Report On Portland City Council’s 126 Amendments, INCOMPLETE Budget

What did we learn from Portland’s newly constructed City Council* during its historic first budget writing exercise?

A. Every member of the Portland City Council is more qualified for their jobs than the President of the United States of America and any and all of his Cabinet.

B. Despite a twelve hour marathon Chair Pirtle-Guiney maintained her sense of humor, composure and focus throughout. She was fair, accommodating and guided her colleagues to a successful conclusion of the necessary legal obligations, albeit with only a minute or two before a mandatory midnight deadline.

C. For the first time in perhaps the entire history of Portland, a slim but determined majority successfully challenged the sanctity of the police budget by transferring about two million dollars to the Parks department. The young but politically skillful councilor Angelita Morillo demanded that Chair Pirtle-Guiney put this sure to be dramatic, attention grabbing moment up for a vote. Despite the late hour Pirtle-Guiney reluctantly agreed and Morillo goes down in the history books.

D. Mayor Wilson needs to have a serious sit down with two of his employees, Portland’s Budget Director and its Police Chief. They both gave seriously conflicting testimony to the council about a police budget item. Councilors were uncomfortably forced to publicly take sides over which of these two they believed before they voted. Citizen viewers could only be aghast.

E. Loretta Smith was admonished at least twice by the committee chair for crossing the behavioral line during the proceedings. You may challenge colleagues’ policies, plans and ideas but you may NOT assault their character nor impugn their motives. Smith did both. She has earned her Persona Non Grata status with all of her colleagues by insulting the chair and ever member of the council. Loretta Smith is a political veteran. She knows better. Her hostile and disrespectful performance was inexplicably deliberate. To what end? This is not in her constituents’ best interests.

F. The Not Ready For Prime Time Portland Councilors do not yet have the skills and the confidence for Priority Based Budgeting. Our current budget process allows them to hide in a group photo. Priority Based Budgeting features individual portraits. More than 300 public jurisdictions in the U.S. have used PRIORITY BASED BUDGETING. It makes each elected official individually accountable for their budget choices. All twelve of our Portland city councilors choose to hide behind our status quo group camouflage budgeting process. Whatever emerges will be a slightly edited version of the mayor/city administrator's budget NOT a city council budget reflecting all the values and priorities of each councilor. That's not why we changed the system. Voters lose.

G. If you watched all twelve hours, as I did, you would have come away with the perception that the Police Bureau, the Community Music Center and the Multnomah Arts Center were the major issues of the day. Councilor Novick’s ill-considered, Novick 4: Motion to Amend the Budget to Close the Community Music Center and Multnomah Arts Center, is not yet on the table. Even a novice political observer could recognize that this amendment is so toxic that to put it on the table, second it or vote for it would amount to political suicide.

H. This budget session failed to address several major issues which will not go away whether or not the Council deals with them. Time, inexperience and fear caused the council to kick the can down the road. The real heavy lifting comes on June 11 when round two begins. Be prepared for another very long day when budgetary decisions of the following may be on the agenda.

1. Does the budget reflect Portland’s most important service obligation to its citizens, namely, providing AFFORDABLE, CLEAN WATER?

2. Does the budget reflect water discounts to incentivize Portlanders to grow their own food?

3. Does the budget reflect how Portland will help support Food Banks and Food Share distribution sites as the need dramatically increases due primarily to the federal government’s mean spirited policies?

4. How does the budget reflect upon the following?

Poll after poll tells us that voters want this at the top of their governments’ to do list:

#1 Getting all those illegally camping on public property removed from those properties.

#2 Providing immediate temporary shelter followed eventually by permanent Public Housing for the homeless as resources and the public mood and values will allow.

Nevertheless, the Portland City Councilors, in their public conversations on Homelessness and Housing and their budget decisions have IGNORED the most important issue to a majority of Portlanders and Oregonians repeatedly confirmed by polls.

Councilors failed to discuss the necessity to develop policies and plans that acknowledge the inevitability of an increased homeless population now and in the near future.

5. Does the budget reflect the enormous cost savings by withdrawing all contributions to the Joint Office Of Homeless Services at Multnomah County and demanding that Metro take and fully pay for operational control of a REGIONAL Homelessness and Housing Policy and Plan?

Richard Ellmyer

Portland resident since 1975.

Oregon Voter since 1971. NAV, Non Affiliated Voter. Citizen Activist.

Campaign manager and legislative assistant to state senator Bill McCoy 1980-1981.

Campaign manager and senior staff to Multnomah county commissioner Gladys McCoy 1981-1984.

Celebrate North Portland award 2016 for Volunteer Work and Service with Political and Social Issues Impacting North Portland.

Certified Oregon Change Agent by Governor John Kitzhaber 2011.

PSU Senior Adult Learner, Spring 2021 - Public Participation GiS, 500 level class

PSU Senior Adult Learner, Spring 2024 - Planning and Housing Markets, 500 level class

Author of more stories on the politics, players and policies of Public Housing in Oregon over the last twenty-three years than all other journalists and elected officials combined.

Project Champion and Data Wrangler - Metro/Oregon Public Housing Location Maps https://www.goodgrowthnw.org/m...

GIS for Activism conference, May 23, 2022, Portland State University, Portland, Oregon

Richard Ellmyer - How I, A Citizen Activist, Used GIS To Effectively Tell A Necessary Yet Unavailable Truth About Public Housing

30 minute Video https://media.pdx.edu/media/t/...

Lifelong Learning at PSU by Jennifer Jordan-Wong.

LET KNOWLEDGE SERVE THE CITY [Section] “Richard used a course he audited at PSU to create a citizen activist mapping tool to benefit Oregon residents, stakeholders, and policy makers…His interest in mapping as a tool for change began when he noticed that public housing was not being distributed equitably”

https://psucollegeofed.wordpress.com/2022/09/23/lifelong-learning-at-psu/?fbclid=IwAR3S9Pff0mBGeT6Ha8dQeAqL0nAqU7QzZ-0pJC_oTQJxBWlAb2fdXzdE0w4

Author of The Ellmyer Report, a newsletter that informs, educates and influences on public policy. Its target audiences are elected officials, journalists and civically engaged citizens. Facebook, Portland Politics Plus. Contributor: Patch news.

*

District 1- Candace Avalos, Jamie Dunphy, Loretta Smith

2- Elana Pirtle-Guiney, Sameer Kanal, Dan Ryan

District 3- Tiffany Koyama Lane, Steve Novick, Angelita Morillo,

District 4- Eric Zimmerman, Olivia Clark, Mitchell Green