Oy. Coppers’ Union Boss, Robert King. This is your last chance to…ANSWER YOUR PHONE!!!!You may recall last month, King told the mayor he was “calling [him] a racist” by commissioning an inquiry into racial profiling earlier this year. King refused to participate in a series of community listening sessions on the issue, preferring instead to wait until the report was written, then THROW A HISSY FIT about its contents in front of City Council and community members who had shown up to support it.

Since then, the report’s co-author, Oregon Action Director Jo Ann Bowman, has been trying to call King to arrange a meeting. “I told him he would have to pay for lunch,” she says, “because he clearly earns more money than I do.” But King, who draws a salary of THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS to be the president of the Police Union, on top of his regular Sergeant’s pay, seems to feel he has better things to do than answer phone calls from community members concerned about the behavior of the police.

Bowman has had about enough. She wants to sit down with community members and co-ordinate a broad-based communication campaign, that might target King with phonecalls, emails, letters, and visits to his office, until he agrees to talk about the issue. This is NOT SOMETHING WE WOULD EVER, EVER DO. USUALLY. But the Mercury will be proud to support such a campaign by giving out King’s cell phone number, as and when it is required. In the mean time, Robert, you can prevent all this! JUST ANSWER THE PHONE.