Having a problem with badly behaving people, people needing help, trespassing, vandalism, theft, etc?
Call one of these downtown officers on their cell phone:
- Corporal RJ Josephson – 541-292-6041
- Officer Kyle Lasota – 541-324-0051
“Often an issue is happening and we just have no idea about it. We need you to be our eyes and ears and to report issues and potential issues to us.
Sometimes I hear, ‘…well, I didn’t want to bother you guys with…’ You’re not bothering us! This is what you pay us to do. Make issues known to us and let us do our best to serve you! MPD wants to be the heroes for our downtown partners,” said Jason Antley, MPD Sergeant – CED Livability Team
Jason Antley was the speaker at our February 10 Power Hour. We thought his remarks were so important that we asked him for his notes so we could include what he said in this newsletter.
Information for this article is quoted from Sergent Antley’s notes with some summarization and editing.
THE GOAL:
The mission of the Livability Team is to improve community livability by reducing criminal behavior along the Greenway, City Parks, and Downtown. This can be accomplished through enforcement, linking resources to homeless, partnerships, and through a collaborative approach to identifying long-term solutions.
Our priority for downtown is for it to be a place where people feel safe to live, work, shop, and visit while protecting lawful activity and civil rights.
Given the focus of safety and resource connections, we also have a deep need to stay connected with the stakeholders in our community, especially in the downtown corridor.
Priority calls are crimes of violence, weapons, robberies, assaults etc. For lower-level offense we frequently employ a matrix that follows the path of education and warning, citation, then arrest. This is not a hard rule.
THE ROADBLOCKS:
There are roadblocks to some of our work. This is not meant to be passing the buck or shifting blame; however, it is the reality of what we are dealing with. Most of the time we are dealing with low-level unclassified misdemeanors.
The jail can only hold for so long. Often, the jail can only hold a person for 2-3 hours max.
Most of our clients have serious mental health issues. Often the reason a person suffering from mental health issues is on the street in the first place is because they are resistant to services. Street life and drugs NEVER make this better and only reinforce the already existing issues.
Most of our clients have serious addiction issues. Again, most often these people are very resistant to services. Street life only reinforces the addictive behavior, finding pro-addiction circles to associate with.
These are compounding co-occurring issues and are very difficult to separate.
The State of Oregon typically takes a very hands-off approach to dealing with those suffering from chronic mental health disorders. Rather than housing the mentally ill in hospitals around the state, Salem prefers to use community restoration as the method of rehabilitation and reintegration. Not every state is like this.
WHERE DOES THIS LEAVE US AND WHAT TOOLS DO WE HAVE?
- Work within the framework we are given. ORS, Municipal Code, Case Law, and department policy
- Exclusion Zones
- Municipal Beds
- Partnerships with service providers and stakeholders in the community
- Beginning conversations at the state level and raising awareness in Salem about the status and impact of issues in our city
WHAT DID THE LIVABILITY TEAM DO IN 2025 TO SPECIFICALLY ADDRESS ISSUES?
Aside from doing the day-to-day police work and holding people accountable, the LVT implemented a few things at the systems level.
- Created the T/A card with the DT (downtown) LVT (Livability Team) officer’s info on the back with their direct cell numbers
- Expanded use of the revised DT exclusion zone borders
- Cemented better relationships with our patrol officers which has increased information sharing between the LVT and Patrol regarding problem areas. This equates to our being able to get weekend and evening extra patrol from patrol officers as they tend to the needs and problem areas in their assigned beats
- Opened opportunities for patrol officers to work with the LVT so they can learn the ropes regarding complex and often difficult to decipher laws
- One weekend patrol team has an assigned officer in addition to the full team who is dedicated to the BCGW (Bear Creek Greenway) and the downtown district
- Implemented surveillance details in problem areas trying to catch issues real time rather than being reactive
- Conducted weekly outreach efforts
- Tracked how many business and people contacts the DT officers make daily – 330 Business contacts since May of 2025
- Increased visibility by having the other LVT members who are not assigned to the DT area step up their focused patrols in the area
WHAT IS THE LIVABILITY TEAM DOING SO FAR IN 2026 TO CONTINUE TO ADDRESS ISSUES?
Added a Livibility Team officer to Saturdays, specifically targeting the downtown corridor and the BCGW that borders downtown
WHAT CAN YOU DO TO HELP?
Use lighting, sightlines, trimming vegetation, camera placements, gating and fencing, access control to discourage unwanted persons on your property and make such persons more easily visible to law enforcement. Make certain areas less hospitable to just “hanging out.”
Make calls and reports immediately if possible but if not, certainly sooner rather than later.
Call one of these downtown officers on their cell phones:
- Corporal RJ Josephson – 541-292-6041
- Officer Kyle Lasota – 541-324-0051
Often an issue is happening and we just have no idea about it. We need you to be our eyes and ears and to report issues and potential environmental issues to us. Often a problem, location can be fixed by the city simply coming in and trimming back the bushes and limbing up some trees.
Sometimes I hear, “…well, I didn’t want to bother you guys with…” First, you’re not bothering us! This is what you pay us to do. Make issues known to us and let us do our best to serve you! MPD wants to be the heroes for our downtown partners!