Yesterday Portland City Council offered amendments to the Mayor’s proposed budget for the next fiscal year. This will be my fourth time going through the annual budget process – and I want to make note that thus far this has been the best process I’ve been involved with.
Mayor Wheeler and his team deserve credit for deeply collaborating with the most diverse Portland City Council in our history to create his proposed budget for the next fiscal year. As currently proposed and amended, this is a budget that keeps our promise as a council to invest in a holistic, accountable system of community safety, to address our unhoused crisis with urgency, to invest in safety on our streets, and to mitigate climate catastrophe.
I’m pleased that with around 100 fully funded positions open for hire within the Portland Police Bureau, this budget focuses on recruiting to fill those vacant positions and expanding our system of community safety beyond armed police officers.
Some of the proposals my office & bureaus are thrilled to see included in the budget are:
Expanding Portland Street Response 24/7 citywide
Funding to make Portland’s outdoor seating program, aka “Healthy Businesses” permanent in City Code
Funding PBOT Transportation Safety Improvements
Yesterday my office brought forward 4 additional amendments that passed with Council support:
$250,000 allocated to the Sellwood Moreland Improvement League (SMILE) for SMILE Station Building Rehabilitation, which will be used to eliminate black mold and provide a new roof for this vital family resource in Southeast Portland.
Directs study on allocation of TIF district dollars to better understand the impact of these investments to ensure we are preventing displacement and gentrification.
Directs Portland Police Bureau to engage in a third-party program evaluation for Public Support Specialists (PS3s) that is similar to the independent evaluation completed by Portland Street Response.
Directs Portland Police Bureau to return to Council in 6 months with policy updates in response to recommendations from a troubling recent Audit showing PPB continues to engage in unconstitutional policing of protests
This is an important moment for Portland as we seek to urgently address many challenges that were exasperated by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. This is a thoughtful budget that really listened to all of council and our community. Like any budget, it’s not exactly what I would have proposed – but it represents a good balance of the different perspectives each Commissioner brings to the table. It invests in creative solutions to our most pressing problems and I’m thankful for the contributions from all my colleagues. I look forward to continuing these discussions and a final vote, which is anticipated for June.