The Oregon Senate Judiciary Committee held a public hearing March 24 to discuss Senate Bill 405, one of two Oregon Senate Bills with ties to the University’s Campus Policing Initiative.
The bill would allow the State Board of Higher Education to authorize the Oregon University System’s creation of campus-based sworn police agencies on its campuses, and was open to a public hearing in Salem last week. Its sister bill, SB 116, is still in the Judiciary Committee. The supplementary bill also authorizes the creation of a campus police agency, albeit one where sworn officers wouldn’t receive full police and fire benefits under the Oregon Public Employees Retirement System.
University Vice President and Provost James Bean, University Department of Public Safety Chief Doug Tripp and University Assistant Vice President and Dean of Students Paul Shang all made brief statements supporting SB 405. The administrators were joined by panels of speakers comprising University Department of Public Safety personnel and Malcolm Wilson, a representative from the South University Neighborhood Association, who also spoke in support of SB 405.
Additionally, Eugene Police Department Chief Pete Kerns, Executive Director of the Oregon Association Chiefs of Police Kevin Campbell and Lane County District Attorney Alex Gardner also came before the committee to back the bill.
University students Sam Chapman, Cimmeron Gillespie and Manny Garcia all spoke against the bill. The students said they opposed the bills because of the potential for any future campus police agency to be equipped with firearms, and what they saw as increased costs associated with a sworn police agency, which could go to alternate funding sources. Students for a Sensible Drug Policy, which has organized meetings opposing the Campus Policing Initiative in the past, will host a spring “Kick Off Meeting” on April 4 at 6 p.m. in the EMU Survival Center to discuss the initiative.
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