Seeking a balance
Ontario police chief laments lack of women, minorities in law enforcement

By JESSICA KELLER
ARGUS OBSERVER
Thursday, August 27, 2009 10:48 AM PDT

Ontario Police Det. Ramon Rodriguez (left) talks with ordinance officer James Swank before lunch Tuesday. Rodriguez is one of five officers in the patrol division who is bilingual.

ONTARIO — When Ontario Police Department Det. Ramon Rodriguez first started on the police force in 1994, only two other officers on the force spoke Spanish.

Now there are five officers on patrol that speak Spanish and one person in the dispatch center who is bilingual.

“In law enforcement there’s always a demand for bilingual officers,” Rodriguez said.

Speaking Spanish and being a minority has aided him in his career, especially locally, where a large segment of the population is Latino and speaks Spanish. Bilingual skills are especially beneficial in being able to communicate with a large part of the community that does not speak English, he said. Being a minority helps because he’s able to bridge any perceived gap between the Latino population and the police department.

Closing gaps between the police force and the people it serves is important at OPD, which is why a lot of emphasis is placed on recruiting minorities and women, as well, Ontario Police Chief Mike Kee said.

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Bilingual applicants and women are desired when recruiting he said because they are very under-represented in law enforcement, which is predominantly comprised of white men.

Minorities and women also make up the fewest applicants during hiring processes, and, as a result, when considering candidates, there is a smaller cross-section of the population from which to choose.

“We would really like to change that,” Kee said. “The make up of the police department needs to look like the community that you’re representing.”

Kee said, when recruiting, OPD representatives often go to the college campus and participate in just about all the job fairs and often send the department’s own bilingual officers to get the word out about applying for a job in law enforcement. When officers go into classrooms, they also stress to little girls or teenage girls there is room in law enforcement for them.

“We think there’s a real good number of women who would be fantastic at this job who haven’t ever thought about a law enforcement career that we’d like to give it a try,” Kee said of the application process. Women, for example, in Kee’s experience, bring different skills to a police department and are generally better at communicating with the public than many male police officers. Communicating, he said, is a large part of what the police department does.  They are also beneficial in certain circumstances, such as sexual assault investigations involving women, because they can conduct all the interviews and gather evidence, such as photos. Currently, a good portion of those crucial pieces are done by outside parties through the health department or STAR center, but, with a woman on the police department, a lot of time could be saved. In addition, Kee said, female victims are a lot more apt to talk with female officers. 

Currently, there are no women on OPD in patrol, and there have only been two in the last 10 years.

Just because women and minorities apply for a job, however, does not mean they will get the job. First, all applicants must pass a 12th-grade equivalency test in reading, writing and match. Then they must pass an Oregon-sanctioned physical fitness test, which includes an obstacle course. The remaining candidates who are not weeded out then move on to the interview board phase and extensive history and background checks.

Kee said recruiting women and minorities has nothing to do with affirmative action although some may perceive it as such.

“It’s just the right thing to do,” Kee said. “We represent the community, and, right now, we’re not representing the community the best we could.”

Jessica Keller is the News Editor of the Argus Observer. She can be contacted at JessicaK@argusobserver.com