Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

Life Lessons: PCC's ?open door' leads to a career of achievement

Photos and story by James Hill

by Susan HerefordLieut. George Babnick of the Portland Police Bureau has pretty much done it all as far as police work is concerned. Babnick’s two-decade career – he is currently with the bureau’s Internal Affairs Division – includes shoot outs, high-speed car pursuits, investigations of homicides, suicides and domestic disturbances. He’s had crooks pull guns on him and he’s also been the officer on duty who is responsible for, more times than he wants to remember, telling family members that a loved one has died."I’ve done all that, but when we had an officer die on duty who reported to me, I had to go to his parents’ house, tell them their son had died ? I took a few officers with me and they were looking to me for leadership. It is my job to do this. That is 100 times harder than somebody pointing a gun at you or chasing somebody down,"he said.Babnick didn’t always want to be a police officer. In fact, he admits he was fairly lacking in direction during his high school years in the early 1970s. When he graduated from Franklin in 1975, he was "an uninspired student. I had an interest in sports and it was pretty much why I kept going to school,"he said. "Like a lot of high school kids, I had no clue what I was going to do with my life."After graduation, Babnick hung out at home, living with mom and dad, playing basketball in the Richmond neighborhood with his friends who were doing the same thing he was. "I was finding myself,"he laughed. "Finally, I thought, ?maybe I should get a job.’?But when he went to the state employment division, he found out he wasn’t qualified to do anything. "I needed a skill. I didn’t have any experience other than yard work and janitorial. And I’d picked berries in the summer."His first job at a rubber stamp company got him into an apartment with his friends from the neighborhood. "I was just getting by,"he said.But the work experience led him to the realization that he was doing something wrong. He was getting paid $2.50 an hour, a meager wage in comparison to what his company was able to charge customers for his labor. He rode the bus to PCC and picked up a load of brochures. "Something about criminal justice was a spark in my mind,"he said. But he was unable to embrace the first course, an introduction to criminal justice, and withdrew. The following term, he decided to try again, this time an introduction to juvenile delinquency taught by Hal Hart.It was 1977. The instructor’s style fed his once-dormant need to learn. "I said, ?Yes, I can do this.’ I think I got a B,"he said.This first class sparked a quest for learning that took him through PCC’s Cascade and Sylvania campuses and on to Portland State University to complete a bachelor’s degree in justice administration in 1981. The drive to succeed in a chosen career had taken hold. By 1979, Babnick felt he would be able to manage full-time school and work. His living arrangement was not conducive to learning. "I would sit in my car that did not run to read my books and study,"he said. In fact, Babnick admits his roommates were mystified by what he was doing. Bit by bit, he was changing and new worlds were opening up, while old habits were falling to the wayside.On education, Babnick is a strong supporter of PCC’s open admissions policies. "The school is accessible. You pay your money, sign up. That has always appealed to me ? Otherwise, I doubt I would have stepped onto a college campus. I knew it was up to me to succeed or fail and the fewer hoops the better."Much of Babnick’s career for the Portland Police Bureau has been spent working the east side, first at the former East Precinct on East Burnside Avenue and 47th Street and then at the Northeast Precinct on Northeast Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard.He moved to Internal Affairs for an opportunity to "assume more leadership and do new things. I am capable and motivated and want the challenge,"he said. Regarding the kick-start he got from PCC, he reflected, "There are a lot people who begin at PCC. Honestly, I would say the education I got there was as good as anywhere and once I transferred, I had no problem adjusting."