City Council supports mayor in taking Frashour case to court
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PORTLAND, Ore. – Every member of the City Council now supports Mayor Sam Adams' court appeal to keep a fired Portland police officer from getting his job back. The issue is set to go before the council Thursday.
Officer Ron Frashour was fired after the shooting death of Aaron Campbell outside a Northeast Portland apartment complex in January 2010. An arbitrator and the state Employment Labor Relations Board both ruled Frashour should get his job back.
Portland city commissioners said Tuesday they feel the arbitration and state labor board systems are both biased in favor of public employees, and they want to turn the firing of Frashour into a test case for managing these kinds of disputes.
The mayor and other city council members feel Frashour's actions in January of 2010 actually violated his training, despite the rulings.
They maintain he doesn't belong on Portland's police force and that the review process unfairly ties the city's hands by ordering reinstatement.
"I think there are other public policy reasons that make it worthwhile to seek a higher court's ruling on this and not to rely solely on the Employee Relations Board which, as I said in my opinion, is stacked," said City Commissioner Dan Saltzman who was police commissioner when the shooting happened. "It's been my experience that a lot of times these things enter the topsy-turvy world or Alice In Wonderland world of arbitrators and the ERB and it just doesn't come out looking like it makes any common sense."
Commissioner Amanda Fritz said she's supporting the mayor's court appeal in the Frashour case for two reasons.
"It's partly who's in charge of the police force and when is use of force appropriate? For me, it's also - it's necessary for Aaron Campbell's family, for his mother to feel that every avenue to justice has been pursued," she said.
Other commissioners want the state Court of Appeals to rule on legal issues tied to the rulings that support giving officer Frashour his job back.
And even the employment board's ruling in Frashour's favor noted Oregon's courts have not answered one critical question that Portland's appeal would raise:
"When do public policy concerns override, or give, local government the ability not to implement an arbitrator's decision," said Saltzman.
Adams will take the appeal before City Council Thursday at 2 p.m. Since a final court ruling may take years, Fritz is also exploring ways for the state Legislature to clarify state labor law as well.
Meanwhile, Frashour remains off the job and his reinstatement remains in the hands of the mayor's office.
Considering the Fact that the People of Portland are the ones writing the Paycheck, you should have a say in if he is hired back or not. This is one issue I do have with Unions, you have to Protect the Good employees not the Bad ones.
I am glad it is not my tax dollars sthat are being wasted. If the city council had any brains they will pay him off not to come back. the arbitrtators ruling is a binding one so the longer the Adams and the council drag this on the more money they will have to pay out to him plus his legal costs as well. The city of Portland sent Flashauer to the State Police Academy for training, and hence forth was trained to the state police standards. The city of Portland has to conform to those standards so saying that Flashauer did something out of pilicy and firing him for it left the city hanging in the breeze anyway. Got to love Portland.....
It's just more of the taxpayer's money wasted by spoiled brat politicians.
Quit wasting the taxpayers money fighting something you can't win Sammy boy. You are acting like the little brat kid who holds his breath and turns blue until he gets what he wants.Â
How about holding Adams and Reese responsible? Â It was their policies he was following. Â The neutral parties who know all the facts (the arbitrator, et al) say he did nothing wrong. Â He's being hung out to dry by the people who only know what the media feeds them and politicians with an agenda. Â Get rid of the people at the top and the people at the bottom will respond.
Good The bad apples in the POPO need to go
"Portland city commissioners said Tuesday they feel the arbitration and state labor board systems are both biased in favor of public employees, and they want to turn the firing of Frashour into a test case for managing these kinds of disputes."
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No kidding! The Bureau of Labor and Indistries exists to support employees, not employers. Arbitrators are more focused on finding middle ground and not what is right and wrong.  Employers and Management don't need arbitrators or agencies to tell them how to do their job; at least not if they are competent. Employees who don't or won't do their job properly need agencies and outsiders to protect them from being held accountable. The unions are incapable of representing anyone if proper procedural issues are followed so they become engaged in the political process through campaign finance, get legislation passed, get labor bureaus created and support those that keep the incompetent and incapable employed.
A liberal government, a liberal system, put in place by liberal politicians and now the liberal city council doesn't like the answer.
Give that terrorist his walking papers.
How about you just do that! Troll!
Naturally. They're all cut from the same cloth. They have no problem spending taxpayer money to further their politically correct agenda.   Black votes, brown votes, guilt ridden white votes from the West Hills. That's how you get elected. Â
Why doesn't that surprise me...?
Drug test all police once a month and every time they use there gun. or any weapon.
Whatever! The City Council, in its ongoing attempt to be everything to everybody, will use up more taxpayer money to right what they feel is a wrong. Perhaps the City should become its own state! It certainly does seem like it's outside ALL of Oregon's thinking!
 @jpk That sounds like a good idea, on the surface. A separate state could be drawn out of portions of Washington County, Clackamas County, and Multnomah County.  My suggestion would be to put East Multnomah County (east of 201st Ave) into either Hood River County or Clackamas County.   The Pearl District could be the capital of the new state.
Sure give him his job back, along with all the doctors that accidently hurt or killed their patients.  While we are at it lets hire back some civil engineers that screwed up our sanitation system.  I heard this is great for business.  Little known fact, NASA kept using the same o-ring manufacturer after the Challenge Explosion in all new shuttles, true story.
Vote 'em all OUT!!
Aaron Campbell would be alive today if he would have said "Yes Sir Officer" at put his hands up. Right or wrong, none of this would have happened.
@poorsob He got what he wanted. Suicide by police. His family got what they wanted, millions of dollars of taxpayer money from the mayor as a non-adjudicated settlement to replace the son who no amount of money would replace but millions of dollars will do just fine..
 @poorsob EXACTLY!!
Sam "Above the Law" Adams. Â At his finest hour.