con­cerned cit­i­zen has a great post up. As tax pay­ing, con­cerned cit­i­zens and par­ents we have a right and an oblig­a­tion to ensure that there is real over­sight of our local gov­er­nance. Thank­fully, this con­cept is not unique to our com­mu­nity but is being addressed all over the coun­try. More later.….

Lack of pro­fes­sion­al­ism is offen­sive to me in any pro­fes­sion but in law enforce­ment it can have dev­as­tat­ing, long last­ing effects on the lives of those that come into con­tact with it. Among the com­plaints told to me entail releas­ing infor­ma­tion, often about juve­niles, that should be held in con­fi­dence. Police are often guilty of draw­ing con­clu­sions in a case early on and never veer­ing from that posi­tion regard­less of evi­dence to the con­trary. Voic­ing their ‘expert’ bias to the pub­lic can have hor­ri­ble effects on the rep­u­ta­tions of young juveniles.

After review­ing many of the posts here and at con­cerned cit­i­zen a cou­ple of points appear to be con­sis­tent through­out and that is that Chief Reaves does not posess the per­son­al­ity or social skills required to be a pub­lic ser­vant. Many are call­ing for his res­ig­na­tion and I am of the opin­ion that his pres­ence has so con­t­a­m­i­nated the cul­ture of the police force that no other option is likely to undo the dam­age done within the com­mu­nity. Like many oth­ers, I believe city man­ager O’Connor should go as well for hav­ing con­doned this behav­ior for so long. (There are other rea­sons, unre­lated to the police depart­ment that a change of city man­ager might be pru­dent as well)

Nev­er­the­less, the aim is to improve the qual­ity of life for all cit­i­zens of Coquille and to under­take this requires a method­i­cal well thought out approach from con­cerned par­ents and cit­i­zens. Per­haps a cit­i­zen review board empow­ered to score the per­for­mance of both the PD and the city man­ager should be installed. Much of this should fall within the purview of the city coun­cil and if we feel that the coun­cil is not giv­ing ade­quate weight to these con­cerns, a recall may be required. Some­one told me that Mayor Steve Brit­ton was famously quoted sev­eral years ago as say­ing “this town needs an enema!”. Maybe Coquille is con­sti­pated again.

Other com­mu­ni­ties have wres­tled with these same prob­lems and we can research how they have addressed them, present sug­ges­tions or plans to the city coun­cil and start from there. More meet­ings will be required with cit­i­zens to work out these issues before we present any­thing to the city coun­cil, I believe.