Portland’s brilliant Charter

Under the current and proposed Charter (pdf), the Mayor gets to appoint three Commissioners to the Civil Service Board. This Board hears complaints and appeals about the City’s hiring and promotion practices, and sets adminstrative rules to govern them. But check out this delicious plan to ensure balance of power in appointments to the Civil Service Board, in the current Charter Chapter 4:

“The Mayor may remove any Commissioner at any time. In the event of any such removal, the Mayor shall, within five (5) days thereafter, transmit to the Council a written report thereof and of the Mayor’s reason therefor, and the Council shall forthwith appoint another person to fill the vacancy.”

Do you see the lovely twist? Under the current Charter, if the Mayor is ticked with a Commissioner, s/he has the power to remove that appointee – that’s the same in the proposal in Measure 26-90. BUT, under the current Charter, if the Mayor fires a Civil Service Commissioner, the Council gets to pick the new one. So the Mayor has to weigh whether the Council might pick someone even more opposed to the Mayor’s preferred policies in hiring and promoting his/her political allies. The Civil Service chapter was written to reform rampant patronage and nepotism in Portland’s city government. Are you really sure that could never happen again?

Under the proposed Charter in Measure 26-90, the Mayor would appoint all Commissioners even after firing one, and only has to notify the Council of the reason for a dismissal. The new Charter would add Council confirmation of all appointees, but I’m not convinced that means much if Measure 26-91 gives the Mayor so much more power to implement or thwart a Council member’s policy goals. We all know that currently members of the Council exert pressure on each other to get to three votes; how much more will that happen if the Mayor has the power to direct all the bureaus?

Measure 26-90 would remove the existing exquisite plan for balance of power, that ensures Mayors think long and hard before firing Civil Service Commissioners. And it allows Mayors to fire many more employees by right, removing them from the protection of Civil Service regulations altogether.

Portlanders should likewise think long and hard about changing our current, brilliant Charter. There are good reasons previous generations wrote its specific words. And good reasons it’s endured and helped us become a City that isn’t perfect, but is so much more fair than other places. Please Vote No on Everything.