Portland has had a surge of gang violence, but UP's neighborhood is more protected
By Amie Dahnke
"Brazen gang-related shooting rattles Portland street."
"6 blocks: 16 days: 3 killings."
"Gang officers crack down on teens with guns."
Recent headlines across Portland newspapers have painted the city with startling colors of gang violence and crime. With the intense media coverage, it isn't news to most Portland citizens that the city is experiencing a wave of gang violence.
Juniors Natalie Hemphill and Andrew Barber noticed the headlines.
"Gang violence is getting worse in Portland," Barber said. "You should google it if you don't believe it."
Luckily, UP students have little to worry about in terms of safety on The Bluff. Despite the recent gang activity, UP's neighborhood is one of the safest in Portland. The story is different in neighborhoods a few miles east of UP.
Dec. 12, the day most UP students were celebrating the culmination of fall semester, marked the start of the gang violence when a man was killed at a funeral service in the New Hope Missionary Baptist Church in northeast Portland. Since the incident, the police reported a shooting nearly every day for three weeks. Eighteen of those incidents - which killed three people - are suspected gang shootings.
The most recent shootings of two 18-year-old men occurred on New Year's Eve, in retaliation to the church shooting. Since then, the police have reported to Portland media that the gang activity has died down a bit.
The shootings and tension enveloping the city, which the police and media have branded a crisis, are being attributed to the Bloods and Crips. Police officials estimate that there are 3,000 gang members affiliated with 118 gangs in Oregon. Portland houses about 2,000 of those gang members. North Portland has been populated by the Hoovers Crips gang since the late '80s, when California gang members traveled north to sell crack-cocaine, according to the police bureau.
The Hoovers, who distinguish themselves from other gangs by wearing orange and blue, is one of many black gangs in the city. According to the police bureau's neighborhood watch Web site, some gang hot spots include Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Northeast Killingsworth Street, Alberta Park and Albina Park. In more recent years, the gang has been responsible for multiple home-invasion robberies, shootings and selling drugs in north Portland neighborhoods.
"When I came to Portland from Newark in 1995, gang activity in Portland was at its peak," said Harold Burke-Sivers, director of Public Safety.
According to Community Police Strategic Plans from 1994-2000, gang violence in north Portland had a more prominent presence than it does today. The Gang Resistance Education and Training program, a school-based, law enforcement officer-instructed classroom curriculum that aims to prevent youth violence and gang membership, was established from the strategic plans. Over the past eight years, crime in north Portland has dropped to such low rates, in comparison to the rest of the city, that the Portland Police Bureau is considering a redistricting plan that would ultimately eliminate the north precinct.
"University Park generally has the lowest crime rates in north Portland," Burke-Sivers said.
That safety is created in part by the University's Employee Home Purchase Grant Program. The program, which offers UP-area houses to full-time employees of the University at reduced prices, helps strengthen the neighborhoods and stimulate economic growth and stability in the north peninsula area.
According to Jim Kuffner, assistant vice president of Human Resources and Administration, more than 100 faculty and staff have purchased homes in the north Portland area.
"They bring a huge reservoir of goodwill and support to the neighborhood," Kuffner said.
Kuffner has lived in University Park for 33 years and is the UP liaison to the University Park Neighborhood Association. He has raised a family in the area without much concern or stress about the safety of the area.
"North Portland to us is home," Kuffner said. "It's a comfortable place to live."
Kuffner did admit that there ?are places within the ?neighborhood that experience riskier, such as east of Willamette Boulevard toward Lombard Street, below the Bluff on River Campus and north of the University, outside of the University Park neighborhood boundaries.
Despite the "stressful areas" of the neighborhood, crime rates from the Portland Police Bureau of Neighborhood Crime Stats support that the University's housing program is keeping the University Park neighborhood safer than the 10 other north Portland neighborhoods. During fall semester, the University Park neighborhood had the fewest reports of aggravated assault, larceny, robbery, vandalism, disorderly conduct and driving under influence of intoxication. The neighborhood did sustain a higher number of thefts from vehicles.
Kuffner agrees that thefts from cars are problematic around the University. "There are kids who don't lock their car doors," Kuffner said. "It's a no brainer; just lock your doors."
Engineering professor Mark Kennedy, who lives in University Park and is the public safety and crime prevention committee chair for the neighborhood association, concurs with Kuffner's assessment on the increase in car thefts around The Bluff. At the December '08 University Park Neighborhood Association monthly meeting, the association reported an increase in car prowls and break-ins. Although Kennedy's car has been broken into twice over the 12 years he's been a University Park resident, he is confident that the area is safe.
"Usually University Park isn't a problem," Kennedy said. "Students just need to be familiar with what's out there."
Hemphill and Barber know what's out there. Before moving out of their houses two blocks away from campus, the pair was victim to multiple thefts. Hemphill, who lived with five other UP students, said that her house had two bikes and its lawn stolen during the 18 months she lived there. Now living farther away from campus, Hemphill and Barber heed caution to their new neighborhood.
"We've heard from our neighbors of people taking parts of cars and stealing mail," Hemphill said. "That's kind of scary."
Hemphill and Barber take regular proactive measures to concretize their sense of safety - what Hemphill calls "common sense things" like locking the doors, closing the blinds when they leave and keeping valuables inside the house. Barber said that Public Safety's presence in the neighborhood also gives the pair a sense of ease.
"Public Safety is important because students have to be protected," Barber said.
Kuffner believes that Public Safety's presence is another contributing factor to University Park's low crime rates.
"It seems that the emergence of our Public Safety office makes people feel a lot better," Kuffner said.
Burke-Sivers said that Public Safety constantly works on ensuring the safety of the campus, patrolling the neighborhood and educating students through hall programs. Public Safety's patrol route travels from campus, south on Willamette Boulevard to Chautauqua Boulevard, north onto Lombard Street and west onto Ida Avenue and back onto Willamette. The sketchier parts of Public Safety's route are farther away from campus, on Lombard Street and Ida Avenue, according to Public Safety.
Most of the gang activity that occurs in University Park and near the campus is on River Campus, Burke-Sivers said. "On occasion, we'll find tagging on the campus but River Campus has the most gang activity which is why we're putting up security measures," Burke-Sivers said.
Most students who run into gang members do so on accidental one-time occasions either alone on the street or while at an off-campus party.
"Off campus parties can just get too big," Burke-Sivers said. "You start with inviting 20 people who then invite other people. The party get s big enough to where random people come. Gang members are attracted to those types of situations."
Should a threatening person enter an off-campus party, students are encouraged to call Public Safety to have the person removed.
"We go to the party to help the people out, not to break it up or bust people," Burke-Sivers said.
Public Safety also offers free safety evaluations of off-campus houses. Its Web site offers a lengthy list of precautions students should take to stay safe, whether students live on or off campus.
"It's not hard for students to stay safe," Kennedy said. "We're in a safe community but we need to remember to use common sense."
