 81% from emergency departments and provided warm handoffs for 68% of the clients. And our aftercare teams provided over 730 hours of aftercare engagement for the 36 clients enrolled. On average, clients remain engaged with our service for 80 days, 28% decline support services after they felt better after their, you know, induction medication with comfort meds and buprenorphine. And they walked off and that is expected. Next slide please. I'll let you read this quote, but I'll tell you this gentleman's story. One of our clients gave us permission to share this story. He we worked with him for several months to keep him engaged in his recovery. We responded. Our overdose response team responded to an overdose call to find him on someone's front porch in severe withdrawal. They administered comfort medications to help with nausea and pain administered buprenorphine reassessed him and stayed with him while his condition improved. They also helped him get him cleaned up to protect his dignity, before getting him into a taxi to go to the clinic. Once at the clinic with consent, a team member remained with him during the appointment to get a prescription. The team also facilitated a taxi to city shelter services, where he remained for several months. We helped him get into housing on a housing list and most recently he shared that he is working on starting his own online business. Next slide lessons we learned from this pilot are highlighted here. Mainly, we learned that a program like chat can provide immediate, low barrier access to medication assisted treatment during overdose to save lives. We do this by reducing withdrawal related harm and supporting clients in recovery access through wraparound services. Next slide. This slide highlights the challenges we encountered during our pilot. Overall program awareness was an initial challenge for us that we encountered among public safety partners and emergency departments. Once we provided them education, we developed more of a rapport with fellow first responders that helped promote pilot success by reducing stigma associated with substance use disorder. Teams were more collaborative, allowing us time on scene to engage with the patient and provide medication assisted treatment. This also has been shown to improve responder burnout. We learned that a standalone, holistic wraparound mood service is really not available in Portland, and our team, our aftercare team, really stepped into this gap and provided this work. We worked with community partners to achieve this. This patient population is very high needs. We recognize that creating a system of care for this group will be key in reducing overall public safety costs. In repeated 911 responses. The lack of immediate non ambulance transport or shuttling of clients from the scene to the clinic was also a challenge, and chat staffing during the pilot was a challenge as we see a lot of our staff go on to become firefighters or work in other areas because many of our all of our positions are considered limited term. Next slide. This slide highlights the value of chat services in our community since 2021. Overall, we've diverted 39% of 911 calls that go to chat from emergency departments and 20% of the patients that are stable that can go to an ed by taxi. We have diverted from requiring an expensive ambulance transport. Next slide. Overall care Oregon members that we surveyed reported that they were 99% satisfied or very satisfied with their experience with chat. Value. And overall, if you take the diversions with the emergency department diversions and the ambulance diversions and add them together, you get an estimated cost savings of over $11 million. Now, these diversions do not take into account the true cost of an ed admission. Avoidable hospital losses for avoidable ed visits, and avoidable medicaid and medicare costs. They also don't account for downstream, more expensive social services that these complex clients will incur later. And I just want to point out, ems is really the front line of the health care system. First responders provide timely medical assessments, treatment and transport if needed for people experiencing sudden illness or injury. Our community and communities across the nation are changing. We have very high needs. Patients calling 911 with complex problems and like I said before, every 911 call does not require transport to the ed. The impact we demonstrate here that is scalable is that an innovative team such as chat can improve the efficiency of the ems system as a whole and as a result, show significant cost savings in both public and safety? Excuse me? In both public safety and healthcare infrastructures. Next slide. This is just a brief recap of the discussion. Since chat has been operating, we have created upstream solutions to long standing systems, problems with our overdose response and support teams, mode service and aftercare referral system. And this shows true system improvement for public safety and healthcare. This year, we have integrated chat into key fire stations to better serve the city, and we have new partnership with OHSU school of nursing who has reached out to us to provide a permanent clinical site for their nursing students. And we also have a new partner with health share of Oregon. Next slide. Chat is a unique program. It's designed to intervene before transport to the ed upstream to provide the right resource to clients in their time of need. The team staffing mix is dynamic and that it can pivot to target marginalized populations who are challenged with access to care and the supports required to remain healthy and as and help them get gain independence. Looking ahead, chat continues to work to reduce the burden of non-urgent 911 calls and inappropriate transports to the ed. We look to improve outcomes for vulnerable populations by expanding mood and expanding our service seven days a week. We continue to work to create a sustainable program with external partners. Next slide. And now I'd like to introduce jeremy kohler, who will give a speak on behalf of healthshare.
13 Jeremy coller.
14 Director, integrated services at health share of Oregon. Thanks for having me. Also, are there behavioral health director? Just as a quick reminder, health share of Oregon is the primary medicaid collaborative serving medicaid and ohp members in the tri county region. We have about 450,000 covered lives in the greater Portland metro area. We are collaborative of OHSU, legacy health, pacificsource, kaiser, providence care, Oregon, Clackamas, Multnomah, Washington county and central city concern. I was really excited this past spring when the health board made an investment in the chat program to expand their operations. It's a one year, $1.1 million investment that started just this month. And so we're really excited to see that lift off and pair with the existing care Oregon investment that they've made over the last couple of years. You can go to the next slide. It's just another way to view our health share structure. We have a shared focus on the high risk behavioral health conditions that are experienced by a lot of folks that are living outside right now. It's definitely a priority population for healthshare as well. And so chat was a natural partner. The ability to do medication assisted treatment for folks outside is really unique. Chat has also done a ton of really great work around medicaid sustainability. They're collecting encounter level data, which is getting us closer to the point of being able to submit claims for this sort of work, which is a really big step for a mobile outreach program. So we're just really here to voice our support for chat and everything they do. And just really excited to see this partnership grow. Thank you. Yeah.
15 Thank you. Next slide. This slide represents chat responses since 2021 where chat prevented a fire response and an ed admission. We wanted to lean into this data and understand where we were having an impact from an ed diversion perspective and alleviating fire from responding perspective. We looked at calls where chat encounter resulted in a patient being treated and released and not transported, so it does represent a potential cost savings to public safety. By not sending fire apparatus and a considerable savings to emergency departments. Next slide. This is a breakdown of our funding. And sustainability. We want to thank council very much for our renewed commitment in fiscal year 2526. And we also want to thank cara Oregon for their continued commitment to our work and for healthshare being a new partner. As you may know, we are working with city leadership to achieve medicaid billing to achieve a pathway for medicaid billing, and have encountered several challenges. We continue to work towards a solution together, and we continue to also work with partner, our current partners, to attain long term sustainability and work to convert our current positions from limited term to regular. And next slide. Thank you for your time.
16 Thank you all for your presentation. I'm going to open the floor for q&a. If anyone would like to ask a question, any of my colleagues, please feel free to just jump into the queue and I'll start with co-chair Novick.
17 Thank you, mr. Chair. Michelle, actually, on the slides there's the mood outcomes number of 36 people. And then it says 28% decline support services after medication intervention. I think you told me the other day and a separate conversation that 36 people should have accepted enrollment, as it were, into mood out of 330 who were offered. Is that is that right?
18 No, that's not right. It's. I can see where you got that, though. The 330 were the overdose responses that the overdose team went on. The overdose response team responded to. And we don't expect everyone to accept mood. But the with during the four days a week that we respond, that's where the 330 came from.
19 Okay. And would would all of those 330 been sort of offered mood services or depend on whether they're available?
20 Yes, they were okay.
21 And 36 of them basically took you up on that. Correct. And what's the 28%? Is that 28% of the 36 or of what the 28% of declined support services after medication intervention.
22 28% of the total clients of the 36. Yes.
23 Okay. And. I had another question I forget it, I'll let somebody else talk.
24 Thank you counselor, I'll ask a couple and then if anyone else is in the queue, we'll keep going. Or if you remember. So first, I'd love to see that if you could send that map, like the high res version of it, that's on the chat system. Value one. It was a particularly striking map because it, I think, highlights the cost savings that are being created by chat's work for potential partners, and thus an opportunity to say, we would love it if you would contribute a portion of the savings that this program is providing you to help keep it going to those hospitals that, yeah, that one that is currently on screen. And I also wanted to highlight that chat. You have a slide on the challenges and the first and last on it are related. One is the fact that chat has one time funding at present. You referenced that and I think responder burnout as well. And when you were going through that, and the other side of that was the opportunity that if, if that one time funding was to be converted to ongoing, that would allow for those limited term positions to be made into ongoing positions. How big is the entire staff that's on these limited duration positions, limited term positions?
25 So the total program, the total program makeup is 24 individuals with 22 responders.
26 Great. And unfortunately, we weren't able to get that done this year. We got it's a66 tie in our amendment process under our current rules. And that one did tie six six and therefore couldn't happen. But I'm hoping to in the course of the next budget cycle, get some ongoing funding for chat as well. And I want to say that with one of our partners in the room definitively here, because I know that's a factor for them. Can you speak a little bit to what that would mean in the event that ongoing funds were provided?
27 As far as morale within the program, it's huge. The people that work within chat love the work that they do, but knowing that it's limited, there's always that question is how long is my position going to be there? So if we could make these regular positions, it allows those people that really dig in to the work that they do and they enjoy doing to not have to look over their shoulder to look for the next thing. So from a moral standpoint, it would be huge. And it would it would allow us to really speak to expanding the program as well. It would be a more attractable. Yeah.
28 I was at station eight, which you mentioned for a ride along, but I was there on a Friday. So the care program, the responders are not there on, on fridays. And I'm going to guess but I'd love you to confirm if are there, is there just a lack of calls that you could respond to on a Friday, Saturday, Sunday? Is it solely a funding issue?
29 Yes, that is accurate. It would be funding since we have integrated our chat responders into the stations. It has been great to see over the course of the years from 21, chat has really still been an outside tool for our firefighters. Without a real understanding of how they can utilize chat to refer people to them. So integrating them into the fire stations like station eight and we appreciate you going to 17 and eight. That was thank you for that. There has been a better collaboration between the two groups. So an example would be a call came in at station eight, one day of a caller that had called frequently in the same day, with more of a high acuity need. So the truck eight with the four person unit in the big red rig rolling down the street is the one that got dispatched. Well, they were in the station together and were able to say we were already on this person and this is really what their problem was. And then chat was able to say, we can take that for you. So they responded. In route to that call, a structure fire was dispatched which allowed truck eight then to go to that fire, whereas they would have been on that low acuity. What really was a low acuity call in the first place. So we've seen a better collaboration between the two, and it would be great as soon as chat goes out of service, we're usually still hearing our fire fighters calling on the radio. Is chat available because it's a resource that they know is effective, and they're and they're referring a lot of people to us.
30 Thank you. And I did also go on a ride along with chat and chief jackson was there for part of it. I encourage my colleagues to do that, and I will with that, pass it over to counselor Zimmerman.
31 Thank you. What type of vehicle does chat operate out of?
32 Combination of what you would typically think of as like a box, ambulance style resource. And then so we have a unit in that and also like a ford ranger pickup truck style vehicle to two person units.
33 I was looking through and I was trying to find in case I had missed it, but I is chat currently taking anybody to the county's 13 sobering beds that are open.
34 We haven't been able to do that because of the high acuity of our patient population.
35 Okay, so that answer, just to kind of put it in normal folks speak, tells me that every portlander, anybody who has opened their eyes in the last few years has seen that person who's too intoxicated to take care of themselves, which I would put that in the sobering category. But what you're saying is the folks that you're encountering are well past that. They're now facing death because of over severe overdose situations. We're not talking general intoxication. My understanding the population correctly. Otherwise I would say, why haven't we been able to take somebody?
36 I would say that. You know, the population that we respond to has such high needs that they aren't able to be managed in a setting such as the pathway center.
37 Okay. So let's correct the record.
38 In its current in its current form.
39 Deflection is not sobering, right. There are two programs. And this is a big problem that we have in this community is that the county has co-located two very distinct services. Deflection. Not for anybody who's high drunk anything but in possession of drugs. And it's a deflection from the legal system. That was something that the county chair and the state kind of dreamt up in a way, to avoid legal interactions. As 110 came about in that same building, though, the county has opened 13 sobering beds to replace what used to be the detox, the cheers model, etc. That is designed for more medically monitored. Sobering situation. But I also recognize then there's a type of use and a situation on the ground that is, this is an er visit, and I'm trying to get that sense and the pathway center is more the deflection when we say it that way. But I want to be specific. This question is just about the sobering side of things. I'm asking the same question to the police as somebody who was helping the county get there. Hopefully soon enough, their full sobering center open. The idea was that psr police, fire, ems and friends, anybody who has somebody who could be shuttled there in the old cheers way could be. So I'm looking for what is preventing chat from doing that.
40 We have had meetings with the pathway center, and we have recurrent meetings weekly with where they're a part of our behavioral health coordination meeting. So we work collaboratively with them. Our team has taken a tour of the pathway center and met the staff. And we also received a detailed list of vital signs and assessments of patients that they would have accept since that time when they I think it's been a month or two since they opened it to us friends. We have had two patients that may have fallen into that cohort, but because of their vital signs, they were not deemed acceptable and they were outside. So we did have them transferred to a local emergency departments.
41 Okay. This is really helpful. I think it gets to the point of there are probably a lot of people on the street today who are on the street, but we've accepted this level of suffering on the street, when in all reality, if you were to actually vital signs, somebody, no medical professional would not take you to the er if we had a thousand paramedics just walking the streets of old town and downtown and all over the place, it doesn't like given those types of numbers, because the sobering center plays a role in almost every community in the united states, just not in Oregon or not in Portland. But our acuity, these issues, the fact that vital signs are not safe enough to not go to an er is concerning. I think it just kind of highlights the. Saturation of very dangerous situations for folks. And just like we could probably double the size of chat, double the size of the ambulance force and still be really in a critical space here.
42 I agree, I feel like that is all part of a collaborative effort. On behalf of interested parties to weigh in on developing a real, true system of care for this patient population.
43 Okay, I my request would be that chat line all the way in to shaping the future sobering center operations. And I will admit, as one of the people who put together the list of people to invite to the original shaping table, I didn't put you on that list, and that was probably a mistake. But I see that as a significant place for your influence, given the type of clients that you are, you are being called to, and the knowledge and experience that your folks have, not to mention the fact that you're one of the only groups that has an after care. Operation. I can't help but think that there is a natural connection at the time of leaving a sobering center. That could be a significant point of interdiction. So this is really helpful to hear those answers in terms of like those vital signs and what you're working through, because it's not just as simple as snapping and saying you can take them. There are other things that are in factor here. So thank you for kind of going down the rabbit hole a little bit with me. It's been helpful to hear I've always been a fan of chat. I think that the service we often talk about the number of ods and domicile unknown deaths each year, but without chat, I think those numbers go significantly higher. So thanks for your service and thanks for your presentation today.
44 And just to add to what you were saying about, I mean, our our aftercare team really does is aware of all the resources at their disposal and how to navigate with, you know, their requests on how to admit people to those places. And it's something that they train on, and our responders are constantly being made aware of how to work within those systems. So we'll continue to.
45 Yeah, we should all set a goal that whenever the county finally opens their full center, not just their co-located ones, that we're all everybody in this room, especially that we're all robust in making that center successful, because that knowledge and connection that your team has is going to make them more successful as county operators as well. So thanks, chief.
46 Thank you. Councilor I'll pass it back to councilor. Novick.
47 Thank you. So in terms of your hopes to scale chat partnerships with csos, hospitals, city, county agencies, can you elaborate a bit on what your plans are, what you think the opportunities are, what the barriers are, and also just tell us whether we can help.
48 I think I'd like I think I'd like tom miller to answer that.
49 Go ahead. Chairman.
50 Sure. I'll have jeremy come speak.
51 Well, we are the primary partner and, you know, we are invested in chat for this year. I think working towards sustainability, like we mentioned earlier, about finding ways to encounter claims. So it becomes a normal part of medicaid reimbursement is certainly a really important thing to work towards. The health share board encompasses all of the major health systems in the region. So this is investment that everyone's interested in making. I think, you know, I think we probably need to do some work with our partners at the state to continue to advocate for rules that would allow us to do more encounter level billing for these types of clinicians that are doing this type of work. So certainly, I think that's something that needs to happen. The chat has done a really nice job of getting kind of prepared and set up for that. And Oregon has done a really nice job working with chat through their relationship for the last couple of years, laying the foundation there.
52 Just through you. Basically, we have the coes and the hospitals involved.
53 That's that's who we are.
54 You're brought in. And what and sounds like what we could the most important thing we could do, if there's some way we could help, is to help work with oha to allow for medicaid billing.
55 And certainly I think, like as mentioned earlier, the funding sustainability on on the same side as well. I think that's that's really important. I the board wants to make investments that they're going to see grow and develop over time. Our investment is really targeted at program expansion and the aftercare components. That's really where we are putting our energy for our for our dollars. So as healthcare and care, Oregon health system at large is investing in the aftercare piece. Piece. Having like that base sustainability from the city I think will only help those other investments, especially in a time of, you know, challenging medicaid environment.
56 Can you imagine health share in your members, for want of a better word, deciding looking at the data to increase your own own investment in chat in both the before care and the after care elements.
57 For right for right now, you know it's a brand new investment. So I mean obviously have to see how that goes. And again, we're in a very constricted environment. Most of the aftercare that happens post chat is all already medicaid covered. So really it's a matter of making sure that the medicaid eligible folks that chad is serving is really well tied into our care coordination programs and to our existing behavioral health and medical services. Getting folks enrolled in primary care centers, behavioral health centers, all of those things that we already fund. And so there's no there's no funding issue on on that front. It's really just about getting folks to the right place, because those are all things we pay for.
58 Okay.
59 Thank you. Of course.
60 Thank you. Chairman.
61 Thanks.
62 I'll jump on that a little bit and say so effectively there's institutional donor funds. There's the possibility of medicaid reimbursement. And then there's the city's investment in it, which we've talked about a little bit being a one time investment as of right now. And I mean, grant funding is effectively the same. The oha side is the part about getting bill ability and eventually reimbursement for medicaid for those who are following along. I wanted to follow up on one of maybe a tangent to councilor Zimmerman's question around when people are released from a place and having that be a good place for interdiction. One of the other places that that's come up is hospitals, in particular at legacy, where folks are sometimes released to the street. And I wanted to just bring that into the conversation and ask, are there any is there any overlap between that population and the aftercare, the aftercare eligible population from chat? I mean, is there a scenario where you'd be working with somebody? Eventually they'd end up there, and then it would still be worthwhile to be there for them as they are released from an ed?
63 Yeah, that that would be a perfect implementation for our program. And, you know, with our new partnership with healthshare, we can explore opportunities like that in in settings like that.
64 Thanks. I only know the depth of that issue for legacy, but I imagine that those other partners you have on the map have similar stories as well.
65 Councilor I just have one other note to tag on to the funding piece, and I know that it addresses the opioid settlement board, and tom miller can speak to that specific item.
66 Good afternoon council. Tom miller. For the record, I'm a community health policy analyst. I help with policy and development with chad and the fire bureau. Thank you for the question. Councilor Kanal. You know this well, councilor Novick you have familiarity, I believe as well with this, that michelle was just referencing the statewide opioid settlement board. You're probably all familiar with the nationwide settlement for with opioid manufacturers and distribution, per the formula that Oregon has adopted, 55% of all of oregon's share gets distributed to municipalities. So the city of Portland gets its share of that 55%. You all allocate that as you see fit. By way of background, in fiscal 2324, chat was funded in part with it's the city of Portland share of statewide opioid settlement funds. In fiscal 25, 26 different decisions were made as of course, you're familiar 45% again. So that's the 55%. But the 45% stays at the state and there is discretionary dollars in that table as well. So councilor Novick, to your question, specifically in terms of homework, if I may, I think there's an opportunity for us to present a case to perhaps be able to allocate some of that 45% again, the state portion, to some of the good work that's being done by our folks here in the city. And as just to piggyback on on councilor Zimmerman's comments, obviously, the city of Portland, I mean, there's a need all over the state, of course, but there's a tremendous amount of need here in the state's largest city, as we all know so well. So I'd like to believe there's an opportunity for us as the city of Portland, to maybe get our hands on a little bit of that discretionary money. That, again, is state. State allocated.
67 So thank you, tom. Colleagues, are there any other questions this time or any discussion that you'd like to have? Okay. Well we're just just behind schedule. And we started a couple minutes late. So we're right on track I think for this item. Thank you so much for being here and for your for your time and information.
68 Thank you for the opportunity.
69 Thank you very much.
70 Diego, will you please read the third item.
71 Item three, discussion on joint terrorism task force reporting.
72 Thank you. Thank you.
73 Our city council meeting, the full council meeting on February 19th. City council voted to accept the PPB report to city council on the joint terrorism task force. During that conversation, we heard public testimony and had discussion on the structure and content of that report. And as part of that, we noted that we should have a conversation with enough lead time to allow PPB to be able to look forward and implement it for the next year's report. And when we asked, we were, you know, brought forward that the ideal time to start that conversation would be July or August. This is that follow up conversation or the beginning of it. We do have two items today, and I'd love to invite up the chief and sergeant friedman as well, if you'd be so kind to talk about it, we will probably have a little bit of back and forth in the sense of us to our our guests, but also between our discussion and eventually we'll take some public testimony. There was also some written testimony that came in. So I know several colleagues had questions during that that time. And I just wanted to start by by asking our guests if there's anything that you wanted to talk about in terms of things that may have changed in the reporting, collection of data, etc. On jttf matters from February to present, and then I'll open the floor up to colleagues. But first, welcome.
74 Thanks for. Thank you. Welcome. Well, yeah. Thank you. Good afternoon. Councilors. Chair canal. Chair Novick and sergeant mark friedman. Joining me, I'm bob day, chief of police. So following that February presentation, been in conversation with special agent in charge doug olson, the fbi. We're in agreement that we want a different product to bring to council in the spring or after the first of the year. So we've been in those conversations. This is an opportune time for us to really start to dig into that as we get into the rest of the year. Specific to your question, councilor, I'll defer to sergeant friedman. I'm not aware of any specific changes in terms of how we're gathering information or how we're doing business. My takeaway and notes reflect from that meeting in the spring of more of a desire for more transparency, more awareness. And I think that both this meeting and future conversations can help us get there. But I'll give mark a chance if there's been any change in process that we're not aware of since the first of the year.
75 Thanks, chief, and good afternoon to the councilors and chair. There have been no significant changes to the way that we have been capturing this information. I think my you know, for my part, I'm here. I want to listen and hear what the desire of the council is and, you know, try to accommodate to the best of our ability, the information that you seek to get at during the report. You know, my report this year was consistent with the report that we've delivered, you know, for several years since the resolution was passed. And so mostly again, just here to listen and to hopefully provide what you're looking for.
76 Thank you. And I should have said this a minute and a half ago, but no changes were expected at this point. Yeah, I don't mean to imply that they were. I just didn't want to ask you to do something that you've already done if there was anything. So thank you again, colleagues. I'm going to open up the floor to we all have a copy of the report up here. And that's what I handed out. But I wanted to open up the floor and see if anyone wanted to, to kick us off in terms of the things that you might want to see in the report going forward. And this is sort of a process conversation in the sense that it's less about the nature of pbs's collaboration with the as part of the jttf, but more about how that information about that is conveyed to council and to the public through this report. And that that note is for the public who may be testifying later as well, although I'm sure there will be some overlap. So, colleagues, if there is anything, I have a couple questions, but I'd like to let any of you go first. I know at least three of you had questions in February, so I'll start with councilor Zimmermann.
77 Thanks. I don't have deeply overarching. You know, I've always thought that Portland should be a member of the jttf. I'm very clear about that. One of the things, I guess to in terms of the spirit of conversation, if we think about the types of cases that one might be involved in, I will just highlight that this type of report might be an item where a look back at the last year is not always the best way to get a full picture, because if any of the significant cases that we talk about are still in the judicial pipeline within a year. And so for that perspective, I would say the better way, I think to have an understanding for how does Portland engage is by allowing more time to exist from a case to then a larger discussion for what was the city's involvement. How should council hear that? How are we, you know, doing our duty for the public? I think the conversation gets more robust when a case is closed, so to speak, and is further down or decided in, in the courts. So I just offer that up, because if you were to ask the chief to come back and say, I want to know all the significant cases that you had in 2025, in a way that is a meaningful conversation even outside of the jttf world. But just in in any criminal case, a lot of those are still going through the pipeline. Right? And I think that is important to keep in mind with respect to, to any time when we're when we're asking for information from the bureau on how our teams work, because I actually think there's a lot to be shared and a lot to learn and to see the process that we can benefit from. So I would just offer that up as a suggestion as we go through this conversation.
78 Thank you, councilor Zimmerman. I'll highlight a couple things that were were brought up in the testimony. I think there were back then and just kind of ask about it here. There was a question around the cadence that did come up a little bit, not in that exact way, as councilor Zimmerman just said it, but in the context around weekly communications that you mentioned back in February on a regular basis. There's communication with the fbi, with jttf. I think the weekly part was, was the latter. And then there's separate conversations with the fbi outside of the task force conversations. Is that correct?
79 Yeah. If I believe you're referencing, I made some statement about regular conversations or potentially weekly conversations with the fbi. I may have grouped those in both, you know, my personal conversations as well as conversations that, you know, sergeant friedman may or may not be having. But suffice it to say, we are in communication with the fbi. So I think that was maybe looking for a little bit of a distinction there.
80 Yeah. And I'm mentioning this one because a colleague who's a council colleague who's not on this committee asked the question about how, how maybe not on a case by case basis. And we don't create an onerous, you know, process here, but how to how council can learn about those conversations without necessarily having to, to wait until the annual report that could be, you know, 11.5 months later. And I think that might be applicable beyond just the jttf at this point, given other things that have occurred since February in the in the ice context. Could you speak to that?
81 Yeah. I think if I correct me if I'm wrong, obviously what I hear you saying is that, you know, we're obviously in communication with our federal partners, including the fbi. The contents of those conversations, obviously, are going to range from routine to maybe case related. I mean, for example, I spoke yesterday with special agent george olsen about testifying today and that, you know, we'll be bringing the report forward. We talked about possibility of him joining me in the first of the year when we give the annual report to the city, you know, how could that benefit? So there's a lot of those types of conversations that happen. I've had, as I've mentioned, testified before, conversations with federal protective service or with ice or with others, largely just around, you know, keeping lines of communication open. So what I hear you saying is, one, an interest in knowing about those in particular, maybe, and once again, making some suppositions. And then two would be more in mark's wheelhouse about actual cases. And, you know, maybe what you're suggesting is if we get called about a case and we have a conversation about it, or I give authorization to look into that case, that at that time council's made aware of versus at the end of the report. Is that sort of a supposition I'm making here in terms of that?
82 Yeah, I think the first set of those was was 100% correct. And the second, I think it was more open ended. But I there's nothing wrong with that. I yeah, and I appreciate that information. I think this may not always be the best the best venue or room to do that in, especially where it's not where, where something's still open. But I definitely appreciate that as well. I'll pass it to counselor Smith.
83 Thank you. Co-chair canal and Novick, thank you for bringing this important discussion to the committee. I know we had a vibrant discussion about jttf on the city council last February, and I'm glad that there is this follow up discussion. But I have to say, you know, as a committee member to call for additional input and understanding, there's no better way to have that input or understanding if we're not on the committee. I share many of your concerns, but I still believe that Portland should rejoin the task force. If we want more information, then we need to get on the task force. We can't sit here and minimize that fact and try to maximize the kind of information that you're trying to ask for. It's ridiculous. So for me, I think the benefits of having a place at the table with other law enforcement agencies where we can have a discussion in real time, it outweighs the risk of harm to people in Portland. And I just want to make it clear, I sit on this committee, but I am not in support of our past practice of not being a part of this task force. And I will not be asking you for a whole bunch of information beyond this report, because I know you can't give it to us because we're not a part of the committee. So come on now, you guys. I recognize those risks and which are substantial, but I have a direct voice about this particular issue. And I look forward to talking to you all more about it. But I'm not going to try to micromanage and ask you for more than we can absolutely have, because I understand that we can't have it. And it's just ridiculous for, for this committee to demand you to give more information than you can possibly give. Thank you.
84 Thanks. Councilor Smith, could sergeant freeman or chief dave, could you speak to the maybe a little bit to the history of portland's inclusion and then separation and return in terms of the 2015, 2011 all that that might be helpful?
85 I probably can I'm going to well, you look on your face. Doesn't look like you're too excited about that either. But yeah, not in detail, sir. Really, I couldn't I mean, other than, you know, we were part of it for a number of years. The decision was made. Was that. What year was that? I was 29, deputy chief. I think that was in 17 or 18. Was it when we when the vote was to step away from it, or was it sooner than that? I don't recall. So yeah. I can't give you that history right now. Well enough. Sorry, I wasn't prepared for that question.
86 No problem. Maybe a better way is the nature of our engagement today right?
87 Yeah. The nature of our engagement today is far more limited in terms of our participation in cases and the information that we're shared, that is shared with us directly. So, you know, mark, if you could just characterize a little bit about what it is today and then, you know, compare it to how it how it would operate if we were a member of the jttf?
88 Sure, chief. So my understanding is, yes, we've had varying levels of engagement and permission to operate as part of the taskforce prior to this most recent resolution, we had more access. We had officers assigned as full time members assigned to the jttf. That stopped when this resolution was passed. And really, right now we're operating under a very what I would describe as a narrow scope of cases that we are permitted to work cooperatively. So and, you know, I think everybody here is familiar with what that is. We're talking terrorism cases and we're talking threats to life bias crimes. So really our, you know, the number of cases that we're talking about, if you look at our historic, you know, when we reported this out every year, it's a fairly small slice of what we work on in, in, in its entirety in our office. And so and frankly, a lot of those cases were threats to life cases. Many of those now have been diverted to the fbi's threat assessment group, which is a new group that's operating out of the field office in Portland. And they're dedicated to managing primarily threat cases. So that's been taken. Those were cases previously handled by jttf and are now handled by a separate group of folks at the fbi. So that's further reduced the number of cases that we see, a request for any type of assistance. And it's also important to note that many of the cases that we work or we collaborate or or cooperate as part of the agreement with are they are also Portland police cases. So, for example, an incident occurs in Portland. It meets the criteria, you know, a threat to life. Or it could be a terrorist case. The fbi will come to us and say that they, you know, they are working a separate case that is connected and that, you know, we do ask in those cases for cooperation. Letter in the spirit of transparency and the spirit of wanting to, you know, to properly handle those when those cases come up. That's the way that we manage those cases today. So it is important distinction to note that many of the cases we report out on are also connected directly. They have a direct nexus to the Portland police bureau. They are criminal incidents that occurred in the city. And so that is also worth mentioning as part of this conversation as well.
89 One of the things I'd like to add is, I mean, one to councilor Smith's point, we don't know what we don't know, right? So we don't know the cases we're not involved in because we're not involved in them. But your question has sparked me to think about maybe looking back at the time when we were in and the time when we, which we've not been in, and maybe do a comparison just in terms of numbers of cases, types of cases, obviously that might be a little bit of a benchmark to give us a little bit more feedback. And I can certainly do that, you know, prior to the first of the year. But you know, share that with you. And I don't know if that helps or not, but that was just a thought that came to mind when you were asking that question.
90 Yeah. Thanks. There's a 2011 resolution and 2015 one, a 2019 one. And I know councilor Novick may be able to speak to one of those a little bit more, but I won't put him on the spot. I'll pass it to councilor Morillo, and then we'll circle back to those who have second rounds of questions.
91 Thank you. Councilor Kanal I, I'm having a hard time understanding why my colleagues don't seem to be understanding the political moment that we're in right now with federal surveillance and an administration that is openly and proudly fascist. The reason we left the joint terrorism task force before was because there were hundreds of testimony. People came in from the community, particularly from the muslim community in Portland, who told us how heavily surveilled they were by the joint terrorism task force, how they were profiled beyond what any other group was experiencing, and it was their expertise and their lived experience that partly informed this decision. We also spoke to experts like mike german, who was a former fbi special agent who specialized in domestic terrorism and covert operations, who explicitly worked with us to discuss why the joint terrorism task force was overstepping their bounds. So the fact that the cases that we are working on the joint with, the fact that the cases we are working on with the joint terrorism task force have been reduced and that they are required to have a more specialized reason for working with our law enforcement is not a bad thing. We should be very specific about when we are engaging with the federal government and when we are sharing information, especially at a time when the federal government is specifically targeting immigrants and any other groups that are actually fighting to protect civil liberties. So I would highly urge my colleagues who feel this way about this to look back on some of the work that was done before and the real reasons why we left the task force, because there are specific reasons as to why I think that this was a compromise that is as good as it's going to get. We're working on certain cases that require our involvement, while also not completely conceding. And this idea that we're just going to get to rejoin and just it'll be like on a trust me basis is not going to be sufficient to address the harm that was done to community before and the reasons that we left in the first place. So I think especially in this political moment, we need to be even more deliberate and judicious about when we're engaging with the federal government, how we're sharing information about our citizens and why.
92 Thank you. Councilor Morillo. Go back to councilor Zimmermann and then councilor Smith.
93 Thank you. Just in terms of specifics and what I would want to see in a report, I certainly don't have any expectation. To be reported to about the conversations that happened. Right. And I think my, my suggestion or my question to you, councilor Kanal, is when you when you say that is being specific in terms of what we mean in terms of the conversations, because what I would want to know is, hey, councilor, I, the chief of police, have zero relationship with the fbi, special agent in charge in Portland. And here are the reasons that I would want to know that. But the fact that you had a text message thread or a Tuesday night call with somebody in preparation for, like, that kind of stuff for me, that's not what I'm looking for. I certainly don't think it would be appropriate for this council to get a heads up or a memo when you have authorized Portland police bureau to work. I think that we have to sit in the after action space and not in the current investigation space. And so I'm not I don't have that expectation. Other others may. But I, I'm aware of a couple of things is that both these men who are sitting in front of us raised their right hand. They swore an oath not only to uphold the state federal constitution, the rules of Portland. And so I have to have some trust in that to know that you have been put in your position, in position of authority and position of decision making, that if you think you're bumping up against a moment where things are not congruent, that you've got some release valves in terms of, I need to talk to the chief or I need to talk to city attorney. And then if we hit that point where where we're in conflict, perhaps then. But I just want to be very clear from a in the moment, even within after the fact, until something is totally closed. I'm not really looking for that that day to day, week to week, or even month to month where I am thinking that there could be some helpful. Not to oversimplify it, but flowchart ideas or simply a. I would imagine that there are different levels of information or types of event that the mayor is going to get briefed on. Then the council is, and I think that is okay. And I think being transparent about the types of situations that would warrant you wanting an audience with a councilor Versus or council or an audience just with the mayor for having that civilian oversight would be helpful. Instead of talking in ideas, we can talk about specifics. With this type of case. I would want to talk to the mayor within the first hour with this within the first week of an investigation, with this after the fact. Those types of things are helpful for me in terms of understanding the severity of what we're talking about. I think jttf over the last 25 years has really taken on a broad sense of different cases, and I think that's a lot of what councilor Morillo has also indicated. They're they're in different communities that has gone, has ebbed and flowed in terms of what people understand. And I think being more clear about it, whenever we're able to talk in specifics helps us not be talking in just like in theory, but talking in specifics helps us frame it up. It helps me frame it up anyway. So that would be my. My hope is that we'd have a better idea for what would be a challenge for the department, and how you might navigate those challenges. And then just also a, an expectation that the Portland police bureau, the city of Portland, the fbi, federal government, that we are. I think that. Now I'm going to pause there. I want to I want to kind of keep hearing this discussion because this has been helpful hearing where other colleagues are at on this. Thanks, guys.
94 Thank you. Councilor Zimmerman. Councilor Smith.
95 Thank you, co-chair canal. I'm very much aware of the history of the. Racial profiling of the muslim community and understand those concerns and was very concerned myself about those. But if I'm sitting here in in my most common sense mind, if those things were going on in 2018, do I not think that it's still going on right now? And what better opportunity do we have to stop it by being a part of it? We don't know what's going on. If they're profiling muslims, blacks, folks who live in east Portland, people who live in high poverty neighborhoods, we don't know what they're doing because we're not sitting there. And I appreciate my councilors concern about profiling, but I think we have to. Some of this stuff is really petty and why we get out of stuff. And I can tell you why we got out of that is because jo ann hardesty got elected in 2018, and we got out of it in 2019. And so the whole notion of us being a part of law enforcement and having some kind of say in what goes on, that's what happened. And so for me, we have to stop thinking about politics and thinking about the people thinking about the safety of the people that we serve, and not just being everything against law enforcement. So for me, I think we have to have a broader, bigger brush of how we gain information, and we have to be the person in the room that says, hey, it looks like we're profiling this group or that group. I think we're out of line. If there's no voice at the table to tell them not to do something, then we're still going to be the same victim we were before, because I think if it was going on that heavily, then if we're not at the table, I can just imagine what's going on. So for me, again, I say ditto, ditto, ditto to what councilor Zimmerman says. I think we do need the information, but I'm not going to be pushing for. I know you're very limited in what you can give us with the access that we have right now. Thank you.
96 Thank you, councilor Smith. I'm next in the queue. I'll just kind of flag a couple things. I brought up the earlier question around the more regular communications, based on another councilors question in February that I think is worth exploring, not out of a personal endorsement of that as a, as a solution. And I actually had two other questions that are based off of what colleagues brought up in February. And I wanted to ask them, because they're both colleagues that are on the committee. But I, I'm interested now that those have been asked, there was a question from from councilor Novick back in February if PPB would disclose to councilor Could disclose to council, I think any jttf efforts that related to political persecution. And at the time, I believe chief de you said that that's something that it was new, a new question to you, and that would be something you'd have to consider. And I wanted to just give you the opportunity to follow up on any of that that may have, I guess, percolated over the last six months. Yeah, yeah.
97 So first of all, I'll be clear, that has not happened in any of my conversations. What I as I was sitting here thinking about councilor Zimmermann's comments around, you know, kind of a timeline, the mayor notification I was trying to recall when or if there has been a need in the last eight months to notify the mayor of something specific that had a nexus to jttf. Right. You know, so nothing comes to mind. That doesn't mean nothing's happened. But what I would the relationship that I've developed in reporting to the mayor on other confidential matters that are pbb related would fall in the same area. So were I to be approached in that way? My first phone call would be to the mayor with a discussion about how to approach that next, in terms of council, and whether or not it would look to his direction as to whether or not that's all council executive council work through the council president, whatever it might be. But so I have developed a working relationship around confidential information. Pb related. I cannot recall anything off the top of my head that has been federally related. There may be there may have been an ice component in there just because there's been so much energy around immigration several months ago, but I can't recall anything. So it would be my it would be my duty to tell the mayor and then to ask, how would we approach council on that?
98 Thanks. And then the other question I wanted to follow up on was from councilor Zimmermann, and please feel free to if I'm mischaracterizing it, was around who has security clearance to see all the information related to it. And I believe the note was that it would be helpful for the chief, the deputy chief and the mayor to all have sufficient security clearance to provide for provide cover for tough cases, I believe is the terminology. And I'll let you clarify if I'm getting there.
99 Thanks. Councilor. I you know, it gets back to more than a decade ago when this conversation happened with the previous mayor, who who voiced concern that his own clearance was lower than his chief's right and there was a concern about civilian control. Et cetera. Et cetera. So you're you're spot on there. I don't know, in terms of our senior leadership in the bureau, what what that posture is. But I think it's a worthwhile one to know.
100 So that might be helpful from either in the report or not. I think either way would be helpful. I had a question around the. So in in the 2024 report, there's a closed case that was referred to PPB from the fbi, and it talks about online interstate threats to an elected official from an individual residing in Portland. And I wanted to ask about the nature of that when it's it implies, although I'm not sure that the elected official that was the target of that threat was not based in Portland. So in the event that that was something that was based in Portland, would that I believe that would fall under the example that you gave, sergeant, about something that's a pbb case, but also relates to this.
101 Correct. So, councilor, to your to your question, certainly, yes. It could be an elected official in Oregon, in Portland receives an online threat that, depending on the circumstances, may be of interest to the fbi as well, but certainly most likely would be reported to us. We would intake that report. It would, you know, a report would be written and it might get assigned based on the circumstances to folks in my unit. It could also be assigned to other units, depending on the circumstances. But but in the case that you're the example that your case you're talking about, yes. In that case it was a threat that was received out of state by an individual who sent it from Portland.
102 Thank you. I'm going to pause here and say it may make sense to take testimony first. No one else is in the queue right now. And then we may ask you to come back up if just because we could just discuss, but I think it'd be helpful to allow for some engagement.
103 I just want to use that last answer as as an illustration of with more time, we get to maybe hear the name, hear the case, hear the threat. But my request would never be in a way that jeopardizes anything but but after the fact, many years, we can say, look, you know, Eric Zimmerman said this thing from his computer warrior stance and it was against somebody in michigan. And here are the situations for that person. Here's how we were involved. Here's the outcomes of that case. I want to just use that case as a reason or as an example where I think we can demystify sometimes. And I think demystifying in this realm is helpful, but that requires us as a council also to accept some lengthier time. And I'd be interested. We don't have to answer it now, but interested in like, what would that look like? Because the demystifying by using names and actual events is more helpful than a case of online crime occurred at some point in the year 2024. I'm just using it as an example. Thanks.
104 Thanks. I'll, we'll we may bring this back up. So I'll technically I'll be tabling this item with unanimous consent to bring it back. I think in the few minutes, seeing no objection, I'll ask diego if you can please call the fourth item.
105 Item for public comment on joint terrorism task force reporting.
106 Thank you. And do we have anyone signed up to testify at this time?
107 We do. We have three individuals. First up is philip chachka joining us online, followed by michelle chachka and finally debbie iona.
108 Thanks. Go for it philip. See you online.
109 My name. My name is philip chachka. I'm a member of Portland copwatch. Today, sergeant friedman mentioned there's a new federal threat assessment office in Portland that handles things the jttf used to handle. And it sounds like the fbi and opb have found a work around to avoid city council oversight and jttf collaboration restrictions. If the jttf just changes its name, is it okay for PPB to collaborate without city council oversight or transparency? As mentioned at the presentation to city council in February, sergeant friedman has been meeting with the fbi weekly to discuss developments in Portland. This close collaboration is of concern given oregon's laws protecting first amendment activities when there is no probable cause of criminal activity. And the fbi. Fbi has long history of surveillance and investigation of minority groups, activists, and people with certain religious affiliations. The jttf report provided to city council are so sparse and vague that councilors have no way of ensuring pbb is protecting our community by following Oregon laws. Portland's collaboration with jttf is supposed to be limited to cases that are not solely immigration issues. We are concerned that the wording of this restriction might not be enough to protect our community from ppb's sharing of immigration status information, or assisting the jttf in immigration enforcement. Given the expanding reach of ice and the deportation of immigrants without due process. Without due process. Sometimes from claims that benign tattoos prove the suspect is part of a violent foreign terrorist gang? We are. We have seen reports that ice agents are not afraid to use excessive force and fabricate criminal charges for the purpose of arresting immigrants or people they suspect to be immigrants, based on the color of their skin. There is very little to prevent agents from using the PPB as an extension of their immigration enforcement by simply claiming a person is suspected of criminal activity, without evidence that would hold up in court. We don't want to look back in ten years to find the PPB has been working behind the scenes to assist mass goons in unmarked vans, kidnaping community members off the streets of Portland. We believe city council must insist on greater oversight and control over city employees. Collaboration with greater oversight must include thorough reporting and should include a designated representative from city council to attend meetings between PPB and jttf, and who has access to their communications to ensure compliance with city and state laws and ensure accurate reporting to city council. Portland, copwatch submitted written testimony detailing what we'd like and report. Thank you for your time. Thank you.
110 Thank you.
111 Michelle.
112 My name is michelle chachka and I work in high school. I work in three high schools and special education, and I have to keep everything very private. And it's really hard when I'm working with so many different people to not share information that is private. And my concern with PPB and the jttf is when they're having these weekly meetings, there's just this familiarity and information being passed around. And unless you're very deliberate, information gets passed. And I know that people working in public safety feel like they want to do good at their job and keep their community safe. But when you're teamed with people with very level of access to the information, like immigration status, it's hard to share some information and not with others in the day to day grind and things slip. And we saw this with reed college safety team. When they're trying to be helpful, they let fellow law enforcement release student information without a warrant. And they were arrested very, extremely. And that was a protester from the ice building. And when you're on committees working for community, you want to help your teammate out. But there's this tension when you say no. And we like we don't trust our federal government right now. We saw that they overstepped with the irs taking immigration. Immigration like status and addresses, which was never done before. We know that our health data is being taken by our federal government, and I don't want the federal government to have access to our families. Data like that's in in the police system or like, or my neighbor's data. Now is not the time to give the federal government any openings into our city. We like as we speak. They have taken over like Washington, dc's police force, and they're putting national guards in other cities, and they're threatening to do it in other cities. This is not a time to invite and give them keys into our computers and into our buildings, and to be teammates. This is a time when we're not in a crisis, when we don't have trump threatening to take over something, to detangle ourselves and set some clear limits. And we know that we can ask for help when we need it. Our mayor and our governor can ask for federal help when we need it from the fbi, but we don't need to have this weekly meeting with the fbi. Look at who is leading our fbi right now nationally. It's a joke, and good people are leaving the federal government and they're going to stay jobs. So it's a time to leave this partnership and maybe rejoin again. But right now, take a break for like a few years, and pbb is not going to keep us accountable for profiling. If you look at the last report, pbb pulled over more black portlanders in the last year than they had in the last three years. So they're not keeping the federal people from profiling our neighbors. All right, that's it.
113 Thank you. Michelle.
114 Looks like debbie just joined us online. Just one moment. Can you hear us? All right. Debbie.
115 Let's see.
116 Okay. I'm there. Sorry I didn't get in fast enough earlier. So I'm debbie aiona, representing the league of women voters of Portland. The league first commented on the city's involvement in the jttf in 2001, and we have shared our views with council throughout the years as an organization that promotes open governmental system and open governmental system that is representative, accountable and responsive, and that protects individual liberties established by the constitution. The league appreciates the thoughtful attention you gave to the annual jttf report at the February council session, and that you are exploring further how the city can improve transparency and accountability in the relationship. In Oregon, we are fortunate that state law protects participation first amendment activities unless there are reasonable grounds to suspect criminal conduct. The fbi does not operate under state law, which underscores the importance of maintaining vigilance over our police bureau's work with the agency. The league has been an active member of the campaign, working on this issue for over 20 years, and encourages you to pay careful attention to the memo we submitted to your offices in April, and that you will find in the written testimony section on the committee's website. The memo outlines a number of recommendations, many of them council members, raised during the February discussion. The primary objective of those recommendations is to encourage council to require inclusion of more information in the annual reports, such as how specific cases conform to the requirement that the PPB and fbi work on cases related to terrorism, a threat to life, or a hate crime. The report should answer these questions. What is the criminal nexus? If a case is closed, why was it closed? Were there charges a conviction? No criminality. If a person had mental health issues, were they referred to the behavioral health unit? Furthermore, the resolution guiding the city's relationship with the fbi should be improved by specifying that information, that information on cases, the fbi. I'm sorry, the PPB refers to the fbi be included in the reports. Ppb does that now, but spelling it out in the resolution is prudent. Hate crimes is too broad a term and should be removed from the resolution. It instead should call for investigations only when terrorism or an imminent threat to life, or of utmost importance. The resolution should state that the PPB will not cooperate with the fbi. If the case involves profiling or immigration status. And finally, I just want to follow up on something I heard. I've been observing the jttf and pbb relationship for years. I do not remember that we knew any more about what was going on when we were a member than we do now. So thank you very much and thank you for paying attention to this.
117 Thank you to all of our testifiers.
118 Before we go on though, diego, are there any other testifiers?
119 That concludes testimony.
120 Thank you. And I just wanted to appreciate not only the written testimony from from this time, but also there was a lot submitted back in February as well that the context for all this. Colleagues will move back into or. Welcome to councilor Smith. Your hand is up.
121 Legacy.
122 Legacy hand. All right. Anyone else? So I had a couple comments. I think we've talked generally, but in terms of specific requests for inclusion in the report, first I wanted to say thank you. I think it was included in not just the most recent one, but the inclusion of demographics in the report was helpful for us, given the allegations that had previously been given around profiling. And please feel free to tell me if this is any if there if this is. A moot point based on what's already in here, but how many cases we were asked to consult on? I think we've talked about the ones that just on the off chance there were any that were requested, but that request was declined in either direction. I should actually say. There was the comment from the aclu's written testimony about the detail of how each of the closed cases. And again, this goes back to counselor zimmerman's point of after they're closed, constituted how they constituted a, a terrorist threat or hate crime. And I think to that end, the cases from previous years, it might be helpful to expand that beyond one previous year to have those cases that can be demystified. As counselor Zimmerman put it forth, any information that can be shared about how we can be certain that that shared information follows state law. This was also in the testimony back in February around compliance with rs 181, a .250. Fifth why cases were closed. And I can write that I'm. I appreciate you writing it down. I was not looking up. I can send this to you as well.
123 Okay. You can put this in writing and get it to us. Okay. Great.
124 Save your hands. I was.
125 Struggle sometimes I leave here and I'm like, what did I write down exactly. So I go back and watch this. But anyway, thank you.
126 Thanks. There's only six, but fifth. Why cases were closed. So for example on the this is the page five, it just mentions case closed for two of them. And on the third it says arrest prosecution completed. I think that would help with the public understanding. I think one of the testifiers referred to it of was this something that ended up being a terrorist threat or hate crime? In retrospect? And finally, I think there was a little conversation, and this may be more on us than it is on you in terms of how we define things through the resolution and through other forms of policy guidance. But the nexus to the first amendment and exercise of the first amendment. There was testimony from, I think, four different groups back in between February and now about the fbi utilizing data collected in other contexts for surveillance, even after protests, not just surveillance of the specific event in which it occurs, but of protesters after the fact. We know that. I think this was referenced in one of our testimonies today that the fbi completed the arrest of the individual who was suspected of a few things at at the ice facility. That was an fbi arrest, not an ice arrest, for example. And so that understanding, maybe just as a note, was there a first amendment event related? Was there a nexus to that in the particular case, I think would be helpful, at least for me to know. So those are the six things that I had thought of as would be helpful to include in the report, and I'll leave it there. Does anyone else want to say anything before we wrap it up? Sorry, I want to give you the chance to if any of that's moot or.
127 No, that's great. You can send that to us and we'll work on it. I think that's been helpful to meet ahead of time. We've been in discussion about this, so we will anticipate a different response. And, you know, hopefully have a little more robust conversation after the first of the year.
128 Councilor Zimmerman.
129 My only last piece that I think would be potentially helpful in a report would be times when you, as chief, assess that it would have been more optimal for us to be involved, but we weren't because of the parameters. And so we can evaluate if we are in fact. Not keeping portlanders as safe as we could be. I expect that that will be almost nil, but if that came up, I would certainly want to know it so that we could evaluate whether or not this partnership is working in the positive or the negative for us.
130 Got it. Thank you.
131 Thanks, counselor. Zimmerman. Counselor Morillo. Thanks. I guess we'll wrap this item up here. Thank you so much, chief day, for coming. Thank sergeant friedman for coming and for following up, I think. Nearly six months after that conversation, the hopes of building a better structure for the next year.
132 Great. Thank you.
133 Colleagues. That concludes our agenda for today. So with that, I'll just note our next meeting would normally be scheduled for the 26th due to the council recess. There is not a meeting on the 26th. Our next meeting of the community and public safety committee is Tuesday, September 9th. And with that, this meeting of the community and public safety committee is adjourned.
134 Thank you.