The Department of Public Safety Standards and Training recently fired to deputy directors and a third supervisor left. The agency is responsible for training and certifying law enforcement officials in Oregon. (Courtesy of Portland Police Bureau)
Two deputy directors at the Oregon agency that trains and certifies police officers were fired last month and a third supervisor quit, public records obtained by the Capital Chronicle show.
The Oregon Department of Public Safety Standards and Training fired Brian Henson, the deputy director of operations, and Staci Yutzie, deputy director of the agency’s training division, both on Aug. 30, agency records show. A defensive tactics coordinator, Richard Daniel, resigned on Aug. 15. Henson worked at the agency more than 20 years, and so did Daniel, according to his LinkedIn profile. Yutzie spent more than a decade there.
“Due to the sensitivity of personnel matters, we are unable to comment or provide additional information,” Sam Tenney, a spokesperson for the agency, said in an email to the Capital Chronicle.
With a 237-acre campus in Salem, the agency plays a major role in law enforcement in Oregon. It trains new hires for about 200 agencies across the state so they can perform patrol and other work. And it has certified more than 41,000 public safety and security professionals in Oregon, including 911 dispatchers, private investigators and firefighters.
The agency has the equivalent of nearly 185 full-time budgeted staff, but its total headcount is 448 because many employees are part-time instructors.
In July, the Oregonian/Oregonlive.com reported the three officials were placed on administrative leave in May and under a personnel investigation, though the agency did not disclose the reason for that. In a LinkedIn post two weeks ago, Yutzie confirmed she had left the agency but did not disclose the circumstances.
“After 11 years of breaking the mold at DPSST and in police training in general, I am off to new adventures,” Yutzie wrote.
Yutzie declined to elaborate in a private message to the Capital Chronicle, but said: “I wholeheartedly stand behind the work I did for public safety and the citizens of Oregon.” She added that she was a “dedicated and decorated public servant who has successfully addressed some of Oregon’s most pressing police training challenges.”
“We built a contemporary training program that has empirically demonstrated its effectiveness and established us as national and international leaders in police training. The mission of DPSST will always hold a place in my heart, and I am confident that the training team will continue to serve Oregon well,” she said.
A deputy director for 13 months, Yutzie also worked at the agency as a class training coordinator, program development coordinator in charge of public safety training academy programming and training division director.
Yutzie said in her message to the Capital Chronicle that under her leadership her team had eliminated a training backlog that had developed over the last five years due to high turnover at police agencies.
New police officers are required to attend the 16-week basic police training course at the agency’s academy within 90 days of their hiring. The backlog made it difficult for police departments across Oregon to hire and train their officers in a timely manner.
In June, Castle and Kotek announced the state had eliminated the backlog. With additional legislative funding, the agency added three 60-student classes and three additional 40-student classes through a partnership with Oregon State Police.
On Wednesday, Tenney said the backlog is still eliminated, with the agency enrolling new officers within 90 days, as required by state law.
A long career
Henson’s long career at the agency included top level management. In April 2022, then-Gov. Kate Brown appointed Henson as acting director when Jerry Granderson, an FBI retiree, left the post after about a year. For the past decade, he was a deputy director, according to his LinkedIn profile. Henson could not be reached for comment.
DPSST board meeting minutes from April, a month before Henson was placed on leave, said he was the deputy director and also served as the agency’s chief of staff for Phil Castle, who was appointed by Gov. Tina Kotek as the agency’s director in February 2023.
A spokesperson for the governor’s office declined to comment on the firings or whether the governor has confidence in the agency’s leadership.
The safety agency also declined to comment on another high-profile issue in recent months: the arrest of David Babcock, who most recently worked as the agency’s training safety coordinator. He was arrested and charged April 29 with misdemeanor harassment of a Marion County deputy in Marion County Circuit Court. The charge, related to an incident at his house, accuses Babcock of subjecting a deputy, Jorge Ramirez, to “offensive physical contact” on April 27.
Tenney, the agency’s spokesman, said Babcock remains on administrative leave. He is due to face trial Dec. 6.
It’s unclear if the two firings are related to Babcock’s case. The employees went on administrative leave within weeks of Babcock being charged.
Editor-in-chief Lynne Terry contributed to this story.
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