City Selects Police Oversight Team Led by LAPD Inspector General

The “independent monitor” is tasked with overseeing the city’s compliance with a decade-old settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice over police abuses.

COMMUNITY RELATIONS: A police officer chats in downtown Portland. (Brian Burk)
By Lucas Manfield

City officials have selected their preferred “independent monitor” to oversee police reforms instituted in the wake of a U.S. Department of Justice lawsuit accusing police of using excess force against people with mental illness. The city has remained under federal scrutiny for more than a decade, most recently due to police use of force during the 2020 protests.

The Department of Justice has come to agreements with cities across the country to institute policing reforms, but Portland’s agreement was unique in that there was no “independent monitor” to determine whether the city was living up to its promises. Now, that’s changing. The city announced it was seeking applicants for the new position last year.

And now, according to a legal motion filed earlier today in federal court, the city has made its choice: MPS & Associates, led by Mark P. Smith, the Los Angeles Police Department inspector general. Also on the team: Antoinette Edwards, former director of the city’s Office of Youth Violence Prevention.

Smith was chosen from among three finalists and 13 original applicants. The Portland City Council will vote to approve the choice in May, but is already asking Judge Michael Simon to sign off on it.

“The city looks forward to moving forward in this effort and attaining full compliance with the Settlement Agreement in partnership among the parties, the amici, and our community,” the mayor’s office said in a statement.

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