Bend council agrees to expand downtown ‘exclusion zone’

Two weeks after Bend Police Chief Jim Porter proposed an expanded civil exclusion zone for downtown Bend, city councilors decided on a 5-2 vote Wednesday night to take that step, described as a tool to deal with violent and/or chronic offenders and make the city core a safe place to work, live and visit.

Since 2006, the city of Bend has had some form of exclusion law in place downtown. It was revised in 2012.

The exclusion zone law says if someone has committed one of many special crimes in the zone, from drug crimes to fighting, vicious dogs or sex crimes, that person is banned from the area for 90 days.

The exclusion notice doesn’t take effect for six days; in the meantime, those who get one can appeal to the municipal court, which has 20 days to hear it — and in the meantime, the exclusion order is stayed.

Those special crimes also can be anything from littering to underage drinking to assault, among others.

The current zone includes public parks, parking lots and Wall Street. The planned zone covers a lot more area. Police moved to include Idaho Avenue east to Lava Road and Harriman Avenue. It will cover almost all of downtown Bend.

“Sometimes in the summer, obscene behavior can happen, and I don’t think that’s something that should be stood for,” said Kelly Cima, manager at Cascade Cottons.

Only one of eight business owners NewsChannel 21 spoke with Wednesday knew about the exclusion zone. Most were in support of it, after learning about the rule.

“We can’t have littering and laying on the ground and what-not,” Cima said.

But one group feels targeted.

“The cops tell us we can’t be here, but they aren’t giving us a place we can be,” said Nicole Harrington, a homeless young woman.

Harrington has been homeless for the past six months.

“It’s not fair. Homeless people are mostly pinned on it,” Harrington said.

“Cops end up in the circle way too much, more than any other time,” Harrington said.

Police say they’re called to downtown Bend more often, compared to other areas (it’s 1 percent of the city’s land but 5 percent of the calls). They say the point of the expanded zone is to improve the “quality of life” in the downtown area.

Porter told councilors in the last 2 1/2 years, 34 notices have been issued, primarily for drug crimes, though also for such crimes as trespass, drinking open alcohol in public and sex crimes.

“We’ve been very judicious about how we’ve issued” them, the chief said. “We’ve issued a lot of warnings. It’s just one more tool to remove the criminal activity downtown. it’s not about panhandling, mental illness.”

He noted Bend police are “one of the most pro-active in the state in dealing with people with mental health problems.”

Councilors Barb Campbell and Nathan Boddie voted no, with Campbell saying she worries the problems are just shifted to other areas of the city.

And while she handed out pocket copies of the U.S. Constitution and said it involves “unequal protections under the law,” Campbell also said it’s not just Bend.

“It’s a huge societal problem,” she said. “The country treats this whole problem like Whack-a-Mole.”

But Porter said there is much “due process,” and that “We’re talking about a balance of everybody’s constitutional rights,” including residents’ rights to come downtown and feel safe and be able to enjoy its amenities.

Councilor Victor Chudowsky said he’s “a very strong civil libertarian,” but that he didn’t see the exclusion zone as hurting that. “At the end of the day, it’s about specific behaviors,” from menacing to harassment and graffiti to theft and arson.

“This is kind of like the center of the community,” he said. “It’s unfortunate we have to do this. I’m not happy about it. But if it’s the best way in the toolbox to address specific behaviors,” he finds it something to support.

Earlier Wednesday evening, councilors discussed the issue of street funding and how to tackle an estimated $80 million backlog of street maintenance.

City Manager Eric King noted that under the city charter, a proposed 5-cent a gallon city gas tax would have to go to voters. Another discussed option is a $5 month “residential transportation enhancement fee” that would be tacked on city utility bills. Each option would raise about $2.5 million a year, possibly to be used in part as debt service for bond issues to fund maintenance projects.

With a variety of issues to decide, the city plans a survey on city street needs and what options the public would prefer. The goal is to bring that data to a special council meeting on June 26, followed by a decision in late July or early August on whether to go to voters in November with a gas tax or other street funding measure.

Bend’s lobbyist in Salem, Eric Kancler, also briefed councilors on the home-stretch maneuvering going on at the Legislature on a variety of issues, including the complex, interrelated ones of rules for medical and recreational marijuana.

With a planned Galveston Avenue marijuana dispensary putting the issue squarely before councilors, a majority expressed interest in looking at what rules can be set governing the “time, place and manner” of marijuana facilities.

Councilor Doug Knight also talked about clustering issues — an echo of the recent vacation rentals debate — in convenience commercial zones — not just for marijuana but establishments that sell or service alcohol.

But Knight said he agreed with colleagues that the city should not be trying to solve issues being wrestled with at the state level.

City Attorney Mary Winters, who drafted a memo for councilors on the legal issues revolving around marijuana, welcomed a suggestion from Councilor Sally Russell to see what rules are working (or not) in the two other states that already have been down that road, most notably Colorado

There also was some discussion of what other Oregon cities have done — a tax on marijuana, possibly to fund licensing and inspection — though there didn’t appear to be support for the punitive tax levels set by some cities, as high as 40 percent.

Russell said they should focus on areas “we know the state won’t pre-empt,” in terms of regulating marijuana sales. Councilors Casey Roats, Nathan Boddie and Victor Chudowsky agreed to serve on a working group on the matter.