12/13/2021 - Packet City of Tigard
Memorandum
To: Members of the Public Safety Advisory Board
From: Chief McAlpine
Re: Professional Standards Sergeant
Date: December 8, 2021
For the last year and a half, the demands for police reform, accountability, and transparency
have reached a level not seen in decades, if ever. The national narrative continues to evolve to
the point that police agencies across the country must better police themselves and be more
responsive to community demands. Just over a year ago when we first created the vision for a
Professional Standards Sergeant it was in response to this changing climate. We recognized at
the time it was long overdue for an agency of our size.
Looking back to 2018 when we lost a lieutenant position to budget cuts, the responsibilities of
that position were divided among the remaining 3 lieutenants and 2 commanders. The
professional standards role however, fell almost entirely on the investigations/inspections
lieutenant. This increased span of control and responsibility simply became too much to
execute properly and effectively.
Over the past eleven months we have piloted a new position in the Services Division of
Professional Standards Sergeant. While this is an entirely new position to the department it has
quickly become one that has proven its importance and need. When the initial proposal was
made, I envisioned the position being responsible for many tasks. They included, but were not
limited to; Professional Standards Investigator, Force Response Incident Reviewer, Department
Training Coordinator, SRO Unit Supervisor, PSAB Coordinator/Liaison, PowerDMS
Administrator, Department Emergency Operations coordinator.
Looking back some of these have proven to be a bit ambitious for one person to take on but the
areas we have really benefitted from are invaluable. The key is that the work done in this
position becomes more important every day, transparency and accountability is the cornerstone
of this position. Community expectations are that we are reviewing ourselves and holding
ourselves accountable now more than ever. This has made what became the primary
responsibility of doing internal investigations more focused than I imagined at the outset. The
sergeant in this role has completed to date, 6 internal investigations concerning Tigard PD
employees, 2 investigations at the request of outside agencies where there was a concern of
possible criminal implications, and he created and delivered an introduction to internal affairs
investigations class to Marion County agencies at their request.
For the internal investigations alone the sergeant conducted more than 30 interviews as a part of
those. Additionally, he has worked with TPOA leadership to standardize the internal
investigation process. This helps to make the process of the investigation itself more predicable
to those involved, increase communication, create equity and reduce the level of anxiety often
associated with these types of investigations.
Of particular note is with the addition of this position we have been able to move to a more
transparent process internally. Since the span of control is much smaller for this position and
resides in the Services Division, it has allowed for more transparent investigations. As most of
the complaints the department receives come in about those in the Operations Division,we
have reduced the likelihood that a direct supervisor would be investigating one of their team
members to almost zero. By doing this it shows a higher level of accountability with our
community in an attempt to exceed their expectations.
A primary responsibility is reviewing Force Response Reviews and making training
recommendations to the appropriate training teams. These practices are important to the
community in that we are checking our practices to ensure what we are doing is meeting the
expectations of the community. By having this process in place,where one person reviews all of
these, it increases our continuity of review and makes identifying potential negative patterns
easier. Thus, providing a quicker path to correcting identified areas of needed improvement.
In the area of training,we developed a department training calendar to make sure all necessary
training was scheduled. Recognizing that delivering training is expensive, the Sergeant is also
responsible for working with program leads to attempt to schedule training creating the least
financial impact possible.
The Sergeant reviews the training plans prior to submittal to the program lieutenant ensuring all
training points identified in the reviews have been included in the training plan. This is an area
where we were seriously lacking prior to the advent of this position and moving forward it will
become more and more valuable as we get better at delivering training regularly. The position
also took over the coordination and planning of all new hire training. This typically requires
scheduling two weeks, or more, of training and orientation for new employees.
As a part of the assignment associated with training, there have been training directives created
associated with recent legal changes. These directives only become more important as the
political landscape around police accountability continues to evolve. We continue to monitor
these changes and train our officers in a timely manner to understand and meet these new legal
standards. Having this role in the department is critical to achieving this new requirement.
One of the areas that was also of considerable community interest and concern was the SRO
program. This program has seen a significant change due to recent contract changes with the
district. The sergeant has overseen the implementation of the new contract ensuring TPD is
following all the provisions set forth. He has worked with the school district DEI Coordinator,
the individual schools, City of Tigard staff and outside agency partners making sure expectations
are being met.
By design, this position also attends a variety of trainings to become a subject matter expert in
multiple areas. To date, the sergeant has attended training on internal investigations, realistic de-
escalation, a SRO training conference, as well as other leadership topics. Since the position is
still very new some of the trainings that will be necessary to best fill the role have not yet been
offered. Having a subject matter expert in training topics and professional standards is best
practice and in the best interest of the community and their expectations as well.
We recently began a deeper review of STOP data. This review, when complete,will provide
insight into what violations we are stopping people for and ensure we are not targeting certain
groups in the community. It is likely this project will take several months to complete as it will
require the comparison of many months'worth of data.
Overall looking back over the past eleven months, reviewing the work that has been assigned
and completed, I have a hard time realizing how we even operated without the position. It has
certainly increased the professionalism of the department in a variety of areas and is without a
doubt a way to create a greater level of transparency and accountability with the community.
It is estimated that the annualized cost for this position is about $174,000 including salary and
benefits. We are currently covering the cost through salary savings, but this is not sustainable
over the long term. Moving forward the recommendation is to convert the vacant transit
sergeant position into the Professional Standards Sergeant position using General Fund monies.