The most important blog post of the week/month/year in Portland?

There are just a few folks who read my blog and don’t routinely check Jack Bogdanski’s. I would like all of you to read, consider, and comment on Jack’s post today on the City of Portland’s total debt. It’s fascinating. I haven’t seen these numbers clearly summarized anywhere else. And while I realize being in debt is an accepted norm in American society, from individuals’ credit card woes up to our federal government’s multi-trillion dollar overspending, I believe overspending is a huge problem. Just because “everyone’s doing it” doesn’t make it the right thing to do.

I would like to know how the City of Portland’s level of indebtedness compares with other cities of similar size – cities we’d like to emulate, and those we’d rather not.

I want to see the City Council outlining plans for paying off these debts, for financing maintenance and replacement of aging infrastructure like water pipes and parks improvements, and for providing basic services (paved streets, sidewalks, frequent and plentiful bus routes, parks, etc.,) in neighborhoods that lack them.

And I’d like those questions answered before the next maybe-nice-but-not-essential spending ordinance is passed by Council, like $350,000 for making parking meters responsive to cell phone messages, or $9 million subsidizing eastern Oregon biofuel farmers.