GRESHAM, Ore. — Leadership in Gresham got another shakeup Tuesday night. But this time it was in the form of someone returning instead of leaving.
The city confirmed Police Chief Robin Sells, who announced she was retiring earlier this month, will return to work beginning June 29. Sells apparently had a “revocation provision” in her retirement agreement, which she is now invoking to return to work.
The move comes in what has been a period of uncertainty for city leadership. While Sells is returning, Gresham’s city manager left earlier this month and former mayor Shane Bemis resigned last week, saying he needed to focus more attention to his business.
Earlier this month, former Jackson County Sheriff and current Gresham deputy city manager Corey Falls sent an internal letter to his colleagues. In the letter, first leaked to the Gresham newspaper The Outlook, Fall wrote “My reception into the city of Gresham has been at best dismal... It was very clear to me that those in [leadership] were not going to accept or support a black man in a leadership position.”
The allegations came as protests across the country, and the Portland metro area, call for an end to systemic racism and racial injustice.
On Monday, Gresham city councilors voted unanimously in favor of flying a Black Lives Matter flag at City Hall through the end of July. The councilors said they wanted to show support for protesters across the country.
“The city council strongly supports and acknowledges that we have problems with racism,” councilor David Widmark said after the vote.
Moments later, Widmark acknowledged his comment could be applied, both, to society as a whole and to recent revelations about the culture of Gresham’s own city government.
RELATED: Gresham mayor Shane Bemis resigns
