The record · Transcript
Council session — 2026-06-17
Transcript from the session's official auto-captions (20,918 words), shown in readable case and split into speaker turns. Speakers are AI-suggested and editor-reviewed (low confidence — auto-captions garble names); each color marks a speaker.
Good evening. Before we officially begin our meeting, we have a pre gavel celebration of the life of a district four constituent, Steve griffith. I'm turning this over to councilor Green.
Mitch Green: Thank you, council president. Good evening everyone. I'm councilor Green and I'm honored to host our ceremony today in honor of the late Steve griffith. Steve was best known to many in Portland as a volunteer head coach for more than 20 years of the lincoln high school constitution team right here in goose hollow district four. Steve's team won four national titles and ten state championships. During his tenure, he was a two term member and chair of the Portland public school board. A devotee of our outdoor and natural areas, a very well regarded lawyer at stoel rives and a rhodes scholar with degrees from stanford, harvard and oxford. He was a civic leader and a champion for civic education and public schools. I want to thank steve's wife, chris dickey, his daughter meg, the students and staff of lincoln high school, past and present, jonathan pulvers and colleen shoemaker of city club, who I'd love to invite up to speak next and offer some words. Thank you so much for being here. Just introduce yourself for the record, when you get up and thanks.
Good evening. I'm colleen shoemaker, I'm secretary of city club of Portland and a resident of district four. I am also recently the chair of city club's membership committee, on which Steve griffith served and inspired since 2024. It's a great privilege to honor my friend, cherished colleague and mentor whose life and work exemplify the ideals of public service. Steve had many passions and interests, but central to all was his love of people. At his birthday party in December, Steve said, these days, some see people as the means to the end. But that's not right. People are the end. Steve lived this principle with a gusto that was contagious. He was a true humanist. He saw the good in everyone. He opened doors and hearts with his enthusiasm, curiosity, generosity, and faith in people. Steve built community and made a difference everywhere he went. Oregon and Portland in particular, have been touched by steve's vision and humanity, but his impact spans the globe from bhutan in the himalayas to liberia in west africa. Steve took action, embraced life and had a midas touch for connecting with people and making a difference. And if you know Steve, you know his interests were wildly varied. But three of steve's commitments stand out. Public service, civic involvement and dedication to young people. Steve first combined these as a peace corps volunteer in liberia, teaching high school. And in 2015, Steve and chris established a preschool, the garden school in the liberian village where Steve served closer to home. As councilor Greene reminded us, Steve served two terms on the Portland school board as chairperson four times 1987 to 95, and ran for Oregon state representative in 2008. In the Portland community, Steve served on the boards of the metro crisis intervention service. Wilderness society faces foundation and chanticleer. He founded the Portland youth choral festival and supported the Oregon league of conservation voters. He helped found several organizations serving youth or run by youth, including for our children's future, mission citizen and Portland supreme court project, as well as other youth focused projects. Too many to list. Steve shared his passions for civics and youth development through mentoring, teaching, and supporting students, he fostered curiosity about the law, policy, and issues. He inspired students to volunteer for causes they care about. To prepare for a lifetime of active civic involvement. I met Steve in 2011 through city club of Portland, serving with him on a research study about civic education requirements in the state and city. And then we did advocacy for civics education in Salem through 2016. In late 2023, when civics, when city club was rebuilding, Steve joined the membership committee. His spirit guided us. He proposed and named the welcome events to bring people together in person after the long COVID isolation, and he hosted several in his and chris's gracious home. Steve gave us the wording and the ethos for invitations to events. Please come. There are so many people who want to meet you. Steve did make a lasting contribution to fostering civic engagement through his 25 plus year tenure coaching the lincoln high school constitution team in the we the people competitions. Oregon live said this about Steve, quote, his ability to bring constitutional law alive for young people impacted hundreds of students over those decades and saw ten state and four first place national championships during his tenure. After losing Steve in February of this year, his lincoln high school constitution team students again earned distinction at the national competition, taking sixth place. Portland's grant high school took third place. Steve maintained relationships with dozens of his students over the decades. He inspired them to be stewards in their communities, of their communities. He made and kept lasting friendships with people whose lives he touched. Steve's dedication to the program also extended beyond lincoln high school. He coached the de la salle north catholic high school team from 2013 to 2017, and informally, salem's sprague high school's 2025 team, which shared with lincoln the national championship. Steve created and nurtured the relationship between city club and constitution teams. Also, the record doesn't give Steve credit, but my memory, says Steve, was the engine of the city club civic scholars program that brought high school students to the city club Friday forums, introduced them to policymakers, and to engage city club members. The year was 2012. Lincoln won its first national championship, and Steve created a path to future civic engagement for high school students. When we lost Steve, the membership committee was in the early stages. Planning events with constitution team students from around the region, Steve said. Correctly, I believe that Oregon has more civically aware and prepared young people than most or maybe any other state because of its many and exceptionally successful constitution teams. Steve's legacy can be seen and felt in almost countless places, not just in our region. We honor Steve with gratitude for what he gave, the example he set, and his inspiration to us to continue to make a difference. Thank you.
Thank you so much for sharing that large volume of legacy that Steve has left us with and gifted us with. Frankly, I'd like to offer councilor Morillo an opportunity to say a few words, because I think you you had direct experience with this legacy. So why don't you take a few moments?
Thank you, councilor Greene, thank you so much for being here tonight. I knew coach griffith as we called him because he taught the constitution team when I was there in 2013, and I was very sad to hear that he passed away. I think that something that you said that stood out was you described him as enthusiastic. And I have never met a teacher who was more knowledgeable and more eager to share that knowledge than him. He was the type of person that you meet when you are a student, and you learn so much from them just by getting to engage with them and having casual conversation. He never made anyone feel bad for asking a question to him. There was never a single stupid question. All questions were good. All questions were an opportunity to teach people, and there was just always an opportunity to connect with others. I feel like we were so lucky at lincoln to have him there, and it's such a it's I also, you know, I grew up in a family that was not civically engaged. My mom's a single mother, an immigrant. If it wasn't for my time on the constitution team and for his work and connecting students to this, I probably would not be here today being an elected representative. And so I'm just very grateful to have gotten to know him. And thank you for being here to honor his memory.
Thanks again. This was the first pre gavel moment that I've used with this privilege. And I'm honored to to share that with you and, and the family and, and those of you who's been touched by, by Steve. Thank you, council president.
Thank you. Thank you very much. I am with that now calling to order this meeting of the Portland city council. Keelan. Can we please call the roll?
Good evening.
Kanal present.
Pirtle-guiney. Here. Ryan here. Koyama Lane. Here. Morillo here. Novick. Here. Clark. Here. Green here. Zimmerman here. Avalos present. Smith here.
Dunphy here and good city attorney. Please read the rules of decorum for the chamber.
Welcome to the Portland city council to testify before council in person or virtually. You must sign up in advance on the council agenda at www.Portland.gov/agenda. Information on engaging with council can be found on the council clerk's web page. Individuals may testify for three minutes unless the presiding officer states. Otherwise, your microphone will be muted when your time is over, the presiding officer preserves order. Disruptive conduct such as shouting. Refusing to conclude your testimony when your time is up, or interrupting others testimony or council deliberations will not be allowed. If you cause a disruption, a warning will be given. Further disruption will result in ejection from the meeting. Anyone who fails to leave once ejected is subject to arrest for trespass. Additionally, council may take a short recess and reconvene virtually. Your testimony should please address the matter being considered when testifying, please state your name for the record. Your address is not necessary. If you are a lobbyist, please identify the organization you represent. Virtual testifier should please unmute themselves when the council clerk calls your name. Thank you.
Thank you very much, colleagues. Our first item on the agenda is agenda approval two two notes to flag. First, colleagues, I want to flag for you that the initial council agenda agenda did not have the presidential update section listed, which is where we have generally gotten updates on city response to federal interventions. That item has been added back to the agenda as item three. Also, I understand that the item related to the renaming of cesar chavez boulevard has been pulled from the agenda back to councilor Smith's office for some additional work to have it heard by the planning commission. Councilor Smith, is that still accurate? Correct. Thank you. And keelan, is there anything else that we need to do to settle this action for now?
No. Okay.
Colleagues, are there any other requests to amend the agenda to reorder items or reschedule an item for a future meeting date? Are there any. Okay. Thank you. Seeing none. Do I have unanimous consent to approve the agenda? Lots of happy nods. The agenda is approved. Thank you. Can we please move to public communications?
First up, we have matthew henderson.
Welcome, folks. As you're coming up to testify, if. Please give your name and you're welcome to share your pronouns. You have three minutes. I'm not.
Sure. I think matthew is making.
His way down.
Okay.
We'll pause for just a moment until they're able to make it down. Can we give the next person on the list just a heads up that they're next?
Sure. Next up we have alex garcia, followed by lacy sutton, camille saunders, and samantha ibarra.
Excellent. Thanks. We will wait just a moment for our first speaker to join us. Hello.
Who's up there? I can be more brief than the past few times I've been here. Don't have prepared words this time, but I'm here to.
Make sure to say your name for the record.
Thank you. I'm matt henderson, I'm with the save lloyd campaign. This is the grassroots initiative to prevent the wholesale demolition of lloyd center mall. And we've gathered very close to 10,000 signatures verified through change.org. We have hundreds upon hundreds of public feedback comments, and we've shared a lot of those with each of you. And mainly, I'm here to say that this time next week or next Wednesday morning, we have a hearing to look forward to. Two appeals that have been filed against the.
Development plans for lloyd center mall. And since I'm going a little off the cuff, I just want to also acknowledge that we recognize that these plans have been in the works for many months and a few years, in fact. And I think one thing I'd like to impart today is that this is a little bit of a flawed part of how this process is unfolded. A community fixture such as lloyd center is is too important. And two memorable for just countless members of our community to have the entire planning process occur, more or less outside of public view, and then the public being invited in at such a late stage to give their feelings about it and have those feelings meet. The city's design commission, and have it really just be only lip service to the process. Hence the two appeals. Okay, so. I come trying my best to represent thousands of portlanders as well as tourists, lots of people who just were traveling to Portland signed our petition as well. So with all that said, what you all could do to help this process, I think be successful and fair is review and advance some of the public comments that were given for this upcoming hearing, but also the previous hearing that occurred with the design commission, because there were 200 plus formal comments given then, and there were. Lots of in-person testimony then that were very moving, and it wasn't lost on anyone in that hearing. So thanks for thanks for the time. And just flag next Wednesday. I know everyone has a lot going on, but it's an important public hearing and thanks for the time.
Thank you very much for being here tonight.
Next up we have alex garcia. Alex garcia. Lacy sutton is joining us online.
I've never done this before. Sorry. Can you hear me?
We can hear you.
Thank you. My name is lacy sutton, and I'm here virtually because my elected representatives won't meet with me anymore. Because fire inspectors won't respond to my emails. And the fire chief has refused to communicate with me about the dangerous conditions here at cherry blossom because there's pending litigation. Those are the words everyone keeps using anyway. But let me tell you what's actually happening. Last summer, after being ignored, denied answers, and lied to by p, f, and r, p, p, d and even the ombudsman, I filed a tort claim notice a notice to protect my right to file a lawsuit within two years, one of which is already up a notice. The assistant fire marshal told me to file. I knew it was a shot in the dark, but I had tried everything else, and I thought that preserving the minutest chance that I would be able to take legal action couldn't hurt. Boy, was I wrong. Because even though I don't have and have never had an attorney, I never filed a tort claim and there is no pending litigation. Public officials. The only people who can do anything about this have been advised by the city attorney to stop talking to me. I asked for that in writing, and what I got back from the city attorney's office was almost entirely irrelevant to my situation. The only thing that applied was this if they have filed a tort claim notice, they can direct their inquiries to the city's risk management division. But tell me, do you think risk management is an appropriate stand in for a fire inspector? The fire chief for you. Hey, can I still call 911 if my house is on fire? Or do I need to go to risk through risk management? I've been told there really isn't a way to retract a tort claim notice. But if there is, I would be tempted. Not because I think the city would finally start giving me answers and everyone would start doing their jobs and requiring remediation of code violations, because every second counts, even in east Portland, but because none of that will happen. Just like it didn't happen before I filed that notice. The city will keep doing nothing for no stated reason at all, but at least I wouldn't have to hear the words pending litigation anymore. It's a slap in the face every time. I wish there was justice pending, but I can't afford justice. But here's the thing. Even if we were headed to court, I'm still a citizen of the city of Portland, and I have immediate safety concerns. There are code violations on this property and code violations on other properties that I have no affiliation with. The city can't just ignore that. You can't just ignore me. So here's my ask. Meet with me. Listen to me. Look at the evidence I have with an attorney present. Bring risk management. Bring whoever you want, I don't care, I have nothing to hide. I'm not afraid of this. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you very much.
Next up we have camille saunders.
Welcome.
My name is cami saunders and I'm a member of Portland contra las deportations. And revoke the ice permit. Pdx, I spoke to you seven months ago demanding the revocation of the permit for the ice facility, and that you take immediate action to protect Portland from federal overreach. I have been disappointed by your inaction since. And abdication of responsibility. As you know very well, ice has been terrorizing our communities and attacking protesters at heightened levels for over a year now. In November, I said we didn't have time to waste on bureaucratic processes. Our undocumented communities are in danger and severely impacted every single day. You allow ice to operate out of their home base at the mcadam facility here in Portland, the department of homeland security claims over 1200 people were detained in Portland during operation black rose in the months of October to December alone. The land use violation for the facility was issued in September of 2025. So in those months, we could have been in the process to revoke the permit and shut the facility down. It is now June, and not only did the city refuse to begin the revocation process every time you had the chance, but you have continued to use the Portland police as a weapon of repression against activists who dare to call on you to take action. You know, the people want the revocation of the conditional use permit for the mcadam ice facility. What you don't seem to know is the power you have to act. Your job as city councilors includes writing ordinances and city code and delegating their enforcement. City council, specifically Mitch Green had no problem pushing permitting and development forward when the cottonwood school next to the ice facility was forced to move, mayor keith wilson had no problem pushing the administrative review decision forward after we protested at his house demanding movement in the process. We don't need performative ordinances that do not address the root of the problem. What we need is for you to do everything you can to take real action, to stand up to trump and his masked thugs. The Portland city charter specifically grants this council authority to regulate land use, exclude nuisance business and even pass ordinances barring ice facilities. Use this authority. Clearly, the mcadam facility is a nuisance and a threat to the safety of the surrounding area. Ice operated out of two small administrative offices prior to the land use permit granted in 2011. Your stances that keeping the building open helps immigrants somehow is not only defeatist, it is dangerous. Glenwood springs, colorado city council revoked the permit for their ice facility after data showed the facility repeatedly held people longer than the permitted 12 hour limit, like they did here in Portland. It is possible kansas city, missouri, jackson county, missouri, seattle, Washington and el paso, texas city governments have banned ice facilities in their cities. So why in Portland, with so-called progressive councilors in office, are we not trying to do the same? Take immediate action, revoke the permit and shut down the facility. Shame on you for not doing your jobs while immigrants are in danger in our community.
Extending to ice.
Next up, we have samantha ibarra.
Hello, my name is samantha ibarra. I'm a first generation mexican American marine corps veteran and a new member to this community. It's been disheartening to move to Portland to find a city where so many people feel that their rights are under constant threat. What is even more troubling is how many people are afraid to show up and use their voice. When I exercise my first amendment rights, I should not have to worry about being brutalized by federal agents, law enforcement, or politically motivated extremists. Yet we fear that we. Yet that fear exists because many of us have witnessed this firsthand. Time and time again, I have watched people be assaulted, detained, or intimidated for simply expressing views that those in power did not like. Let's be honest, what's happening? We are told that these aggressive tactics are necessary to to protect public safety, yet the same explanations fall apart under scrutiny. The reality is that people are gathering to express outrage to an administration and the city government, whose response to these injustices has felt often inadequate, delayed or entirely absent. Many of you are quick to issue statements, appear in headlines and post videos. But my question is simple what are you actually doing to protect the people of Portland? What are you. What concrete actions are you taking beyond beyond public messaging and political optics? I was presented I was present at the ice facility on may day when officers forced author katherine esperanza to the ground and placed a knee on her neck, the same way that they killed george floyd. This was already when she had suffered a broken leg, so she had a boot on her leg already. But sorry. Because they had broken her leg months earlier. I still struggle to understand how the level of force used against protesters that day, or any other day is necessary, or it can be justified. So I ask you, when is enough enough? Are we going to wait until someone is killed until something meaningful, meaningful action happens? Because that's what we're trying to avoid. What's especially frustrating is the double standard that so many of us see. Right wing extremists have repeatedly harassed, assaulted, maced, and stolen from members of this community, often with little to no visible accountability. But I will say this many people in this city see a system that is far more comfortable scrutinizing marginalized voices than protecting them. As a veteran, I took an oath to support and defend the constitution, and that oath did not come with the exceptions for political convenience. The rights guaranteed by the constitution belong to all of us. The people standing in the streets demanding accountability are not the threat. The threat is the government that becomes comfortable ignoring the rights of the people it serves. The people of Portland deserve better. We deserve leaders who will do more than just acknowledge these concerns via social posts. We deserve leaders who will act.
I'm going to see if alex garcia has arrived. Okay. And then our alternate tonight is ivan vargas.
Folks, I'm going to remind folks we. Appreciation with some nonverbal things. Please. We have rules against clapping in the chambers. Thank you. Okay.
I apologize. My name is ivan vargas, by the way. I didn't have anything written since I wasn't on the list originally. But I will go off this city council. We demand you shut down the Portland ice facility. The clock has been ticking for over a year now regarding the revocation of the permit. While immigrants have been wrongfully and violently put in jail cells in this so-called sanctuary city, the people ice has taken away are responsible. While respected members of our community and people with families. Those people are our neighbors. The conditions of the facility are disgusting, especially when you take into account that isis is known to hold people for longer than 12 hours. There is no bedding, no access to showers, nowhere to use the restroom. For context, the longest time isis held someone in the facility is 52 days. We refuse to let city council and the mayor said passively by. While our neighbors are being terrorized by these fascist thugs, we say, revoke the permit and shut down the ice facility. Thanks.
One of the wall lot on the walls in there. Have you ever been in there?
One more outburst.
There we go. Now we're back. Okay. That concludes. Thank you. Item three is the presidential update. We're now going to hear an update from city administrator lee on the.
Over a year of inaction in the face of federal overreach and terror in our community.
That if there continues to be other disruption of this meeting, the person engaging in disruptive behavior will face ejection from the meeting.
Revoke the permit.
You're gonna have to listen sometime.
We will now hear an update from the city administrator, lee, on the status of the ongoing response to federal investigation interventions in the city. City administrator.
Thank you, council, president and council, we have two updates, one on the land use hearing and also on the detention facility impact fee as well. First, on the land use hearing. As you recall, the hearing officer held a two day hearing in may on the notice of the violation of the ice facility. The hearings officer, an office was prepared to issue a decision. In early June, the building owner filed a writ of review in the county circuit court and obtained a stay to stop the hearing officer from issuing a decision. The city objected to the stay and the city is challenging the stay, and in the county circuit court. Most immediately, we have a hearing on July 10th and the circuit court to try to get the writ dismissed and the stay lifted so the hearing officer can issue its decision if the writ is not dismissed on July 10th, then there will be a follow up hearing on August the 14th. After filing the initial writ of review. The building owner has since filed additional writs of review in circuit court. In. A hearing is set for August the 14th on these additional writs of review, the city will seek to have those additional writs dismissed as well. The city's goal remains to have the notice of violation resolved on the merits, and for the hearing officer to issue a decision as soon as possible as it pertains to the detention facility. Impact fee. Next Friday, June the 26th, we will be publishing a draft of the permanent administrative rule for the detention facility impact fee legislation for public review and comment. As a reminder, these rules address the ordinance that council adopted in December. We had a temporary rule in place since February the 27th. The temporary rule allows the city to take enforcement action relating to the use of chemical munitions at detention facilities, while a permanent rule is currently being developed, it establishes an enforcement framework, includes a citation process, fine schedule, service requirements and appeal procedures under city code. That temporary rule can only be in place for up to six months, and it is set to expire in late August. The city's process to adopt a permanent admin rule requires posting a draft for public comment for 30 days. So that's what we're we'll be kicking off on next Friday. Members of the public can review the draft rule online and provide comments once it's posted. The current temporary rule is also currently posted online. The comment period will run through July the 26th. After the comment period closes, staff will review the comments received and consider updates, with a deadline to finalize the permanent admin rule by August the 26th. Thank you.
Thank you, city administrator councilor Kanal.
Sameer Kanal: Thank you, council president. Thank you, city administrator lee, can you speak to what.
The people will be heard? I'm here to speak on the individual. To give a.
Product is disrupting the meeting. Please be seated and allow the to continue to meet. This is a warning that if there is continued or other disruption from this meeting, persons engaged in disruptive behavior will face ejection from the meeting. Councilor Kanal.
Sameer Kanal: Thank you. Can you speak to what the potential contents of the the hearings officer's report would be, and what the next steps would be, depending on what that is.
I will either lean on legal to kind of update that, or we may have staff that may be able to talk through the actual hearing officers ruling when it gets to that point.
Okay. Let me rephrase. If it's released and it is not in the favor of the landowner, or even if it is for that matter, would be appealed and that appeal would come to city council. Is that correct? Okay. I'm seeing no.
Yeah. Robert taylor, city attorney, the the decision of the hearings office will decide whether the the notice of violation that the city issued should be upheld or not. And and we want that decision from the hearings office. So we know what the the hearings officer has concluded. At that point, the building owner or the city, whoever. You don't like the result. We can appeal that to circuit court and and have that decided on the merits and the circuit court. The, the our goal here is to litigate this issue to. Conclusion on the merits from the hearings office to circuit court and wherever else we need to to get a final decision from the court on the merits of the violation. And once we have that and if it's in our favor, council can act on that in the land use proceeding. That is the goal of this. And we, as the administrator said, we are working very diligently and our goal is to get a decision on the merits through the judicial process as soon as we can, and we will continue to do that.
Thank you. Councilor Kanal. Councilor. Morillo.
Thank you, counselor. Our council president Dunphy so in very plain terms for the public, because I think a lot of the legal stuff and the writ and this and that, basically the city said, we think that maybe the macadam ice facility and the landlord in charge of that did something wrong. We are going to issue something against you about the things that you did wrong. Then he is saying, I did not do anything wrong. I'm going to continuously challenge that. We keep appealing it. And so that's the process that we're in right now as it's going through the court system. Correct?
That is correct.
Okay. And so the city, every step of the way thus far has been actually trying to appeal those decisions with the legal powers that we have.
That is correct.
Okay. And this is a question, perhaps for robert taylor. Could the city unilaterally initiate reconsideration right now?
Well, I think.
You missed your chance. Okay. Aye, Morillo.
I think the ultimate goal of the city and my judgment is to make a decision that we can defend and succeed on in court. And I think if we did, if we did, as you had suggested, just unilaterally take an action like that, I think we are going to have a difficult time defending it successfully. And I think that type of action might be counterproductive to the city's ultimate, ultimate decision here. So what we are trying to do is to go through the legal process to.
Time for that. And they have billions of dollars. Could that be the dalles myself?
Go ahead.
Thank you. Yo.
Thank you, robert, for your answer. I think. Yeah. Thank you for your answer. That makes sense to me. I think something that we need the community to continuously consider is the fact that laws are enforced through force or through the legal court system. And if the legal court system does not support our findings, then we don't have any standing and we do not have a standing military like the federal government does. So I think that's part of what we're honestly having to address here. But thank you for answering those questions.
Thank you, councilor Morillo councilor Pirtle-guiney.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney: Thank you, council president. Mr. City administrator, you read through a lot of dates and upcoming actions there. Is that something you can get to councilors in writing? We have a number of constituents who are interested in this as well, who don't watch council meetings. And I'd like to make sure that when I'm providing this information in community, I can do so accurately.
Most definitely. We'll get that to the full council.
Thank you very much. Thank you, council president.
Thank you. Keelan can we please move to item number four?
Would you like me to read the time certain items altogether?
Yeah. Let's go ahead and read all the time certain items together please.
Item four memorandum for adoption of the fy 2020 627 budget for the city of Portland. Document 2026 193. Item five document 2026-194. Certify that certain services are provided by the city to establish eligibility for state shared revenues. Item six document 2026-195 approve accepting funds from the state of Oregon under the state revenue sharing program for the fiscal year beginning July 1st, 2026 and ending June 30th, 2027. Item seven document 2026-196. Adopt the annual budget of the city and establish appropriations for the fiscal year beginning July 1st, 2026 and ending June 30th, 2027. Item eight. Fascist item eight document 2026-197 approve. Levying.
Common. Sensible is insane. That's. Roommate.
If there is continued disruption in the chambers, including cheering and applauding, I'm going to be. I will be clearing the chamber and moving those convening. So please go ahead and continue.
Thank you. Document 2026-197 approved levying taxes for the city for the fiscal year beginning July 1st, 2026 and ending June 30th, 2027. Item nine document 2026-198. Authorize a temporary interfund loan not to exceed $600,000 from the parks capital fund to the hydroelectric power operating fund to provide interim funding to avoid negative cash and fund balances at 2020 526, fiscal year end and item ten document 2026-199 adopt the supplemental budget for the fy 2020 526 over expenditure process and make budget adjustments in various funds.
Thank you. That was a lot of reading. Good job colleagues. Item four is the memorandum for adoption of the fiscal year 2020 627 budget for the city of Portland. This is the final step in the fiscal year 2627 budget. Last week, we closed the difficult session, and I feel the need to go back and reflect over the full scope of this year's budget process. We started with the thick part of this budget year. With the mayor's proposed budget, the mayor's budget sought to close a more than $160 million gap between the money we have and the current service level, and those gaps existed for two reasons. We had been funding services with one time money, which we didn't have anymore. That's about 105 million of the $160 million gap, the two big buckets. There were $68 million for Portland solutions, which is shelter and cleanup, and $35 million in public safety stretched between chat community safety programs, police and fire overtime. We're bringing in less tax money than needed for the services we fund with the ongoing dollars. That's about 55 million of the $160 million gap per cbo 25 million of that gap came from. Came to us directly from the united states president and congress via the one big, beautiful bill, which allowed corporations to write off more expenses, which in turn blew a huge hole in our business license tax. At the same time, the city's health insurance plans also got about 20% more expensive. Then there's a $9 million decrease in franchise fees and the losses in property taxes and hotel taxes we hear about so often. And finally, this council referred and voters approved a parks levy that we all knew would not pay for the current level of service at that bureau. Over the life of the levy, the mayor closed that gap with cuts across all across the city government. There were major cuts everywhere, first to materials but also to people. The big cuts to public safety programs and parks got a lot of attention, as did the loss of 69 jobs to the core realignment process. In total, 150 individuals were on the on the block to be laid off. And what the mayor didn't cut he by, he kept by drawing from reserves and taking money back from the county. This council filed about 95 budget amendments and notes to try and save those programs and those jobs and make other tweaks. Councilor Morillo led a huge cut to the council's security services and saved a lot of the community safety and parks programs. Councilor Koyama Lane drew from staff to restore the tree permitting program, and councilor Kanal drew from tax reserves to save a fire station. Many others contributed important fixes, with a range of profiles and sexiness and a lot of ideas died 6 to 6. Why exactly that happened is a topic of great debate and endless spin, and it should lead us to consider how this process can change in the future, to allow all of us to be more solution oriented, to separate the things we want to support from the things we can't live without losing. That is work for another day. Today, we are left with a budget mostly shaped by mayor wilson and oddly, by congressional republicans and donald trump. The mayor's proposed budget remains in significant part before us today, much discussed but largely untouched. This isn't the end of the conversation, of course. Layoffs are not effective until August 3rd. The. The tao is coming sooner than we think, and then elections. And if we're lucky, the rest of our human lives with people that we love in a city we're lucky to call home and continue to fight for. So there is no council action on this item, and the presentation is placed on file.
This is a disruption. Please eject the gentleman from the.
Bathroom.
This is a. Disruption asking you to please escort the gentleman from the chambers.
Keelan. We're now moving. You already read it. You don't need anything else from you now. We are now moving to item five. Colleagues, this resolution item five affirms that the city is eligible to receive shared tax revenue from the state of Oregon. It received testimony and debate last week and was carried over this week over to this week to vote on the budget. In one hearing, it requires seven affirmative votes to pass. Is there any discussion?
Council president, do you not do the presentation with it? Says ruth levine is doing a presentation. Is that not happening?
There's there's not a further presentation.
This is just your speech.
It was just my speech. That was all we had. And the documents that are posted online. Councilor Smith.
Loretta Smith: Thank you.
Thank you. Council president, I just wanted to acknowledge some of the comments that you had. There's always going to be six six until we have the ability to have the mayor to break a tie, or we have an uneven council, that is going to happen all the time. It has nothing to do with whether or not we want to agree with each other. We have an we have an even council. And so we need to do something about that. We need to change the rules to meet the charter. And until we do that, we're going to continue to do this on every single vote.
Thank you.
Council.
Okay. Is there any further discussion of item five specific to the city certifying that certain city services are provided by the city to establish eligibility for state shared revenues? Seeing no one in the queue. Keelan can we please call the roll on item five?
Kanal I.
Pirtle-guiney I.
Ryan I.
Koyama Lane I Morillo. I Novick. I Clark I Green. I Zimmerman.
I.
Lewis Smith. I Dunphy. I resolution is adopted with a vote of 12 ayes colleagues.
We're now moving to item six, which is the approving accept approve accepting funds from the state of Oregon under the state revenue sharing program for the fiscal year beginning July 1st, 2026, ending June 30th, 2027. This emergency ordinance accepts shared tax revenue from the state of Oregon. It received testimony and debate last week and was carried over to this week to vote on in the budget, when one hearing and will be effective upon immediately upon passage. It requires nine affirmative votes to pass. Is there any discussion of item six? Seeing none. Keelan can we please call a roll call on item six?
Kanal I.
I Ryan. I Koyama Lane I aye, Morillo. I Novick. I Clark. I Green. I Zimmerman.
I.
I Smith. I Dunphy. I the ordinance passes with a vote of 12 ayes.
We're moving to item seven, which is the adoption of the annual budget of the city and establishing appropriations for the fiscal year beginning July 1st, 2026 and ending June 30th, 2027 is a disruption.
Thank you. It's not a performing.
This is the second reading of the budget ordinance. Colleagues, this item right here is the fiscal year 2026 2027 adopted budget ordinance. It has received just under two months of this body's committed attention, most recently having received testimony, debate and amendments last week. This is the final vote on next year's budget. It requires seven affirmative votes to pass and must pass in this meeting to comply with our timeline under state law. As a reminder to my colleagues, I am recused from voting on this item or debating the underlying item due to a. My wife's employment with the bleach botanical garden. So given all that, I believe it's in the best interest of the body for us to pass this budget without a lot of fireworks today, certainly with comment, and I encourage my colleagues to get in the queue to comment on this one, but without much back and forth. And so to that, I'm asking that we limit ourselves to speaking only once to the underlying colleagues, to discussion. Councilor Green.
Mitch Green: Thank you, council president, before we get into this right here, I just.
Want to city council, it has been more than a year.
This is a disruption to go ahead and escort her.
The last time I was completely unnecessary, she.
Go ahead council Green.
Thank you. Before we get into the discussion, I'd just like to ask some clarifying questions and I might need either robert taylor or it might require our cfo to help us understand a little bit. But, you know, I had been working with councilor Pirtle-guiney to try to salvage, I think, some negotiations that didn't quite land last week. And yesterday we were told that an amendment, if an amendment would be brought tonight, it would result due to some noticing requirements in us failing to meet the the sort of deadline that we need to meet in order to publish our budget books and kind of close it out. And so, cfo biery, can you please come to the dais.
Carefully?
Thank you. So yeah, just just kind of walk us through that. I just want to make sure I understood that clearly. You know, we sort of stopped that effort because we said, look, there's no pathway here because if we were to adopt an amendment tonight, even if we found nine votes for it, it'd be impossible for the city to sort of reconcile that and move into the next fiscal year.
Yeah. Councilor, thank you for the question. And for the record. Jonas biery city chief financial officer this.
Pvb sweeping out isis right away. Acting like you're on. It.
If security could.
Also please pay attention to the folks who are continuing to clap and whoop.
Thank you. Oh, you poor thing. You're such a crybaby.
Please go ahead and escort folks out. Thank you.
So, councilor, there's two elements to your question. There's a legal element around the legal timeline to meet the state budgetary requirement. The deadline that you're describing, which is also reflective of the council adopted budget calendar. So I want to acknowledge that we did talk about this last year in the budget. We talked about this in December when council passed the budget calendar that we are currently following. That calendar set an intentional deadline with an intentional reason of June 17th is the drop dead date. The reason for that is because humans have to do the work to implement council's action. And in prior years, we've requested ten business days to ensure that that work is done, is done completely and done accurately so that city employees can get paid on July 1st, and we can continue to provide city services on July 1st. We've squished that to eight business days. So that is the limitation. We are putting extreme strain on the systems and people who do that work, continuing to expand and move. That discussion not only will prevent us from having an implementable budget on July 1st and incorporating those extremely high risk and dangerous scenarios, including exposure to potential labor complaints, potential vendor complaints, potential legal risks. So extremely, extremely dangerous and high risk behavior. It also, as we're shortening, that increases the possibility and likelihood of errors that we know from experience. This council does not respond favorably to. So I just want to be really explicit legally. Can you do it? Yes. From a functional, responsible perspective. Can you do it? No.
I appreciate that because that's that's what I heard from my colleague on the phone, kind of expressed that concern and that, you know, we were really working hard to land a plane to sort of close this loop and negotiate and compromise and do something for labor. And I think we both agreed on the phone that that this would be reckless if an amendment were to be brought tonight. So I just needed to hear that from you. And then I just. Mr. Taylor, just can you clarify what the sort of legal aspects are that are facing us tonight?
Yeah.
Thank you. Thanks.
Thank you, councilor, and thanks for letting me know. You might ask this question in advance. That's very helpful.
City council, it has been over a year of inaction.
This is a disruption.
Thank you for security. Go ahead and escort people out.
Thank you.
For what about those people that have been when I got shoved down and they busted. Yeah. Can you they've been doing.
This individual.
From the chamber.
Are you going to actually stand up here? And and do. Absolutely.
Council chamber rules that we do not allow applaud.
What are you going to do something.
City is welcome to escort some folks out.
So there's really to answer your question. There's really two legal issues. One is to, to meet the logistical constraints that we have. We plan to pass the budget today. And if we pass the budget today, that gives jonas and his team the ability to do what he needs to do to implement this by July 1st. If you make an amendment today to the budget, then to pass it today, you would also need to amend it to add an emergency clause and pass it as an emergency ordinance with nine votes, so that would be possible. The other legal issue is if you if that amendment changes appropriation and a fund by 10% or more, that triggers additional notice requirements under state budget law, we'd have to do that and we'd have to come back next week. And that would really compound and make impossible, really, the logistical challenges that mr. Beary has addressed. So those are the legal constraints and logistical constraints we're operating under.
Thank you. And just last question, if if because I've heard from some of my colleagues that they plan to vote no on this budget, we already know when one councilor has to recuse himself from from the budget. And so if we failed. So if we pass an amendment and we failed to then get the nine votes to to adopt an emergency clause on this, what would the legal consequences be?
Ran somebody over yesterday.
Well, if you if you amended the budget tonight, could not pass it as an emergency ordinance tonight because you couldn't have nine votes. You'd have to carry it over at least five days under the charter to vote on it on second reading. So you'd be pushing it in the next week, depending on the size of the change you make in the amendment, you may or may not have to abide by the additional notice requirements. So you'd force us to take action next week. And at that point, mr. Berry and his team don't have time to do what they need to do. So it's not a great result to to push this into next week, which is which is why the the calendar for this is built the way it is and contemplates the council passing the budget tonight.
Thank you, mr. Taylor. And I'll just note the council approval rating is about 24%.
Thank you, counselor Green. Counselor Smith.
Thank you. I just wanted to make sure that we were not saying things that were not legal, because we can do this, and if we want to amend it, we can amend it on the last day. That is a part of our charter and understanding that it's not going to be like 20, 20 or 25 amendments. If someone puts one amendment in, that's not going to cause a lot of work. And so for me, I think that when we get information from the administration, we should get it. We should get information that is very clear, not information to push us away. So we won't do something that you don't want us to do. Because if you can't add one amendment to this, to this budget tonight, and if we get nine, if we get nine votes, you should be able to do it. So my second question to you is, what if we don't get seven votes tonight, period, and we don't pass a budget, then what happens?
So on on this item, it's a it's well, if you don't amend it and and you just take it as it is right now, it's final passage of a nonemergency ordinance.
But what if we don't get seven votes.
The mayor because this is final passage of a nonemergency ordinance. Under the rules adopted by council, the mayor can break a tie on that.
No, I'm not talking about breaking a tie. I'm talking about what if we don't even get six votes and we get five votes tonight?
If if it looks like this item is going to fail, then what I would what I would recommend the council do is use the procedure to. Move for reconsideration. So somebody on the prevailing.
Take a recess. Is that what you're saying?
Well, you would you if this item fails, you need to follow the procedure to reconsider the vote to revive the council to revive the item.
Over a year. Thank you.
I you, keith wilson. You.
Colorado city council. Paying you to keep our facility open.
City attorney, could you please answer? Finish the answer, please.
Yeah. If if this item fails to to pass tonight, you're going to want to reconsider in in order to do that, you need to be on the prevailing side to make a motion to reconsider, which means you need to have voted no. So you need to pay attention to how you're voting. You may need somebody may need to change their vote so they vote no. If you vote no, you can move for reconsideration. I would strongly advise council to vote yes on the motion to reconsider. That would revive the item. So it's at least still alive and before the body. And then you may want to take a recess and we can talk through what is possible at that point.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you, councilor Smith. Colleagues, is there further discussion of this item?
Oh.
This is the yeah. If folks want to make comments on the vote on the budget, this is a good time to do it. Councilor. Pirtle-guiney.
If no one else is going to get in the queue, colleagues have a few things to say, but I need to counter a false narrative first that we've heard a few times through this process. When we asked you, portlanders, to pass the parks levy, we told you it would maintain the current level of service in some very Portland.
This is a disruption. Thank you. Security, please escort this gentleman out.
Portlanders. We said that that levy would maintain current service level in parks in some very key and specific areas. We meant that many of us very specifically asked the mayor to make sure that any budget he brought forward maintained those areas within the parks. Budget. Parks also has general fund that mixes with levy funds and some other funding streams, including user fees, in their budget. And as we have had to cut general fund, there have been some cuts in parks. But to continue to say, as multiple people have, that we put forward a levy that wouldn't fund current service level or that we are cutting things that we said we would fund in. The levy is false and it will not help us restore portlanders trust. We need to represent where we were at and be clear about why we are making the decisions we are in other parts of the parks budget. I also want to note that there are many councilors who brought and passed critical amendments to this budget, not just those who are named previously, but colleagues. What I really want to say is this is not a great budget. It's not. We knew it would not be. We knew that a budget with the level of cuts that we thought we would be making in a city with the needs that we have, and frankly, with the population, with the inspirational, brilliant ideas that portlanders have about ways we could be doing more and doing better by our community if resources allowed, there was no way this could have been a great budget, but this is not even a good budget. We have left so much on the table. Our city administrator. With all due respect, mr. City administrator, I know the work your team does is critical, but your team is doubling at a time when we are cutting frontline services. I think most portlanders would find that unacceptable, but we did not even discuss that, despite the fact that many of us brought forward proposals to change that. We all agreed on some positions that needed to be saved. Our international program, fire rescue's ps three, that I think the vast majority of people up here talked about, but we couldn't come together to get there and close that deal. We gave up opportunities to respectfully debate big issues and the trade offs that they presented to us. I am disappointed in that, and I hope that portlanders expect enough of us that they are too. So, colleagues, this is not a good budget. I want to be clear, our city is too important to me, and because of that, I won't risk this budget failing. I won't risk our staff not knowing what July 1st holds for their employment or their paychecks. I won't risk portlanders not knowing what July 1st holds for summer camps that their kids are enrolled in, or public safety in their communities. So sure, I will vote yes today, mr. President. I will vote yes today. But I want to be so clear that this is not a good budget. There is work that was left on the table. There is work to do to support portlanders and to respect our city employees. Thank you, mr. City administrator, for picking up on the ask. Some of us had to make sure our city employees aren't looking at losing their health care in two weeks. I appreciate you doing that. When we could not. I hope, colleagues, that we can do better in future years. Thank you, mr. President.
Thank you. Councilor pirtle-guiney vice president Clark.
Thank you, council president, I don't really have a speech prepared.
Zoning code. Detention facilities must adhere to state.
This is a disruption of security. Can please escort this person out of the building.
Thank you.
And security, if you could also please take care of the people up front here who are continuing to disrupt the meeting.
Thank you. Thank you. Security, please escort the folks.
Out of the room. This is a disruption. And the folks who are standing in the back of the room, can you please, please be removed from the from the chambers security, if you could please remove the individuals who are standing in the back of the chambers. Thank you. Go ahead and please remove the people in the back of the room. They're causing a disruption. Thank you. Security.
Shame on you. People. Listen to your people. Go back. Let's go.
Watch your neighbors allow.
You to.
Vote to permit. Pirtle-guiney. Vote for bernie. I.
Vice president Clark.
Thank you, council president. I got to get my blood pressure to go down here a little bit.
My blood pressure.
This is a disruption. Thank you. Please escort this person out of the chambers. Councilor security. Please go ahead and escort the person standing out of the chambers.
And parking stolen land and.
Vice president Clark.
Are you sure it's safe for me to speak? Probably not. Probably not. Okay. Deep cleansing breath. Get that blood pressure down. Okay. So I'll. Oh.
All right.
Thank you. I'm going to ice. Thank you.
Thank you. Security.
They're running over our contest. What are you guys doing to protect us? We deserve our customers to protect them.
Thank you.
I don't want to hear the people don't want to hear the people. Progressive councilors. Hey. What's funny? But that's so funny, right? That's so funny. Democratic socialist.
That's okay. Okay, I'll try one more time.
Try one more time.
Deep cleansing breath, people. I want to just say that I really appreciate the comments of councilor Pirtle-guiney. I agree with many of them. I also appreciated the comments of councilor Avalos last week when she mentioned that we might be arguing over the sources of money as opposed to the substance, and I think we're actually much closer as a group than we are apart. So I agree with those comments. But this is a very difficult vote because I'm not really happy about the budget. Clearly, I'm not happy about the cuts that we're approving potentially losing vital employees. We're cutting public safety. I think that's really inappropriate, that we're going to be less safe. We're going to create longer 911 response times. And at the same time, we've been asking our public safety department to do more and more to, to, to implement ordinances that we pass, that they may not have the resources to do so. While ultimately, while I'm really unhappy with this budget, I'm not going to give up. I am not going to give up and find other ways to restore the cuts to public safety, to police training and support and fire rescue. I think we've made multiple attempts to do that, and we've failed 6 to 6, as people have pointed out. But I am undaunted in working to restore those cuts. I will very reluctantly be voting for this budget tonight, but I will say I am not giving up.
Thank you, vice president Clark councilor Morillo.
Angelita Morillo: Thank you, president Dunphy, I, I feel like we don't get a chance to say good things to one another. And I want to thank you for your process this year for a few reasons, because you have a really hard job and everyone's always mad at you. And you're the council president, as everybody knows. And we had a very a much more comprehensive process. We worked on this. We had nine work sessions to discuss the budget in depth, the entire council, it wasn't broken up by committee. So everyone had the same information. Each of those work sessions was three hours. So we had 32 hours of deliberation for the approved budget, and then seven hours of deliberation for the adopted plus six hours of testimony on the approved. And that means that we had about 72 hours total on the budget, 75 if you count some of what's happening tonight, that is more process, and that is more information sharing than we had last year. And I think it was much more comprehensive when we brought amendments forward this time around, because we had time to look at everyone's amendments and sort of grapple with what was coming forward. So I want to say thank you for that, because I don't think you've gotten a lot of public thanks for that. And you do deserve it because it's a hard job. I, I also want to say, you know, when we're talking about parks and what's happening in the budget, there are a lot of different areas that are being cut. The parks board did share a letter with the council that flagged issues with the mayor's proposed budget. With regards to the levy, the proposed budget. This is a quote from their their letter. The proposed budget calls for 14.3 million reduction to parks and recreation funding from the general fund. This is a cut on top of the additional 7 million in the core services realignment measures that are understood to have a negative impact on parks and recreation. The board believes that such cuts would immediately and unacceptably reduce parks and recreation service levels, and would break any trust between the city's government and the city's residents. That was established with the passage of the parks levy. While there are certainly, I think, technical aspects to the levy, I don't think that when I talk to my constituents that they understood the way that those technicalities were framed, because when I speak with people, regular people, they think that the parks levy fully funded maintaining services as is. Nobody understood the nuance that it was not. So to me, I don't think that's because our constituents are foolish or don't understand it. I think it's because we poorly advertised and explained it, and it's our duty to make sure that we're the ones properly explaining it. I also want to talk about what compromise means on this council, because I'm kind of glad that we're starting to have the discussion about the fact that there are actually two blocks here. The word compromise doesn't mean that everyone eventually agrees to your position. It means that we are all trying and negotiating with one another based on the things that are important to us. The progressives on council brought roughly six different funding sources for the fire and rescue's. Over two days, every single one died on a party line of 6 to 6. You don't get to bring six offers and be called the inflexible one. We move to negotiate, and
And that was voted down when councilor Green moved to recess. Specifically get to get to a yes on other people's package. The pirtle-guiney Novick for one, that motion motion failed three 8 to 1 with one person, I think, being absent. And they voted against taking the time to reach an agreement on their own amendment. Councilor smith's recess to renegotiate a combined package failed 2 to 10. We asked to talk and that was adjourned. So we cross over to pass things, and that is the actual test we voted for Zimmerman seven. I thought that was a good one. We built a Koyama Lane nine with Eric Zimmerman. It passed 11 to 1. Crossing the aisle to pass something is collaboration and voting no on every single funding source for fire and rescues is not what actually dies on a tie. On our side is a 6 to 6 that kills fire and rescues a 911 call taker. Union jobs. Everyone with a real name, a named funding source. On the other side, the thing that they killed repeatedly is one thing protecting the police accountability fund that 82% of voters approved. That's the real divide restorations versus a voter mandate that they want to raid. The fiscal responsibility line does not survive. Contact the cfo has admitted under questioning. I'll wait till they're removed.
The permit. Revoked the permit.
Councilor aye, Morillo.
Thank you. The fiscal responsibility line does not survive because the cfo has admitted under questioning that there's no model tying any of these amendments to credit rating risk. It's a vibes based argument. The mayor's own budget draws down 44 million in reserves. We are lectured that $6 million for frying rescues is reckless by people who are comfortable with 75 million plus of climate funds on an arena. The door is still open for anyone who wants to negotiate or anyone who will pick up the phone or come in person to a meeting. Gam two the package that saved every single affected job and core service was left on the table. We worked overnight on a compromise, were ghosted by the morning, and if anyone is actually serious about a compromise, it can still land at the June 17th second reading, and we're going to be there for that. We keep hearing that compromise means working together. And I agree. So count the offers, count the crossover votes count who moved to recess and to negotiate and count on who voted no and record the answers to those questions. And please give me that breakdown when you have it. I would love to see it all laid out. I don't think that this budget is good enough. I think that we have sacrificed the workers that do everything for our city. I think we have sacrificed a lot of core services. I think that we have not bought ourselves the time. We have not bought ourselves the time to save these employees, many of whom are immigrants.
All of y'all can do. And you're being complicit. Help us.
We have not taken the time to save the core workers who do our core services. When we could have bought this, we could have bought ourselves time to do this the right way. It didn't actually have to go this way, because I believe that we have to be responsible with the budget. I will, of course, be voting yes. I think it would be, frankly, embarrassing for this council to not be able to pass a budget without having the state intervene, but it is honestly sort of devastating that we can't get our colleagues in the room when we are repeatedly offering that in order to work together. And I'm sorry.
Thank you. Councilor Morillo councilor Novick.
Angelita Morillo: The last time we were here, he was in a chokehold. And then, Loretta.
This is a disruption. Can you please go ahead and remove this person from the chambers?
Thank you. Threatened to shoot us with a gun. Isn't that interesting? You care more about us than ice. What we're going to see suppresses protesters. You are. You are collaborating. A fascist takeover. Yes. Can't do anything. Can't do anything. Come on, all of you.
Councilor Novick.
Steve Novick: I was not planning to say anything, but councilor Morillo has repeated that there were negotiations going on and she was ghosted. And that is simply not true. I my while we were on the dais last week, my chief of staff was discussing with the staffers for your side details of a possible agreement. And then you guys walked away. And because and when I questioned when I raised that with you last week, you said, well.
With Elana, not you.
Well, I was I was hearing from Elana all the time and our staff was continuing to talk that morning. So apparently.
Councilor Morillo.
Angelita Morillo: Councilor. Morillo. This is my time.
Thank you.
So the the, the, your idea that you bent over backwards to forge an agreement is false. And you're stating that we were the ones that walked away is false. Sometimes you just can't reach agreement. For example, one of the reasons we couldn't reach agreement was that one of your bottom lines is no money for police training, because for some reason you think that poorly trained police is a is a public safety priority. We couldn't reach agreement. It's not that some of us didn't try.
You. Councilor Novick. Councilor Zimmerman.
Eric Zimmerman: It's a weird day to weigh in on something. I walked into this budget well aware of the budget cuts that we were facing, and my line that I was trying to adhere to was the the front line service, right? If you mow the grass, if you respond to the call, if you're the carpenter, you make sure that the play structure is safe for kids to, to play on and slide down. You know, those those front line services. And I think that in large part, a lot of that was protected here. And there's a lot to be left that is not it's not okay. This budget should not have been crafted with as much public safety cuts in it as far as we've come in the last few years. And that's really troubling. And the last two council presidents ruling that the mayor doesn't have a tiebreaking vote has really hamstrung this council. And I think that was the wrong call. But I think that, you know, we we live to fight another day. I don't think that any mayor in the future should craft a budget this way, because we cannot build it back without without the vote. But overall, I think I generally feel like we stuck to that line of front line service. But that also means there are plenty of city workers who are uncomfortable or mad or or outright angry with my position on that because I've said time and time again that the multiple layers of coordinators and analysts are not the area that in a budget like this that I was really looking to fight really into the late hours for. And I and I recognize that, but I was willing to look at a park worker at a ps three. I was willing to look at people who teach your kids how to swim. That. That's where my. That's the kind of basic frontline service that I described with district four. As we entered into this. And I think that. I think that at the end of the day, when Portland calls 911 on July 1st, they're not going to get a a slower response time on July 1st than they would have today. And I care about that. Pools, pools are going to be open. Kids are going to get to swim. That part. That part matters. And I think that this is a very frustrating process. I have not enjoyed it. I appreciate the councilor Morillo gave some praise, but I think this has been a rough process. I think we ended it early hours in the afternoon for kind of erroneous reasons, and we could have gotten there, so didn't go great, but I want to just end it here. Mister mayor, mister administrator, I don't know that there is another city in Oregon who has as lacking of a transparent budget as the city of Portland. I cannot make well-informed decisions in this process. With this budget moving forward. I have worked in four governments. As a senior official, I should have a fairly good grasp of the funding to programs, the employees to programs, and how that fits on an org chart, to programs, to people, to processes. And I think that part of this at times explosive, but just this undercurrent that is kind of we feel today has a lot to do with of all the councils across the state of Oregon, I think we had the least amount of information because by providing an abundance of information that's not usable doesn't make it actually a more informed process. And so I'm asking for basics next year, really. Basics. Please. God, look at Multnomah county. I can look at the health department who has multiple divisions and multiple sub offices of those divisions. And within a flip of a page, generally get within the 90% mark of. This is a grant funded program. It has five employees to it. It also has some general fund. That's another five employees. That's called the east county clinic, or that's called the downtown mothers and infants clinic or what have you. We don't have that granularity to get here. And so for decision making purposes, when a person brings an amendment that says four fte to not be able to raise that against the relativity for the whole program and how it's all fits together makes it an impossible task. And so I am begging you, I am asking you, there are resources across the river. There are resources across the state. It doesn't have to be this hard. And these budget documents, frankly, were not adequate. We're not adequate. And. I've done it a lot. This is my first time. It's not my first time. I've done this a lot. And, and I, I can agree with my colleagues. I think sometimes maybe this point gets a little glossed over because it comes from some of the newer colleagues, but I am doubling down on it. They are right, I am right. We need your help to do it. And if if we don't get it, the forcing function is a blunt instrument. The forcing function is 6 to 6 constantly. The forcing function is a bunch of work sessions that frankly were just about cuts. Nobody came and presented about what they were going to go achieve next year. We need your help in that. The story of this year didn't have to be about cuts. The story of this year could have been, yes, we are dealing with cuts, but here's also what we're going to deliver. There's only one section that was able to talk about that, and that was in the mayor's sheltering plan. And the reason I think that is, is because you have deep ownership over that. Mr. Mayor, I would encourage you, in the city administrators and the deputy. Department and the deputy city administrators to please have that type of deep ownership over what you're going to deliver next year's budget presentations, because the moms, the dads, the brothers, the sisters, the senior, they want to hear about what we are going to continue to fund. The cut doesn't have to be 99% of the conversation. So this is a challenging, challenging budget. It was not helped by a challenging process and challenging documents. And so it's been compounding. But for portlanders, again, when you call 911 on July 1st, we're going to answer. We're going to respond. We're going to give you help when you sign your kids up for lessons or camps, or you go to the park, it's going to be mowed and cleaned up. The things that bothered you a few years ago are becoming fewer and fewer. And I think that that is a good thing. So let's not lose sight of that, which can be a good thing.
And that's your legacy. Change it or not.
And with that, thank you, mr. President. That's the concludes my remarks.
Thank you very much. Councilor Zimmerman. Councilor Koyama Lane.
Tiffany Koyama Lane: Thank you, council president, and thank you, councilor Zimmerman, for being really specific about some things that we need to see in upcoming budgets. And I want to note, I don't know if you saw, but there were a lot of people nodding along with what you were saying. And I also want to say that to the media because it is maybe more fun or interesting to focus on when we are locked in six six. But there also are quite a few times when we agree, oftentimes unanimously on things too. So maybe we can talk about that a little bit too. I also want to thank council president, council vice president for this process for all the work that's gone into it. I also want to thank your staff. I know that they have done a ton of work in building timelines and giving us updates, and making sure that we all have the right things in our inboxes. So props to the staff that don't get as much recognition as they should. I think budget season people had said this is like the worst part of the year and we're almost done. We're so close. I also want to thank councilor Pirtle-guiney because you put a lot into it last year, and I don't think I understood as much until we got to this year. And I kind of am like, I don't even know how you did. I think you just like, I don't think I would have known how to like, pull it out of nowhere because you had gone through budget processes, seen other people do it. But I believe and I think council president would agree that he added on to a lot of what you had started. So I'd like to acknowledge that. I'm I'm bummed that we didn't we weren't able to come with some amendments that were compromises to save more jobs. And I'm I'm holding on hope, holding on to hope that there will be some work in the coming weeks. And I'm going to push for that. And if needed, be part of that. I do hope that a place we start is like, it's really simple. I feel like I've said it a lot, like, let's just draw a venn diagram and like, see where we overlap in the middle and let's start there. And what are your non-negotiables? And let's just try to see where we can overlap. And I know there's like a lot of back and forth and who was available and blah, blah, blah. And honestly, like, I don't really care. Like I just, I just want us to, to get to a good place. And I also do feel the need to say, because I know that we're all going to be allowed to just talk once. So I don't think councilor Pirtle-guiney is going to get a chance to talk. I don't.
Have one more.
Okay, well, I kind of already teed it up. So I just want to say. More than any other elected up here. I have a special connection to you because we're moms that go home to little kids. And I know that that comes with different challenges. And whatever happened with the text messages and who was dodged, I, I know that and believe that you were taking your kid to the dentist that morning and you have had my back when I've actually was it just last week when I wasn't going to go to a procedure for my own kid? And you encouraged me to remember that I'm also a mom. Okay, so I, I just want to acknowledge that and whatever happened, I believe that and I support you putting your your kids first in that way. This job is so weird. And there's, I've, I'm processing a lot. Like I think being out a year and a half, I have realized there's like always a group mad at you. And that's kind of how it's supposed to be. I think if you're doing it right, there are people that are mad at you. But I did want to tell us this. I've shown this to council vice president many times. I want to show you guys a postcard that was sent to my office, that is to all of council. And there's some beautiful art of the pacific northwest. On one side. It says, once we begin to act, hope is everything. And it's from a fourth grader in my district who wrote this to all of council. So I want everyone to hear this. There's a peace sign and it says two city council from you, rufus, you da best council ever. So I just want us to remember that like, there are kids like rufus that are watching us and are rooting for us. And this is hard, but it's worth it. And I'll leave it there.
Thank you, councilor Koyama Lane, councilor Green.
Mitch Green: Thank you, council president, I'm going to keep this brief. I actually wasn't going to say anything to the sort of substantive part of the budget, but I, I, I don't know if I'm going to be sitting next to councilor Zimmerman next year. You know, you may get bounced. I may get bounced. We're up for reelection, but I you're spot on. And everything that you said about the process, I know that city administrator is hearing that. I know the mayor's hearing that. I know that our our our finance staff have heard that every step of the way. It's important for the public to hear that, too. So thanks for making those points. That's an area of great unity. I think, you know, I think for my own amendments could have been easier to make the case. Perhaps if it was easier to go through a budget that was much more transparent and I could communicate more easily about, you know, we're chopping from the what chopping from the top might look like, for instance. That's that's one piece of the puzzle. But I just wanted to reinforce that. I think it's an important point to make. I think we all were nodding along. And, you know, I agree this is not a great budget. We're dealing with terrible conditions and we need to get serious about raising the revenue from the large corporations who do business in the city of Portland, so we can actually afford the core services of our city. And I'll leave it at that.
Thank you, councilor Green. Councilor Ryan.
Dan Ryan: Thank you. Thank you so much. Council president and council vice president. I agree that although the content was rough, I thought the way you managed the meetings was actually really helpful. I liked that you stuck to time boundaries, and I think it forced us to be more on point. And anyways, and I think the two of you did a good job as a team. So I just want to lift both of you. I don't know if anyone's mentioned jonas and ruth, but your you, the two of you and your offices, you put in so many extra hours, you're called up to answer complex questions on the fly, and you always show up and you do it. And so a lot of gratitude to both of you and your staffs. You know what? I just want to start by saying happy pride, happy pride, everyone. It's June, it's actually June 17th. I'm an old gay at this moment, and I've been celebrating pride longer than any of you. Well, I don't know, Olivia. You're probably out there with your allies, weren't you? You were an ally. But I just think it's really important that I name that. I was real active. That's what got me involved in politics as a gay activist in my 20s. I was in my 20s once, and I really I've I've seen pride evolve where it was only a protest. And especially for me, who's lived with hiv for over 40 years, it was a it was fighting for our lives. And it's so awesome today that there's allies everywhere. And it's truly a celebration. So I know we celebrate it in July, but June is pride month. And so I just wanted to acknowledge that with everyone on this dais, I also want to acknowledge something else that's bigger picture. For nearly six years, I've been able to represent Portland in this role. And for 18 months I was the parks commissioner, and I really made a big focus on the beautification, renovation, renovation of the downtown parks and plazas. And I got a lot of pushback on that. But it was about the big picture strategy because as you know, I always say the city is like a body. The heart is downtown, and you better hope that there's a lot of activation and it pumps resources out to district one, out to delta park in the far reaches of st. Johns and district two. And if our downtown doesn't come back, I don't know how we're going to come back as a city. That's my way of saying, I hope you can come celebrate. There's a ribbon cutting tomorrow at darcel plaza and there'll be a big, big, fun celebration next Thursday night, complete with basically a darcel show out outdoors. So it's something I. I pushed hard on a lot of pushback to get it to where it was, and I'm just delighted that tomorrow will be cutting a ribbon. Okay, now I have to get focused on the budget. Sorry, allowing me to go off a little bit, maybe providing some levity. And I needed to do that for my own self. You know? Yeah. We're split. That's just a fact. Six councilors are consistently loyal to one another. I actually kind of envy it. We're learning how to do that a little bit more. We're learning how to as independent as we are, we're learning how to come together and do strategy ourselves. Thanks for smiling. And you know, I know that that's just part of moving Portland forward. And I don't I don't I'm not upset that the other side is doing that. And congratulations. But it's just the reality of where we are right now. So let's just name it. And I'll join the chorus of hoping someday that there'll be a ruling that allows the mayor to break that tie. Because I haven't met one person that looked at the voters pamphlet that sees it any other way. For this council finding ways to improve the mayor's proposed budget was really limited. It was very limited. It was to additional staffing cuts, tapping into a variety of funds and reprioritizing the mayor's proposal, like many portlanders who have reached out, I've struggled with these trade offs. I've seen each and every one of you struggle with the trade offs. And this council's biggest vote of the year. So please allow me to explain my vote. I'll start with the mayor's proposed budget. I thought it was a reasonable and focused on improving the humanitarian crisis on our streets. I know at least six people don't agree with me on that, but thank you, mayor, for understanding the connection between economic recovery and providing services to those on our streets. I believe the mayor's budget was shortsighted on public safety. Make no mistake, cuts to training budgets are cuts to police reform. Cuts to ps three are cuts to property crime services. We are second worst in the nation after memphis. Let me repeat from earlier in the budget deliberations, the only bureau that has experienced a net loss in staff from the city of Portland over the past ten years is. Police. Lastly, the budget was out of touch with portlanders. Affordability challenges. Fee and rate increases are well above inflation rates. We can't keep adding higher cost for those living on fixed incomes, like working class families and seniors. Overall, mayor, I'll give you a b-minus or c-plus. I doubt if they even give c's anymore. Today I must decide on if I will support and adopt a budget that now includes 29 amendments and notes. And boy, have I been reflecting. And it's clear to me our amendments and notes actually made the mayor's budget worse. If the amendment. Councilor clarke, myself and others had passed to spend 8 to 10 million of unused money collecting dust, in my opinion, over the next year to bring back the public safety system to include police and fire, I would have been a clear yes today. It was simple, legal and fiscally responsible. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. Instead, we're going to backpedal. We're going to backpedal on emergency response times. We're going to backpedal. On police reform due to less training. We're going to backpedal on helping with property crime and fire rescues. The city of Portland, oklahoma county are sending a clear message to our residents and their current electeds that their current electeds do not prioritize their public safety. With these continued cuts, the comparison of our county's public safety budget with neighboring counties is darn right embarrassing. We also continued a bad habit of draining accounts and watching reserves and contingencies dip too low. Our city's financial professionals tried to educate us, and the majority of this council dismissed their sage cautionary tales. It often felt like we suspended reality. We simply can't preserve every city program. While a resources decline and our fixed costs continue to rise. You know what? I always have hope. I wouldn't be alive if I didn't have hope. And it happened on the Willamette river in a dragon boat on that boat. I was on one team with three members of this council, and they all happened to be members of the peacock caucus. We did our best to sync up for the best interests of everyone on the boat. Ideology didn't matter. We were one team paddling forward together and damn you, mayor, for winning. We'll get you next year. This independent public servant right now is really struggling. I hear everything you're all saying. I really have been listening a lot, especially this year. I listened a lot more than I than I spoke, and I hope the majority can come together with shared goals that we can all accept. But I hate to say it, this budget is out of touch with the majority of portlanders, and I'm leaning. No.
Thank you. Councilor Ryan councilor Pirtle-guiney.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney: Thank you, council president, for letting me back in the queue. And thank you, councilor Koyama Lane and councilor Novick for taking me at my word, recognizing the work that was done and standing up for a colleague. Portlanders have already heard me have to refute the claim that I ghosted my colleagues in negotiations to try to preserve jobs and services in this budget. And I don't want to belabor. I don't want to belabor the point and waste time on interpersonal conflict at this dais, but I cannot continue to have people tell lies about my work and my motives and not say something. So I want to be very clear, at no point last week, I believe that was Thursday did I stop trying to find a compromise. At no point did I ask my team to do anything other than whatever it took to find that compromise. At no point did my team walk away from the table. At no point did I ghost anybody. Thank you, council president.
Thank you, councilor Pirtle-guiney councilor Kanal.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney: Thank you, council president. Thank you as well to ruth and owen. Mayor wheeler, sorry. Now I'm typing it. I really strongly apologize for.
Oh my my my.
Can we as.
Well to.
Mayor for this moment of gratitude.
We just got to sit with that for a minute.
I moment of levity.
To mayor wilson, to the city administrator lee, to everyone else involved in the process. This, obviously everybody said, is a brutal budget year. I think it often gets forgotten that there are real impacts on real people. Beyond the numbers on a page to city employees, of course, and to portlanders writ large. I'm disappointed in the budget. On the whole, I'm aware we're working within several constraints, most notably the overall budget situation, which the mayor worked within to propose a budget and certainly political constraints as well. I have several process comments, some about improvements since last year and some about steps backwards since last year, some about the council part of the process, and frankly, more about the pre-council part of this process. I'll save all but one of those for the committee of the whole budget debrief next week, but I will say one, I agree completely with councilor Zimmerman's statement that I cannot make well-informed decisions in this process. With this budget moving forward, this has to be better next year to the content. This budget does not fund everything I'd hoped for. It does many things I'm proud of, and I want to talk about those. But first and foremost, protecting the will of the voters by ensuring that every single dollar of climate justice and police accountability funding goes towards climate justice and police accountability. As a member and former co-chair of the community and public safety committee, I also want to set the record straight with regard to public safety funding, not so much for the folks up here, but for a media that I think has often run out of tired narrative instead of looking at the facts. First of all, council did not cut public safety budgets. The mayor's proposed budget cut public safety budgets, and this council worked very hard to restore many of those cuts. Not a single council amendment cut from public safety, other than cutting our own security budgets. Secondly, and portlanders, I want you to hear this. It was progressive councilors who successfully restored many of the mayor's public safety cuts. And obviously, those restorations required a crossover vote or two. And I'm incredibly grateful to everyone who did that specifically for Kanal two and eight. And two of those people are, yes, I'm getting to you. I'm calling. I'm I got your name in here. Don't worry about it. We restored funding to the office of violence prevention ceasefire in Portland street response. We gave chat ongoing funding for the first time in the history of the program with Kanal two, with the vote of council, Loretta Smith. We restored funding for the st. Johns fire engine. And I will say you're right, two councilors who have said that we cannot afford to drain all the funds because there are negative consequences associated with draining reserves, including new reserves that don't exist yet. And I am mindful that there are risks associated with that. And those risks are less are less than living in saint john's and not knowing if you are going to get a fire response, because the station does not have a fire engine with water in it, because the next station over in portsmouth is busy responding over in where station eight is, because they lost their engine and now we don't have anybody near us unless they're coming from hayden island or coming from across the saint john's bridge. It's not enough for the people of linnton to be told, well, we needed money for a reserve so we could not fund a saint john's fire engine. And for the people of saint john's specifically, but linnton as well. I don't think that it rings true to them that having a new blt business license tax stabilization reserve is more important than the seconds it takes for someone to get there faster or not faster. Based on our decision not to fund that particular fire engine. And so I'm very grateful to all seven folks who voted for Kanal two and restored that. I'm also grateful for those who restored the 911 call taker this second round of the budget with Kanal eight, because when we start with response times, our first first responder, the first person you talk to is the person on the other end of the call when you call 911. And so I'm very grateful that we managed to save one of the three cuts there. It wasn't enough. We saved six PPB jobs. You heard that correctly. Progressive councilors successfully added money back to the Portland police bureau to save the administration administrative positions of the desk clerks. And we did all of that without defunding police accountability, which, for the record, is also a critical component of public safety. Do we want to do more? Absolutely. There were amendments proposed many amendments to fund fire rescue's public safety support specialists and victim services jobs. At PPB, we tried to fund the fire rescue colleagues in so many ways. We tried in Green one to use one time general fund contingency to fund restoration of a unit. We tried in Kanal five b to use opioid dollars currently allocated to Portland solutions, which the administration responded to, saying that those dollars would be taken from bybee lakes and grand recovery. We tried in Green Avalos Morillo one to use PCEF interest from 2025 2026, the current fiscal year we tried in Kanal Koyama Lane ten a to use some of the money for expanding the north Portland temporary alternative shelter site to nearly double, instead of more than double capacity there to restore one unit. We tried in Kanal Koyama Lane ten b and ten c to use money from the impact reduction program used for campsite removals for sweeps to restore two rescue units, and it was split in half so that you could vote for either just half of that or the whole thing. All of that failed five, six, six. That's five different sources of funding, all with the same six on either side. I should note there were other amendments which failed to restore the rescues. They fall into two categories. First, the ones which use an inefficient funding source by cutting general fund overhead spending to add general fund discretionary spending, which basically means you have to cut a dollar to spend $0.43 when there are other more efficient ways to use that, and they have value where they are. I couldn't support it, but I don't think that was an immoral proposal or anything like that. But there were amendments which aim to defund the new police accountability system, right? As it's starting to get stood up. And I do need to correct the record on that, because that is against the will of the voters. And I'm grateful that five of my colleagues stood with not only me, but with the thousands of people in particular, those from marginalized communities who that new system will serve. And when they come back, not if but when they come back for the police accountability funds, when they could easily cut the phrase from the o, c, p a from the amendment and address our concerns when they come back to defund it again, we will all know that it was never about where the money was going, but always about defunding the police accountability system and cutting its legs out from under it. And if you didn't know that before, you heard it from my colleague just a few minutes ago when he said he'd vote yes on the budget, if and only if we defunded police accountability, clip it. Now. That doesn't mean we shouldn't fund those public safety needs. We should, and I will keep working on responding to concerns from portlanders, including the parks board, that we must uphold the parks levee's promise. I will keep working to respond to concerns from portlanders, including the naacp, that we must ensure unarmed responders remain a core public safety service, in addition to the completely unaffected armed response at PPB, there was money available for PPB in 311, which was offered up as a compromise, and it was turned down. I'm okay with a no. Let's also say here's another option in the future. I hope I'll keep working. I'll keep working on preserving our ability to work with the world outside of national borders, for our economy and our culture, both on ending the violence associated with sweeps on, ensuring that we stop spending police overtime dollars on protest response instead of combating human trafficking and street racing and all the other stuff which that came from their list of priorities at PPB. And I'll keep working to try to preserve city jobs, union jobs, and make our org chart look more like a pyramid and less like a pillar. And to those union employees who are going to be laid off here, I am sorry that we did not do better. Colleagues, we all need to do better by looking not only at our priorities, but each other's, but also each other's red lines and finding more solutions. And I'm grateful. As I mentioned, councilor Smith voted to restore the st. Johns fire engine. Councilor pirtle-guiney voted to fund hygiene programs and small donor elections. And I also want to highlight councilor Avalos and pirtle-guiney partnering to preserve the integrity of piece f. But before I get to that, one last thing to the state. Because we need your help. Not with money. Well, sure, with money, but with the public meetings law. And I want to speak to a specific situation. Last Wednesday, two amendments that use this year's sff interest to save jobs failed. Six six. We did not have enough time scheduled for this year's adopted budget, but we did have overnight to solve it. And the five sponsors, and I believe the council president were was involved. At one point, they went off to compromise and for whatever reason they couldn't. But the other six of us couldn't be involved in that solution. We could hold the line, or we could just vote to go the other way. And you, the state legislature, who has written a public meetings law that you could not apply to yourself because you know that it doesn't work, made our jobs much harder. And given that constraints, we still should have done better. And this year, on that particular compromise opportunity, we didn't we did pass the test on another one, which is councilor Avalos and pirtle-guiney partnering to preserve the integrity of peace. And I'm grateful for that. And that made it possible for me to vote yes on the underlying budget. And finally, to the mayor. I do appreciate your courage to make bold choices that past mayors wouldn't make. I think you got plenty of criticism, including from me, for specific decisions on what was cut or not, the process, the communication, and more. I'm not walking that back, but I do see that. I do appreciate it. I know you had a lot to work with, and so I did want to express my gratitude to mayor wilson on that and to express the hope that we are iterating and getting better each and every time. Thank you, council president.
Thank you. Councilor Kanal councilor Novick. Last word.
Thank you, mr. President. First of all, councilor Kanal, I thoroughly agree with you on the public meetings law. I just wanted to note that councilor Pirtle-guiney and I brought forward a proposal which you did not mention to fund the rescues using the PCEF interest, which was the preferred funding mechanism of the peacock group. And five peacocks voted, voted against it. And I also wanted to say that we attempted to restore one of the rescues with cuts to council office budgets. And you're right, not every dollar of the council office budgets can go to general fund, but the rest would not have been wasted. That would have gone back to PBOT and water and be bts. So I just wanted to say that last week. Just need to say it again. Thank you.
Thank you, councilor Novick colleagues, this is the second reading of a nonemergency ordinance. As a reminder, I am recusing myself from this final vote. It requires seven votes to pass. Keelan can we please call the roll on item number seven?
Sorry. Kanal. I pirtle-guiney I Ryan no. Koyama Lane I Morillo. I Novick. I Clark I Green. I Zimmerman.
Avalos unfortunately I. Smith I.
Dunphy abstains the ordinance passes with a vote of nine eyes, two noes and one abstention.
Thank you colleagues. We still have four additional items before us, but it is 8:00. I'm going to give us a ten minute restroom break. And everybody, please be back here at 805. Thank you. And we are coming back to order. Thanks so much for your patience, everybody. We are now moving to item eight, which keelan has already read. Item eight is the approving levy approved levying taxes for the city for the fiscal year beginning July 1st, 2026 and ending June 30th, 2027. Colleagues. This is the an emergency ordinance that confirms rates for local property taxes, uses funds, specifies uses of those funds, and enables tax increment financing districts as required by state
Law. It received testimony and debate last week and was carried over to this week to vote on the budget in one hearing, and will be effective immediately upon passage. It requires nine affirmative votes to pass. Is there any discussion? Can we please move to a roll? On item I eight roll call on item eight, please.
Aye, Morillo pirtle-guiney aye, Morillo. I Koyama Lane. I aye, Morillo.
I Novick I.
Clark I Green. I Zimmerman. I am. I Smith absent Dunphy. I the ordinance passes with a vote of 11 ayes and one absent.
Okay, colleagues, moving to item nine authorizing a temporary interfund loan not to exceed $600,000 from the parks capital fund to the hydroelectric power operating fund to provide interim funding to avoid negative cash and fund balances for the 2526 fiscal year end. This is an emergency ordinance that authorizes a short term internal loan to ensure that hydroelectric power operating fund does not end the year in a negative in violation of state law. It received testimony and debate last week and was carried over to this week to vote on the budget in one hearing, and will be effective immediately upon passage. It requires nine affirmative votes to pass. Is there any discussion? Seeing none, please call the roll on item number nine.
Kanal.
Aye, Morillo.
Pirtle-guiney. I Ryan I Koyama Lane I Morillo I Novick. I I Green. I Zimmerman I Avalos I Smith I Dunphy I ordinance passes with a vote of 12 ayes.
Thank you colleagues. Item number ten. This is adopting the supplemental budget for the 2526 fiscal year over expenditure process and making budget adjustments in various funds. This is the second reading of a nonemergency ordinance of the annual overexpenditure ordinance. It received testimony and debate last week, and was carried over this week to vote on the budget in one hearing, and will be effective immediately upon passage. Nope, that's not right, because it's the second nonemergency ordinance. This requires seven affirmative votes to pass. Is there any discussion? Councilor Kanal.
Sameer Kanal: Aye, Morillo. Yeah, I just wanted to say thanks to the folks that got me information after the last reading on this about the grants, there were a couple that I asked about. I appreciate it, I don't have my notes in front of me, so I can't make it a public thing at this moment. I don't want to say anything incorrectly. And so I just ask that that be made. If we can add that as an attachment to the record later or something like that, to make sure that that's public what those grants were. But that was all I wanted to to get on the record. Thanks.
Thank you. Councilor Kanal. Seeing no one else in the queue, keelan can we please call the roll on item number ten?
Kanal. I pirtle-guiney. I Ryan I Koyama Lane I Morillo. I Novick. I Clark I Green. I Zimmerman I Avalos I Smith I. I ordinance passes with a vote of 12 ayes keelan.
Can you please call item number 11.
Document 2026-165 authorize sewer revenue bonds to finance sewer system capital improvements for an amount sufficient to produce net proceeds of up to $235 million and to refund outstanding sewer revenue bonds.
Colleagues, this is the second reading of a nonemergency ordinance. Is there any further discussion? Seeing none. Keelan, can we please call the roll?
Kanal.
Item 11.
Item 11 yes.
I pirtle-guiney. I.
Ryan I.
Koyama Lane I Morillo. I Novick I clerk Green. I Zimmerman I Avalos. I Smith. I Dunphy. I ordinance passes with a vote of 12 ayes.
Thank you very much. Keelan. Can we please move to our last item tonight? Item number 12.
Amend city code. Oh, sorry. Document 2026-174. Amend city code to transfer oversight of portable sign placement in the right of way and remove registration requirements. Amend code title 3032 and add code. Chapter 17.110.
This is the first reading of a non emergency ordinance with us is christhopher herr policy analyst with council operations for a committee staff summary report. Take it away christopher.
Good evening, council president and.
Councilors for the record christhopher herr council operations policy analyst. I serve as staff to the city life committee. The ordinance before you document number 2026-174 was considered in the city life committee on may 26th, where it was referred to council with the recommendation that it be passed the ordinance amend city code title 32 signs and related regulations as shown in exhibit a. The amendments add portable signs to the list of signs exempt from permit and registration requirements, and make conforming changes throughout title 32. The amendments also add reference to city code. Chapter 17.1 ten the ordinance adds city code. Chapter 17.1 ten Portland signs as shown in exhibit b, the chapter establishes definitions, standards, and enforcement provisions related to portable signs. General requirements include compliance with applicable standards and title 32, and provisions requiring sign owners to maintain signs in good condition. Ensure signs remain upright and placed outside of pedestrian through zones. Chapter 17.1 identifies locations within the public right of way where portable signs may not be placed, including roadways, traffic, islands, islands, medians, traffic circles and areas within five feet of a crosswalk. The city administrator or a designated representative may inspect for compliance and enforce the chapter pursuant to trn-8.1 for right of way use enforcement program violations are subject to penalties assessed on a per day basis, in accordance with trn dash 3.4 50 transportation fee schedule. The full impact statements on the ordinance includes financial and budgetary impacts, community impacts, and community involvement. There was no verbal or written testimony provided prior to committee action on may 26th, and that concludes the committee staff summary.
Thank you. Thank you, christopher councilor Pirtle-guiney. This came out of the city life committee. I'll turn it to you.
It did. And that overview was fantastic and thorough. Thank you. Christopher, I will reiterate that this was a unanimous vote. And there was a fair amount of discussion about some of the technical specifics and how this works, but not dissension or significant concern raised on any of the topics covered.
Thank you. Councilor. Pirtle-guiney. Councilor. Novick. This is your item turning to you.
Thank you, mr. President. And thanks to the members of the committee that voted this out. Five to nothing. And thanks to caroline holcomb of the central eastside industrial council, who brought this issue to my office's attention as part of a list of silly, unnecessary requirements that burden small business. The. The fact that small businesses are required to get a permit to put a simple sandwich board out in front of their business struck us as extremely silly. It's a requirement that is frequently ignored. It actually is one of these things that places a burden on particularly well informed and conscientious people who are aware of it and say, okay, I'm not going to break the rules. I'm going to send in my 100 bucks and I'm going to get a permit. And so whereas other other people either unaware of it or just just ignore it. So we thought that this is a simple enough thing to do to alleviate a small burden on small businesses. And as christopher said, it simply clarifies that PBOT has the authority to, to, to enforce rules against them being placed in the right of way in ways that are problematic.
Thank you very much. Councilor. Novick. Keelan. Has anyone signed up to testify on this item?
We do have a handful of folks signed up.
Okay, colleagues, before we move to testimony, is there any are there any technical or clarifying questions or question or comments? Okay, let's move to public testimony, please.
Okay. I'll call people up in groups of five. First up, we have taylor long, stephanie wilde, parrish, weber, blair, glennon, taylor goss.
Good evening councilors. My name is taylor goss, and I am here today to discuss something that I think is important regarding the oversight of portable sign placement, namely, why, during a time when portland's residents are being abducted off of the streets, were bothering to discuss it at all. I don't need to tell you that for an entire year, your constituents who were here this evening have been demanding that city council take immediate action to shut down the Portland ice facility. And for an entire year, we have been met with either inaction or frivolous legislation like this, or the ethics of foie gras. And, you know, the lloyd center. It would seem to me that city council's priorities are currently misaligned. You did, in September of last year, finally issued the land violation, the fine for which has never been enforced. And since then, the city has willingly allowed ice's landlord, stuart lindquist, to repeatedly appeal and delay the violation process. I know that you have told us and you will tell us that you're trying, but we don't have time for bureaucratic nonsense. As we sit here and discuss signage, immigrants are being kidnaped off of the streets and communities are being terrorized. But it's not just your inaction on the ice permit. While cities across the country are enacting policies to fight back against federal oppression, Portland actively takes a hand in suppressing those who would defend our communities. Councilor Morillo, you mentioned earlier this evening that Portland doesn't have an armed force to enforce laws. But in may, on may day, the Portland police bureau was sent to defend the ice facility and officers brutalized and arrested activists. In February, they were sent here to city hall to silence protesters who were exercising their first amendment rights. This is not only unacceptable, it is a betrayal of your community's values. Now, I know that this evening was frustrating for you. I saw it on all of your faces as I sat here and watched the proceedings. Understand that we're just as frustrated with you as you are with us. You see, we are willing to risk our lives, our bodies, our well-being to step up to that blue line. We know that you're trying. We know that your heart is in the right place. But why aren't you willing to do more? Thank you very much for your time.
Thank you very much.
Next up, we have evelyn pdx city, vlad pdx city raphael pdx, city, ray pdx city and izzy pdx, c d. Followed by holly brown. Bailey ullom, maddie c. Bridge Green simka. And caroline holcomb.
Welcome.
Hey happy pride y'all. Thanks. I'm bertrand simka charles johnson. I'm supposed to wash the shirt today so. Thank you for this effort to save me from the burden of having to affix a little plastic sticker on a sandwich board sign. I, you know, there was a summary that talked about the decrease. And between this and the foie gras ban, I'm sure we've instantly turned around things in Portland. Portland was able to survive for up till today with this burdensome legislation. But now that this burdensome legislation is gone. Fast tracking success. I, I yo soy contra deportations. But there are many pathways to trying to minimize and hopefully remove totally the harm that this asinine, racist presidential administration is bringing to cities all over. I don't always empathize with every tactic of pdx deportations, but they are spot on when they say, we can't just have every few months an excessively long, long session like this where we talk about whether we're going to allocate $150,000 or $300,000 to assisting immigrants that are fighting deportation. And of course, things have been really busy that that conversation that I was here for February, I wonder I think we were taking some of the city attorney's money. We were going to take money from the city attorney to make money available to. So I hope to soon hear a progress report to know the positive impact we're having on how many people and if. I think there was even a little very Portland esque episode of different nonprofits feeling not all equally like they weren't getting equally treated. So. Let's even though it's nice that there's a little banner on top of the Portland website, now that we're putting this. Actually, we have put the budget to bed. Now that that's done, let's be sure that we have clear visibility in every channel of city communication, not just with favored or disfavored nonprofits, about what money and resources are available to minimize the trauma that we have not yet stopped down at the ice building. Thank you.
Thank you very much.
That completes testimony.
Okay, colleagues, is there discussion of this item now? I am actually going to kick us off as the as I've talked about before in the past, I am a former small business owner myself. My wife and I opened a coffee shop in the Sellwood neighborhood in 2008. I hand made my my sandwich board. I cut out plywood and attached a door hinges, and then went through the complicated process of trying to get all the permits that my business needed, including spending my $100 on a sticker on that sign that. I realized very quickly after we opened, none of my neighbors had stickers on their signs. Or if they did, there were many years outdated. Nobody from the city ever came by to look at it. And admittedly, it expired. We did not renew it. I think that this is one of the times that it was a really good intention to try and regulate the public areas, but we do truly nickel and dime the smallest of small businesses and some of the things that were really good intentions ten, 15, 20 years ago are just not providing value now. And there are continued burden. Another example is the city's efforts back over 20 years ago, maybe 15 years ago, to limit access to spray paint so that we could cut down on tagging. And we required small businesses to collect the driver's license information from every can of spray paint that was ever sold. The general manager of parkrose hardware told me that they have a physical copy of every spray paint can. That receipt that has ever been sold. It was two feet tall in the corner of their office, and when he called the north police precinct to see what he could do with all of these documents, there was no intake ability for the police office to even be able to have that. There are a thousand little things like that, that all across our system are deeply inconveniencing small businesses and councilor Novick, thank you for tackling this one, and I look forward to seeing all the different ways we can continue to support small business. So you will be having my support on this. I think everybody else is pretty close to being tired and ready to go home. So councilor Green.
Mitch Green: Thank you, counselor Novick, thanks for bringing this. I remember when the sort of germ of the idea began and we were like, how can I, how can we get this in front of the arts and economy committee? And I think maybe we even had a policy preview discussion at that time. Maybe, maybe I'm remembering a different committee. This all feels like a blur. But yeah, I agree with everything the council president just said. I just also note that. This is certainly not the most important thing in Portland right now, but it is something that is a very practical problem to be solved. It can be solved very easily with at very low cost, and it can improve, I think, the function of the city, and particularly the small businesses who are. You know, looking for a signal here. So I appreciate you bringing it forward. Also, I'll note your presentation has a slide where there's a there's a advertising big dog, hot dogs on the vendor. I don't know if that's intended to curry my favor.
I think it.
Was okay. Well well played. I plan to support this.
Thank you, councilor Green.
Mitch Green: Councilor Kanal I was going to make a comment about hot dogs too actually, but so no need. Thanks. I, I think I just want to comment. We can't solve everything in a single ordinance. We never will. And so if the standard of what meets our is worthy of our time is it has to solve everything or it's not worth doing, that's, that's a standard that will never be met. And it's worth sort of adjusting expectations in that regard. I think this is something we could spend several hours on, or we could spend a few minutes on, and we should probably do the latter. I plan to support it. Thanks.
Thank you. Councilor Kanal. Colleagues. Seeing no one else in the queue for discussion, pausing for dramatic effect, this is the first reading of a nonemergency ordinance. This item now moves to second reading. That is our final item on the agenda. Colleagues, is there anything else for the good of the order? Councilor Kanal.
Sameer Kanal: I just wanted to get.
An idea. If there was a proposed timeline for the the item that was withdrawn or that was referred back, I should say not withdrawn.
Yeah. Councilor Smith.
Loretta Smith: Let's get a little more info there. If there's if there is available.
There's there's no information is exactly what the council president said. We will bring it back. We have to go in front of the planning commission.
I look forward to working with councilor Smith to getting that back on the agenda as urgently as possible.
It's the 68th minute. Columbia is up 2 to 1 over uzbekistan. Let's go.
Thank you. With that, colleagues, we are recessed until tomorrow at 2:00.