This morning at City Council

No, I don’t have any comments yet about the election results yesterday, except that I’m happy the candidates I supported won. Having the right people in decision-making positions can make any structure/system successful.

While many of us were busy trying to inform Portland’s citizens about the proposed Charter changes on yesterday’s ballot, the City Council had to continue its regularly scheduled main topic for this time of year: The Budget. This morning, the City Council convened as the Budget Committee (readers of this blog, and I, know more about state rules for budget committees now, don’t we?). I watched the hearing on cable, while working to catch up on domestic chores that have been left undone over the past several weeks.

What a mess – the hearing, as well as my domestic environment. I should start by saying Mayor Potter has a very bad cold, so perhaps wasn’t at the top of his game. But as has often been so, he didn’t call for citizen testimony at the appropriate time, and the result today may have cost citizens $850,000. Here’s how:

The Council, as the city’s Budget Committee, was voting today on the almost-final version of the Budget. The hearing began with a heated discussion of a late cut of $650,000 in the Bureau of Maintenance’s street sweeping funding, proposed by Commissioner Adams. Sam said the cut is needed to meet Transportation’s General Fund limitations, and that while he didn’t like doing it, it was the next on the list for de-funding after seven years of cuts in Transportation. Randy Leonard objected to the timing of the proposed cut, late in the process. (I missed the details of the preliminary debate, from taking a phone call from an elderly neighbor needing help about a zoning issue) Then the Council moved to accept the Budget, and individual members started making motions to amend it. And the Council voted on the amendments without hearing citizen testimony on them. If they had taken public comments, perhaps they wouldn’t have taken such a tortuous route to reach their conclusions, and time and money might have been saved.

Dan Saltzman asked for three amendments. His first, to change funding for support for victims of domestic violence from “One Time” (just this budget) to “Ongoing” (accepting responsibility for the program every year from now on), was defeated 1-3. Erik Sten was absent. Randy made the valid point that the City should not take on additional social service programs until the County decides what will be cut/saved in their budget this year. He said (and I agree) that if it’s a choice between victim support and drug/alcohol treatment for offenders, the latter is the higher priority – addressing the cause rather than ameliorating the effects. He also mentioned there has been talk of the City and County revisiting Resolution A, the formal division of which jurisdiction provides defined services. I would love to see that happen – I believe it’s a very important part of our “form of government” conundrum.

Dan’s second amendment was to add $200,000 for Portland Parks and Recreation programs providing evening activities for teens. Perhaps in light of recent media attention on teens using free time less productively, this amendment passed unanimously. Another good call, in my opinion. The third amendment, to add $85,000 for traffic signal improvements at SW Bertha/Capitol also passed. Dan said he was proposing it in response to citizen testimony at the Budget Hearing at Robert Gray Middle School – just a few blocks from the intersection in question. The Mayor asked if a study had been done. Sam replied it has, and that the location is not on the list of Top 25 most dangerous in the city. But they passed it anyway. Sam said in his vote, “There are these kinds of intersections all over the city. The case has been made here.” See, citizen testimony and showing up does sometimes make a difference. Commissioner Leonard made an excellent point that there are many streets in east Portland which need improvements and where citizens are not as able to lobby for them. Randy said he hopes to work on a “new way of providing” funding for such areas, over the next year.

Then things got messy.

Sam proposed an amendment taking $650,000 from the contingency allocation of around $3m, to keep street sweeping at the current levels. Randy voted Yes, the other two No, motion failed. Then the Mayor took public testimony. Nine people spoke to the street maintenance issue. Richard Beetle, business manager of Laborers Local 489, the maintenance workers’ union, did an absolutely amazing job of telling the Council the true, on-the-ground meaning of this one item in the proposed budget. He demonstrated why managers should ask front-line workers for their input on issues. Richard took listeners through a detailed account of what happens to trash and dirt that is left on the streets. He talked about how catch basins under the sewer grates are cleaned, about silt build-up in the Big Pipe, about filtering mechanisms at the Columbia sewage treatment plant, and sludge haulage to Eastern Oregon.

Richard Beetle also spoke to the human cost of the proposed cuts. Due to lack of communication, which Sam Adams apologized for several times, there was confusion about whether the cut would result in layoffs. One longtime city worker attended the meeting where employees assembled a seniority list for potential job losses, and went home and had a fatal heart attack. Line items in a budget have an impact not only on services, but on real people and their families. Decision-makers and lobbyists should always remember those facts.

After Mr. Beetle’s testimony, a variety of other citizens testified about the impact of street trash on bicyclists, motor bicyclists, neighborhoods, tourism, and streams. If the Mayor had taken public testimony on the amendment before calling for a vote on it, I believe Sam’s amendment restoring funding would have passed immediately.

But since he hadn’t and it didn’t, Randy voted Yes on the budget as a whole, then announced his intention to Move to Reconsider the vote next week when Erik Sten would be present to provide the needed third vote for funding the current level of street sweeping. A lengthy discussion between the financial people, the City Attorney person, and the Council people ensued, as to whether the Budget Committee could reconvene at any Council session, and when/whether they can change the budget sent to the State. I’ll spare you the details. The upshot was, Dan Saltzman announced brightly, “I’ll move to reconsider right now, if we consider a package of both restoring the street maintenance $650,000 AND ensuring $850,000 in funding for Park Block 5.”

And that’s what they did. The City Attorney said the two changes to the budget had to be voted on in two separate motions, so Dan astutely moved the Park Blocks funding first. Block 5 is that new park over a new underground garage in the South Park Blocks downtown. So now taxpayers will be providing $850,000 from the General Fund to aid its construction. I hope everyone in neighborhoods in NE, SE, SW and elsewhere that have been parks-deficient since annexation decades ago all enjoy this new park downtown, that we are now ponying up another $850,000 to construct.

Mayor Potter voted No on both the motion for reconsideration and the amendment. I admire that. In some ways it was good to see the deal struck in plain view of the public, but the entire hearing made me sad. The Budget deserves more attention than it was given amidst the Charter change kerfuffle. Decisions that affect workers’ lives and neighborhood livability should not be made as an afterthought. And public testimony on amendments shouldn’t be an afterthought, either.

In fact, come to think of it, the Council never took public testimony on the late amendment for $850,000 for the Parks Blocks. Is that a problem?