The record · Transcript
Council Session — 2026-01-12
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Session summaryEditor-reviewed
The Governance Committee met on January 12, 2026, beginning at 2:31 p.m., with roll call, a statement of conduct, and time offered for public testimony, though none was given. The committee approved November 2025 meeting minutes by unanimous consent. A presentation on the Advisory Bodies Enhancement Project outlined next steps involving three components—city code, council procedures, and administrative rules—with discussion of a draft council procedures document addressing liaison committee roles, appointment and confirmation processes, and reporting relationships between council committees and advisory bodies. Discussion included concerns about committee workload, the number of advisory bodies (figures were stated inconsistently, referenced as around 91 or 92), and processes for reviewing or reducing that number. The committee then held an informal discussion with the City Administrator about strategic priorities, covering concepts such as priority-setting, strategic planning, retreats, and alignment between council and administration, including timeline considerations tied to an existing resolution deadline. Finally, the committee reflected on its 2025 work, discussing accomplishments such as the governance handbook, advisory body reforms, and tiebreaking procedures, along with hopes for 2026 governance work. The meeting adjourned after outlining expected future agenda items. Any votes referenced are recorded in the vote ledger.
AI-drafted from the session's auto-captions, reviewed by an editor — describes the discussion only; recorded votes live in the vote ledger. Captions contain errors.
Procedural markers in this session
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0 One moment.
1 Good afternoon. I called the meeting of the governance committee to order. It is Monday, January 12th. It is 2:31 p.m. Keelan. Will you please call the roll?
2 Good afternoon.
3 Dunphy. Here.
4 Pirtle-guiney here. Ryan. Clark. Here. Here.
5 Koyama Lane here. Ashley, will you please read the statement of conduct?
6 Welcome to the meeting of the governance committee to testify for this committee in person or virtually. You must sign up in advance on committee agenda at w-w-w. Agenda slash governance committee, or we're calling 311. Information on engaging with the committee can be found at at this link. Registration for virtual testimony closes one hour prior to meeting in person. Testifier must sign up before the agenda item is heard. If public testimony will be taken on item, individuals must testify for three minutes unless the chair states otherwise, your microphone will be muted. When your time is over. The chair provides or preserves order. This disruptive conduct, such as shouting, refusing to conclude your testimony when your time is up or interrupting others testimony or committee deliberations will not be allowed. If you cause disruption, a warning will be given. Further disruption will result in ejection from the meeting. Anyone who fails to leave once ejected is subject for to trespassing. Additional. Additionally, the committee may take a short recess and reconvene virtually. Your testimony should address the matter being considered when testifying and state your name. For the record, if you are a lobbyist, identify the organization you represent. Virtual testifiers should unmute themselves when the clerk calls your name. Thank you.
7 Thank you. In today's meeting, the governance committee will approve committee minutes for the month of November, receive a presentation and engage in a discussion about the next steps for the advisory bodies enhancement project. Engage in an informal discussion about council's strategic priorities and collaboration with city administrator lee, and also discuss and reflect on the work of the governance committee in 2025, and also look ahead to our hopes for the governance for governance work throughout 2026. This is the time where we usually make a little leave a little time for chair and vice chair announcements. Vice chair Ryan, did you have anything that you wanted to share? Okay. And I, I tend to to like having some slots at the beginning for public comment. And I think that was left off this time. And so I did wanted to see if there's anyone that wanted to come up and give public testimony. I can invite anyone to speak right now. Good. Okay. Basically, terry harris wondering if you wanted to say anything. All good. So let's move to item number one. Keelan, please read the first item.
8 The first item is the action to approve the November 10th, 2025 governance committee meeting minutes.
9 Thank you. Keelan. So this is the approval of committee meetings for the governance meetings held in November. And December. Would we be doing November.
10 Just just November.
11 Just November? Okay. These meetings are available online as part of the meeting agenda. If there's no objection, the meetings will be approved by unanimous consent. All right. Seeing no objection, the minutes are approved. Keelan, can you please read the next item?
12 Item number two, next steps on the advisory bodies enhancement program implementation.
13 Thank you. Thanks for coming up here amanda garcia snell. So the first step of the advisory bodies enhancement project, the ordinance, the city code changes and report passed out of the governance committee here with us on December 15th and will be heard by the full council at our next council meeting today. The chief engagement officer, amanda garcia snell, thank you for being here. We'll share a presentation on the next steps of the advisory bodies and enhance and committees enhancement project abcs. The next steps include adopting a resolution to guide the relationship relationship between abcs and city council, as well as administrative rules to guide the relationship between abcs and the executive branch. So our intent is to submit a resolution based on recommendations from the project team for discussion on the governance committee on January 26th. So we're not voting on anything today. This is another part of the discussion. And if you remember julia meyer, who was leading this, talked about it like a three legged stool. So that first leg is already on its way to council. And now we're on leg two. And now I'm happy to pass things off to our chief engagement officer, amanda garcia. Snell.
14 Thank you, chair Koyama Lane. And for the record, amanda garcia snell chief engagement officer so I just have a very brief presentation. Thank you for that tee up.
15 Would you mind bringing the mic a little bit closer?
16 Yes. Is that better? Okay. I just have a very brief presentation. Thank you for the tee up for where we're at. We've made a few stops at this committee to provide high level overview, as well as take a deeper dive into proposed, recommended citywide policies and practices for the city's appointed advisory bodies. At the last committee, as you mentioned, you all referred a draft code to full council for further discussion and adoption. That was initially scheduled to happen this Wednesday, but it will be happening at a future date, and I think that schedule will be determined after Wednesday. But so today, I'm here to present the next steps and adoption to of the citywide abc policies and practices. Next slide please. Okay. Thank thanks. Ocean. So as you may recall, we've shared a fair amount of detail about the background and context of the project. So for today I'm just going to pick up where we left off in the previous meetings and talk about the big next steps, adoption of of a few things, the three, the three legged things, and then implementation and continuous improvement. And then I'll touch a bit on the distinction between the three elements of adoption. Next slide please. So city code is the first piece. And that's in process. As you mentioned it was discussed and referred from this committee to full council. We'll have a new date soon. And and then hopefully that will be adopted. Additionally council procedures is something for you all to consider if that's something that you want to move forward with. And as chair Koyama Lane mentioned, that's really about the relationship council to the advisory bodies, also clarifies roles regarding appointments and confirmation. So there, you know, in that conversation, it's do you want council committees to be designated as a touch point or liaisons for specific advisory bodies. And then what will those expectations be of if that's the case? And so julia meyer is so thorough and and was able to draft some code council procedures for your consideration. Those are in the process of some legal review. And I believe the city attorney has had a chance. Sarah ames has had a chance to take a look at those and provide some feedback, but it seems like this conversation was really about whether or not you want to move forward with that consideration of procedures, and how much or how little you you would like us to to help move that conversation along or or or not. So I'll take that guidance from you all. And then I know that sarah had shared with that her edited versions or her recommended edits or suggested edits to the piece that julia had adopted. I think that's only been shared with councilor Koyama Lane and councilor Ryan. But if that's something that you all are interested in considering, I'm happy to share that with the whole committee. But but I wasn't sure until you let me know if that's how you want to proceed.
17 Thank you. I think that would be great to share that out. Councilor Ryan and I have gotten a chance to look at these and and I think it would be helpful to hear, are you going to tell us a bit more about where things are at in terms of the outlining the relationship between council and these abcs appointments and confirmations? Are you able to go over that?
18 I, I can I mean, I wasn't sure if that was something that you were interested in doing. Now, since the document hasn't been fully shared.
19 And I think as much as you can share would be great.
20 Okay. Yeah. So so a couple of things. One, it's really looking at as I mentioned, that relationship. So one of the things that that is currently happening, but not consistently is that council specific advisory bodies are bringing their appointment confirmation conversations to different council committees. And if that's something that you want to continue in the future, and if that, you know, if you would like that relationship to be more formalized. That is one of the pieces of that. And so it was really determining where, where those if that's how you want to do things and then where those specific committees would go or how you want to make that decision for appointment conversation. The many of the it can be kind of clear about many of the committees on how those the advisory bodies and how they might be connected to specific committees in terms of their, you know, their primary focus, but not all of them are that clear. And so I think being able to determine what is that guidance or how do you want to make that decision so that we can follow with that direction from you all, is something that you could consider in your council procedures. Another piece of that, and I'm just running through this list here, would be about how you want to receive reports and updates on on the work of the specific abc, the specific advisory bodies, some of them. There's a really clear relationship. Some of them have a history of that, some of them do not. And so it's considering how you want to receive that if they are in advising council and what that relationship looks like, that's another piece that can be considered in this council procedures. And then in terms of appointments and confirmations, just having some determined consistency around that. And for you all to decide how you would like that to happen is another piece of that. So those are kind of the the big buckets and.
21 Great.
22 I'll stop there.
23 Yeah. Would would you like us to stop here and then discuss. You have a couple more slides. Is that right.
24 Yeah I have a couple more slides just about the other elements of, of the next steps because it's not just about code and council procedures, but then there's also administrative rules. And those are, those will be approved by the city administrator. But we're waiting until code is adopted so that we can be really responsive to that guidance. Juliet had also kindly started a very extensive document outlining all of the the pieces of the administrative rules. That draft has already gone to the internal workgroup for their input. And so we're incorporating that feedback. And then it'll go through a legal review. We did commit to bringing a draft administrative rules to you all for for your review. If that's something that you're interested in as in the interim because we aren't there yet. I thought I could share some of the big bucket elements that will be in those. And so that's what's listed out on this slide. The foundational elements, the establishment of advisory bodies and the governance, recruitment, appointment, membership, some of those pieces and then membership expectations and support. And this was something that we talked a lot about. Or there was a lot of conversation about how are we supporting members to have what they need to be effective participants. And then also in terms of in situations of conflict or where where there might be need to be really clear expectations about behavior and how people interact. So those will also be in the administrative rules and then program oversight, as well as the elements of the continuous improvement, which are periodic review and then reporting to you all.
25 Great. Amanda, how about you just finish the presentation and then we can go back and have a discussion as the committee about where we might want to go in terms of council procedures, working with abcs. Thank you.
26 Next slide please. Ocean. So implementation that once we have administrative rules in place then and and of course council procedures if you choose to go that route and then code is adopted. We'll start with the that's what we'll really launch the implementation. And so the hope in that is that we'll be able to start with this first initial phase of code cleanup. And these are the recommended changes that came out of the large scale inventory that we did. So we'll be working with service areas to really try to determine if those are things that can come in packages just in the interest of your your limited time and capacity. There will be some small changes. There might be larger discussions that need to happen in terms of how do we right size the existing advisory bodies to meet, how we're planning to do things in the future and this improved way? Another piece of the implementation is around council priorities. And so one of the amendments that came forward by councilor Canal as part of the draft code that council will be considering is really around reporting the implementation plan and then receiving council's input on that to make sure that we are that we're aligned with the priorities that you all would like to see. And so we have a time frame for that, assuming that the code is adopted, that we would do that by February 28th. That was the recommendation or the requirement in the amendment. And so that's when we would plan to bring draft plan to you, get your input from that, and then make sure that we're that we're clear about what your priorities are for that direction. And then we will begin what will be quite a bit of work to create or update existing resources so that things can really be aligned with the the way that we're doing the new improved practices. And so this will be all manner of things around application, around bringing members up to speed with the onboarding look like how are people supported, do they have the training that they need and sort of all manner of that for not only members, but then also for the community so that they know what to expect, and they know that we have some very standardized and and reliable ways for them to learn about advisory bodies, that those things are on a temporal schedule, or we're announcing recruitments at a certain time of year with regularity, so that people can be more aware of what's out there, and it'll be easier to communicate those things consistently. Additionally, what support staff need in order to be able to implement those new practices and to really support advisory bodies in alignment with the new, excuse me, the new practices and then the the last piece of implementation is the continuous improvement. So that's not just this periodic review that we've discussed a bit about, which is 25% of the advisory bodies will be reviewed every year so that they are on a four year. Each one is on a four year review cycle. Not just that, but also regular reporting, updated communications, making sure that our website information is accurate and timely and and responsive to the improved practices. And then, as I mentioned, a recruitment schedule which will hopefully help with communications. And so that community know what to expect and and when they can pursue participating on an advisory body. Next slide. And then this is the timeline. We've talked about this we've shared this graphic in the past. Things are shifting just ever so slightly, but not enough to really change the the lines too much within those quarterly temporal notations. And so our goal is still to have the city code, administrative rules and council procedures to be adopted by early 2026. And then after that we'll start the implementation. As I mentioned, staff will start to create resources and update existing resources and really start that process to bring those materials into alignment materials and supports, into alignment with the new practices. And then we're hoping to be able to start expanding trainings to advisory bodies in the fall so that we can have what people need in order to participate most effectively. And then we also will be looking to ways that we can start collecting and reporting data, so that we can really look at metrics that demonstrate, are we doing what we set out to do with advisory bodies in terms of are they reflective of the city's, of are they representative of all the people that live in the city? We tend to see participation from certain sets of demographics, but we know that we have real opportunity to expand advisory bodies so that they can be more inclusive of all people that live in the city. And so metrics are one way for us to really look at that. The city doesn't have good longitudinal, longitudinal data about advisory bodies. And so once we have all of these new practices in place and we're rolling out this implementation, it's an opportunity to really look at that and that piece of it. And what can we do more consistently. And then so as I mentioned we'll report regularly. We will maintain an accurate inventory of advisory bodies. We'll get onto this periodic review schedule of of looking at 25% of all of them every year, and then reporting those findings to ul and the mayor. We will look to and begin collecting and tracking and reporting on, on membership, on participation. And then we will continue to revise materials as we go forward. And that is all I have.
27 Thank you amanda. So when we look that at last slide talking where it says adoption, city code, council procedures, administrative rules, that's the three legged stool am I right?
28 Yes.
29 Okay. And then city code that first leg has is going to the full council. I know that colleagues are thinking about bringing different amendments to that might have some different feelings about that. I know my office has been working with some other offices on possible amendments. And so today you're really we're focusing on the council procedures. And that piece which will be coming as a resolution. But it would be great for us to give you some feedback. And julia meyer has drafted a resolution, and attorney sarah ames has given some feedback. But before we officially have it be something that we are voting on, you're hoping that we could answer some questions and have a bit of a discussion. Is that am I getting that right?
30 Yes. And if I understood correctly, from my conversations with with dana around the process for this, that it that council procedures would be coming from you all and so. So that that would be the direction that I would be looking for. And then whatever I can do to support that, whatever might be helpful.
31 And councilors, that draft is in your inbox right now. Keelan. I also shared it with you because I believe if we're talking about a document, we will need to post that even though it's a draft as an exhibit, so the public has access to it, but it looks just you can correct me, but that the big topics here are a what is that relationship between these community members who are volunteering on these abcs? If they are, you know, should we have some sort of a with our committee system that set up, have each abc have a committee that they are connected with? That's that's somewhat of a liaison. So if it's the pedestrian advisory committee or the bicycle advisory committee, then they would be designated to be connected with the transportation and infrastructure committee. I would think at this point. So there's that's kind of a b is around appointments and confirmations outside of the recruitment part, a lot of it seems pretty similar to how our council president has had things rolling, where referrals come to us, the council president refers them to the committee that it makes sense to refer them to. The committee considers the appointments. Then they can recommend or reject and send them on to full council. They could be pulled from the consent agenda if necessary. So I think what amanda is looking for is some feedback and some thoughts on those two areas. And I see councilor Clark with your hand up. Go ahead.
32 Thank you. Council vice president may have signed up prematurely because I haven't. I'm just now looking at this draft, but I was wanting to comment on council procedures. I guess I didn't know this was coming. And this what you sent us this draft. Then we'll bring this back to this committee to discuss. Right?
33 That's correct.
34 Okay.
35 So this is the discussion, and I apologize that you didn't get to see it until just now. And the red lines are from attorney sarah ames.
36 Okay. So I'll just without benefit of education, without benefit of reading this, I will just say that I was going to raise some questions about the workload of the committees and just are we down to 91 advisory body? How many are we down to?
37 Yes. I mean, I believe we have 92 actually.
38 92. Okay. And they're pretty much it's you know, it's been a while. They're pretty much all. Advising bureaus, right. No, they're advising us now.
39 Yeah. They're kind of all over.
40 All over the place. Okay. We're still all over the place.
41 Through the inventory and the. Just for clarification, there has been a recommendation from service areas to make adjustments to some of those advisory bodies that if all of those go forward, and that's the code cleanup and reconciliation that would happen in the spring, then we would be looking at a smaller number of advisory bodies.
42 Okay, I thought that was one of our goals was to try to reduce the number 92 down. Okay. Great. Great. Good. Okay. We're on the same wavelength. So I'll just express a concern about workload for our committees. And and I guess I'm sorry I haven't read this, so I don't know if the circumstances under which you would want an advisory committee to come to a committee if there was like a hot issue or report. I just I'm really worried about the workload and what what's the trigger for it coming. Do we do we have to have these reports or are they issue focused or I mean, if it's just the routine. I'm not really sure what I'm talking about because I haven't read this, but I'm just concerned about I'll just say that one last time, the workload for the committees and getting lots and lots of advisory committee reports just express a concern.
43 Thank you, councilor. And that's something that has already come up in some of the discussions with my own staff, is what what does that look like exactly? What is the expectation? What's the difference between being a liaison and then having like actual. Like actual things you have to do rather than there being it being more of a touch point? I can see there being a need to kind of thread the needle and find a sweet spot. What I do hear from community members on some of these abcs is that there's no connection, sometimes with council, or no clear way of how they interact with us. So I do I hear what you're saying and I yeah, go ahead.
44 Just one more thought then I know we're going to talk about the governance committee later, but I maybe, maybe one option is they all come through here to the governance committee, or we take a first look and then we send them on or okay, is that just way too much? No.
45 I think I think it's good to put all the different options out there. Councilor Clark, I appreciate it.
46 Just thinking off the top of my head, that's all.
47 Thank you, council president. Go ahead.
48 Thank you chair. I'm still laughing at. The fact that we had the recommendation for everything to come through this committee, because I think we discussed that at the beginning of the year, and it feels full circle coming back to it. But I think it's important, like you said, chair, to have all options on the table right now, because I see some really good arguments to have this more formalized relationship with committees, but also some, some concerns that I just want to lay on the table as we continue our discussion. And I'm wondering just to make sure I have full information, this is the first that I'm seeing this document. Were there other considerations for how we would have this back and forth between the abc's and council that were taken off the table that we should know about as we think about why this might be the best option, or was this really what everybody has been focused on on the administrative side, as you've been putting together a proposal for us?
49 So if I'm understanding your question, and I think so, the this document, the council procedures document is, is something that we we were understanding would might be helpful. But it's really up to you all on whether or not you want to move forward with any procedures or any version of what julia has drafted and what sarah has looked at in terms of the conversation. This has been informed by all the the interactions that we've had, all of the documents and so or all of the things that we've put together so far. So that includes the internal work group, of which councilor Kanal is the council representative on that group, as well as community inputs, the staff liaisons group and then the community. There were two versions of community input in terms of of just general feedback around this process, as well as the conversations that we've been tracking that you all have been having in ul and your fellow councilors, in all committee meetings and in full council. And so and then we also had connected with former staff in council operations around some of these elements and staff from councilor Koyama Lane and councilor Ryan's office. But the so that's sort of how that was put together in terms of all the specifics of what was considered, I don't know that I can speak to all of those things.
50 Part of what I'm wondering is. Did in all of those groups, in the conversations with councilor Kanal, and it sounds like there was community feedback and all of these other pieces, were there other proposals that were raised, like everything going to one committee or like only some of the abcs having relationships? I don't necessarily think those are the right answer, but I'm wondering if any of those things were raised and considered in getting to this suggestion.
51 Yeah, I don't I don't know that I would be able to say exactly what those conversations were.
52 Okay, it seems like there's a lot of work that's been done that we don't have visibility into, unfortunately, and maybe that's a conversation to have with. Maybe councilor Kanal has more information and I can check in with him between committees. I do want to just raise a few things if that's okay. Chair. The first is that I hope we can explore what being a liaison committee means. I see I'm trying to get to the spot on the page. I was just skimming this a moment ago. There's a list now. I totally lost it. Anyway, there's a list on here of what some of those responsibilities are. And I think things like having a consistent committee that hears appointments from a related abc is absolutely important. I think that formalizing the idea that if those abcs have updates to give to council, the committee should make time for them. Is that makes a lot of sense to me. I hope that when abcs have reports, they want to give that that's already happening. If we have a committee that, just because of their policy area, ends up liaising with 30 of those abcs and they're supposed to have a meeting with each abc every year, that that's concerning, not because meeting with the abcs is not important, but because then we don't have time for those committees to be doing much else other than that. And that's a requirement that's in here right now. I also think if we are looking at receiving reports that we need to have hearings on every year from abcs, if we have an abc that only meets quarterly and maybe doesn't have a lot new to report every year, having that requirement in here becomes a little bit concerning for that same balance of work issue, I think we could have a list that says that the liaison committee or whatever we're calling it, is the committee that works with the abc on these things and list those things without the requirement that every year with each committee you do that work. And we might want to think a little bit differently about the formalization in that way of that relationship. I also just want to flag that while I think having having a clear direction that, hey, there's a committee that aligns with the work you're doing that you should be working with is important. There is also an argument for having a common touchpoint. And amanda, you talked about metrics who were appointed to committees making sure we're representing all portlanders. And I think it's important to look at those metrics committee by committee. But I also think it's important to look at those metrics across abcs, because it could be that on individual committees we're doing pretty well. But when you look at how things are weighted, they're weighted toward 1 or 2 groups on every committee such that collectively, across all abcs, we start to see that pattern where we might not when we're just looking at a couple. And I want us to consider whether there is a space for us to have this incoming and say, okay, let's do a quick first vet on some of these things, like, are we hitting the metrics that council determines we need to hit whatever those are? Are we aligning conversations well still, or have conversations amongst committees changed such that an abc really needs to be working in a different committee? Also, and I don't know if that place is here in governance or if that place is with council leadership, or if in the way that we assign councilors to different intergovernmental oversight bodies. We have a councilor or two who are assigned to that. I think that there are a few ways we could conceive of that, but I would ask us to consider whether we want that place where we're having the holistic conversation about abcs or not. And I think, for better or worse, either governance or council leadership seem like the obvious places where that could happen. But I'm sure that there are other creative ideas folks could come up with if they don't like those options. And maybe we'll decide that that's not worth the extra layer that it creates. There are certainly downsides, but I don't want us to lose the importance of that. I think I'll stop there for now. I might have a little bit more later if we get into a deeper discussion. Thank you chair.
53 Thank you council president. That was helpful for me. What I heard was, when talking about the relationship of the council to appointed abcs or two abcs, the a is appointed that under three, where it talks about the liaison committee has the following responsibilities. I heard you say three b receive that the the liaison committee, if this exists, receive reports and updates on the work of the abcs to which the the committee is, is connected to or liaison that one seemed to fit for you. Is that what you had said that seemed appropriate?
54 Can you give me the the number again?
55 Three.
56 Okay. Got it.
57 Yeah. So let's see. So for an example would be chair clark's t&e committee would get reports and updates from the abcs that connect to transportation and infrastructure. That's what I heard from you that one. And then okay.
58 Yeah I think b fits though I wouldn't want to put a time requirement on it. Just as reports and updates come up. They would go to a consistent place. The notification seems like a courtesy that we may have missed a few times this year, but that as we develop our relationships across government, I hope would naturally develop. And if we want to call it out, great, it's the the annual piece in c that requirement that gives me a fair amount of pause.
59 I agree and can even see it being worded where rather than it being a requirement that the liaison committee is made aware of work sessions or opportunities for that. I would also love at some point to be able to hear your feedback, because on the appointments and confirmations, this seems mostly to match what I think you've been doing, but would love to hear at whenever you'd like. Vice chair Ryan. Yes.
60 Thank you. Chair. Hi amanda and hello ocean and others that are working on this. I have just a few big concerns or just things to lift. I haven't had a chance to dive into the document. I think today you were looking for high level dialog. And so I'm going to avoid getting into some of what part of this that we're speaking of, because I don't think we came with that transparent type of assignment. So I'll start with that. I'll just do them like this. So I think we're in the conversation we wanted to be in for a while. I think that when we were putting these to the next council, these same concerns haven't been addressed. But I have this like new one, big picture, one, it feels it. I need to understand the evolution from civic life, providing a lot of this to having it suddenly be put under council operations. That's what I'm sensing today. But I've never heard the official there's some faces out there. So what's the official like through line? That said, we're going to move this from civic life responsibility to council operations. And if I missing something, tell me what it is. But that's what I thought I was hearing.
61 Sure.
62 So without naming.
63 It.
64 Which always bothers me.
65 Yeah. So so a couple of things. First, I didn't think that you were planning to discuss this document today, which is why it wasn't shared. So apologies about that because it's a council procedure. It's not really intended to come from staff. Julia just drafted it because she's very capable and thoughtful in that way. And so so apologies about that confusion. And let me just own that because I misunderstood. In my conversations with council ops.
66 I was trying to bring us back to that.
67 So and for your question around what is council ops role in this and what is civics civic life's role in this? So civic life is still the place where the advisory bodies program lives. And so that's where the the administrative rules will be something that that ocean and I and others work on and will be approved by the city administrator, the the supporting with the creation of new materials and leading the internal work group and and the staff liaisons to advisory bodies, workgroup, all of those things. The coordination of that the the development of those materials and processes, the tracking of data, like all of that operational stuff, will still happen in civic life. The council ops role, if I understand correctly, is really around the navigation of this council procedures. This is not really a place where staff have a role. And so that's my conversations with dana have sort of been around, okay, here's this, here's this document. Now. Now what. And clarity of the relationship is something that will be really helpful to staff. But you know, of course it's up to you all. And then the high level direction around what are your priorities related to implementation? I think it would be really helpful. Just me personally, as a person that's leading that periodic review to have a clear understanding of council's priorities as we develop, what is that temporal process look like? And so those are the types of things that that civic life will be doing. But we'll be looking to you all for direction.
68 Yeah. And eventually we'll get there with some common standards. Yeah. And right now we lack that okay. So I think the purpose and authority of council as it relates to the abcs is important for us to clarify. Like what is the purpose also of each one. So here's what's here's how it plays out. So in my time on council, it's been confusing. Sometimes when appointments come and there's a lack of clarity on why this, why this body exists, what its purpose is, what its goal is, and why we thought it was a good idea to appoint these people at this time. So when you're in a position in your career where you try to when you have boards, say when you're an executive director or ceo of a nonprofit, on a good day. I always had governance work with me to make sure that the the expertise talent gaps were covered when we were recruiting. Within that, we always made sure that we had we always had 50% people of color on the board that I oversaw was best practice before it was popular to say equity, because I believe you can do that. But it was more important to begin with, what are we missing in terms of expertise on the board as it relates to what the goals are of the actual body? And I still think we lack that when people come to present. And I always like to know what those goals are of that committee and what metrics they're using to to measure the success of their existence. The third one, after purpose goals, which includes metrics, is the balance of that. And so that's back to like having it be. When I remember when I had bts, which is the old word for permitting, permitting, we had too many people that actually had too many slots open. A and we didn't have enough people that were actually builders. And yet that's the group that was utilizing the services. So it made sense for us to actually have people on track that represented those that were using permitting and not to. It was out of balance that we just didn't have that. So I think it's I think we have some bodies that civic life's been working with each bureau over time, where they have certain slots for certain folks, and I think those constantly have to be updated. And I don't always experience that. That analytical work took place before they plopped someone in, which makes it feel then to me like it's personality based and not a purpose based for better word or principle based. I think that we talk a lot about the fact that we have 92, and I don't think anyone likes it, and then we say we want less, but we don't name what that is. So I want you all to come to us and say that a group of people looked at this and they've suggested, based on what we have, the portfolio should go from 92 to, let's just say 41. Let's cut it in half. Let's be bold. Right. And so what does that look like? Because right now all you hear is we have too many. We don't have enough capacity to staff all of them. And many of them aren't really that active. That's inspiring right. So that was cynical. So we don't want to continue to have that be our story. And I'd like this to be the opportunity to restart that new story. And that's where we got the hiccup when we were transitioning from one to the other, that we didn't have time while we were packing to do that. So we just put all the clutter in there and moved, as opposed to going through it and taking that time to invest in that analytical process. And then when we come up with the idea that this committee, this advisory board is no longer needed, the statute says we don't need it. There's no one at the bureau saying it's helpful. There's been enough agreement that it's not necessary. Then pull it. Like what? How do we pull that plug? What's the criteria that allows us to cut that? So if we really think we want to go from a number of 91 or 92 to a more functional number, what does it look like when you decommission like we need to know what that's like. And you perhaps might need the council to help with that. I don't know, I'm just getting us to a point where I hope there's some goals in this process. I think if we turn all of our. Public facing committees to political committees, which they become political, once this body is connected to them, we can use the word community. It sounds safer. It's a safe word. But the truth is it's a political body. Once the council gets too much of its tentacles on it. So I like it when there's more that are run by the public servants and that we adhere to some of these guidelines. So this we need guidelines.
69 Yes.
70 So that's just some advice I'm giving for part two. And I hope that next week's conversation, the week afters conversation I can see in between meeting between this and the next that I can see that you and ocean and the rest of the team have been thinking about this with perhaps dana, I don't know, but I'm using this as an opportunity to voice some of those concerns. How to decommission will be a big one.
71 Thank you for that. And yes, I agree, and many of those things that you're mentioning are discussed in the final report, which is a is we've we shared some of those bits and pieces with you all a few in December in this committee, but happy to dive more into that. Some of that is around this extensive inventory and the recommendations from the service areas for which advisory bodies.
72 Processes becoming so convoluted to me. I can't remember what we've discussed and what we haven't. Yeah, so maybe that's part of it. So I'm sorry if I'm repeating myself, but I need to see the action like how we're going to get to that action.
73 Yeah, I appreciate that. And I think once there is some code to help guide that and provide some direction, then we will launch into this implementation plan that will have those elements, and it will be based on some of those findings from those inventories. I, I, I hate to break it to you, but 41 isn't going to happen because we don't have authority over that few of the advisory boards, but certainly we could get to a number closer to that through this process of really looking at what our advisory bodies continue to serve these outlined purposes.
74 And my concern is that we don't have those guidelines that are guiding principles for all of us. I don't think if we had those, I don't think we would have had a committee that showed up that I made this point very clear. One of the biggest goals of tif is to do building of housing and the lack the the amount of people that we appointed that actually have life experience in building housing was really small. And I thought, how did we build these tif committees without a decent number of people that have housing, experience building housing, and I don't want us to get in that pickle going forward. So I felt like we had more political appointments than we had expertise, appointments, and our city needs action right now. So thank you.
75 Thank you, councilor. Thank you, vice chair, council president.
76 Thank you chair. I put myself in the queue to respond to your question. I do want to say one thing briefly, just based on our vice chairs comments. I had taken the the alignment with committees, assuming that the direction of the work of the abcs is still coming from the administrative side, and that these groups are still generally advising the administrative side, and that the relationship with committee, that liaison role was about ensuring coordination between the work that those advisory bodies are doing in the work that council committees are doing, so that we're not providing direction to a bureau in an opposite direction of an advisory body and never talking to each other. I'm flagging that because if in fact, this is turning over a lot of the running of the work of an advisory body to council operations, I would share the councilor's concerns about the political. I went there with the word that is impossible to politicize politicizing. I was trying to make it an action at the end, the politicizing of the work of the advisory bodies. I hope that's not the case, both for the sake of council ops capacity and also for the sake of having good, solid advice for our bureaus in the city. But I just wanted to to name that. And what my assumption was, and I see you nodding that my assumption is at least somewhat in line with the direction you all are going. You're not on the camera right now, so I want to call that out for folks watching us and answer. Vice president chair, to your question about the process, this process is very similar to what we currently do. This is a bit of a naming of how things happen. Two things that I'll flag. I have seen some of these come through as resolutions and some as reports. This notes that they would all come through as resolutions. I think that's great. I think consistency is always better, but I just want to name that. I don't think we're considering it now. There's a difference there. You asked about differences. The other is that the language on the page here talks about appointments could come from committee separated or together, and that appointments come from committee and generally go on the consent agenda. And I would assume that if a committee has separated out a name from the appointment list, that likely the committee's intent is for the bulk of the names to go on consent, but the separated out name to come forward separately for debate. And I just want to make sure that we don't box ourselves in. Maybe that's not always the case, but I would assume that that might be the case. I don't want to box us into the committee having to place both on consent. We might say that generally appointments will come to the council. Right now, I think it says the liaison committee will seek the council's confirmation of appointments via resolution. Appointments will come to the council on the consent agenda. We might just add a line saying something like, if an appointment has been removed from the group in order to have separate consideration, that appointment may come on the regular agenda. A may not a must or a shall, but just to allow us to follow what I would guess would be the committee's intent there. Yeah, but other than those two things, this looks pretty in line with what we currently do. Thank you for asking.
77 Yeah, thank you for that. Yeah. Go ahead.
78 Yeah. Let the minutes read that my math was off. So 90 two half is not 41. I was giving this to 82. So 46. But I think it's important that we have an aspirational goal of some sort because we've been complaining about how many we have for a long time. So I hope that the staff can say these are the ones that haven't been meeting for x amount of years, and there's a reason for that. And so those will be the ripe fruit that hopefully we can eliminate and then get to where we see some duplication. I think raymond lee and his team will be able to look at where there's duplication and where there could be greater efficiencies. So I really am going to keep just reminding us how important it is for us to not continue to complain about how many we have.
79 Yeah.
80 Thank you.
81 Yeah. Thank you. And that's the hope with the code reconciliation in the spring. And then also what doesn't get picked up in that lower hanging fruit process based on the recommendations that have come through so far with the inventory and analysis that then the additional bodies as they go through this periodic review, that will be a time to really ask those critical questions. Are these still an effective use of community's time? Are they still serving the need? You know? Et cetera.
82 Thank you for that, vice chair. What I'm hearing from some of my colleagues is that it would be helpful to hear from the abc team, what were some of the recommendations and some of the trade offs? How how are they considered what was considered when crafting these recommendations? I think that would be helpful. And I know I might have been the one that kind of brought us more in the weeds rather than up high. So sorry about that. I know that julia meyer did a lot of the in the weeds work, and so maybe we can check in with her and get some of those answers. And I know that there's a lot of openness from your team, I believe, to hear input about where is a good place to land for this. I would say probably specifically around the relationship of between council and the abcs. And so what would be the best way for committee members to engage with your team before our next before our next governance meeting, when this will hopefully be coming as a resolution?
83 You can reach out to me.
84 Reach out directly to you. Wonderful. Thank you so much. Thanks for being with us today. Keelan. Can you please read the next item?
85 Item three discussion about council's strategic priorities. Collaboration.
86 Mr. Lee, it's so great to have you with us. It's an honor. Welcome to the governance committee. As we are talking about governance, it seemed like a great time to talk about council's strategic priorities and collaboration. I know one thing I've been so encouraged to hear from you is your excitement around strategic planning, and also around retreats and even different types of retreats budget retreat, overall annual retreat. And so I'm excited to pass things off to vice chair Ryan to kick us off and make some remarks. Thank you.
87 Thank you so much, chair. Good to see you, raymond. And it is a great day because we do have you here sitting in the box, city administrator raymond lee. And we're going to talk about visions and goals for council's strategic priority setting, basically trying to come up with shared priorities. And that will happen before January 31st least. Will have the conversation before then. And I just wanted to make sure that we could share some thoughts out with you prior to that. You know, last spring when I started, first started talking about this, and I want to thank all of you for your patience as I wouldn't stop talking about it. It it finally happened. So we did take a vote at the end of the year, and we decided it is a wise idea. Like every large organization that's complex, to have a priority setting conversation with those that are accountable to the public, and we don't know how that will turn out. We know that no one will get their way. We have a lot of evidence of of that of late. And so but what's important is that we begin those conversations and we know what our north stars are. And I know when I was in dialog with you as a candidate, it was really clear to me that you've set up some of these processes in the past. So what I'm attached to today is just having a, I would say, a casual, transparent dialog about what some of those practices were like and lessons learned. We always I always fail forward. So it's from the mistakes that we learned from that allows us to improve. It's not about perfectionism. It's about what you've learned in the past that you would like to keep evolving with so that you can bring those to us here in Portland. And I'm just extremely encouraged by that dialog that we've had with you. So really, colleagues, I just wanted to open this up and give you the floor first so that you can kind of help level set us on what you would like to share with us about your experience in getting this conversation started, and any other points that you'd like to offer. I have a feeling that this could be revised and improved as we move towards the entire council and work session, so really, this is just some throat clearing for us to get moved to move towards that dialog. Ian, you're in. All right.
88 I'm in.
89 So I'm going to go ahead and turn it over to mr. Lee.
90 Amazing. Thank you. Yeah I'm glad the mic actually works over here too as well. Thank you councilors for actually inviting me to actually talk about this conversation. This is actually one of the topics that I actually enjoy talking about, because any time that you're looking at an organization and truly trying to figure out what that organization is about, what the organization stands for, you have to be able to look at the priorities of that organization and the strategic direction of that organization. I've been fortunate in my career to be a part of organizations that have already had that established, and I've been fortunate to be a part of organizations that have not had that established, and we had to co-create that as leaders of the administration of the organization and working with the electeds to really create. What are those priorities or key focus areas that we're looking at and that will be emphasizing on? And what is the vision for those areas? You know what I've seen to be successful in most of these conversations always has been to find some commonality with the electors regarding this is below ten priorities that we all can agree upon to a certain degree, that we have an alignment on on. This is the direction that we need to do this. What I've seen success in doing that in is through retreats. And these haven't been, you know, half a day retreats. Some of these have been two day retreats to really be strategic about how we are tackling and focusing in on what are those key things as themes quality of life, public safety. Community, vitality. What are those key things? As a council, an elected group that you want to see us excel in as an organization that really tells the story about who we are as an organization. And those conversations sometimes can be some very complex and dynamic conversations, but it really helps us hone in as an administration on what are those key things that we need to be focusing on as it relates to how do we budget? How do we staff things from a resource standpoint, and how do we really make decisions regarding about how do we enhance the capacity and looking at how we're performing overall, we create dashboards off of these type of things to really show progress in the community of how we are achieving these key focus areas and priorities as an organization and as a council. That council can speak to their constituents and residents about as well. These are key things, but those conversations have to be intentional. Those conversations have to be set aside for really strategic strategy planning. I think so often we get caught into the day to day of putting out fires as administration, as councils responding to what's the topic of that day. But this is really preparing us to be future focused as an organization and really honing in on what is the organization that we're going to be down the road, because we're always looking at process improvement, growth, always looking at how do we have this commitment to excellence and trying to grow ourselves and grow this organization that is providing optimal services to our businesses and residents of our community, and that structure of those strategic planning sessions to be future focused, to be focusing on strategy. You know, we have to be committed to. And this is not just a one in every 2 to 3 year type activity that we're allocating our time to. It's one of those things that every year we're coming back to the table and having a discussion regarding, are we still on this same track? Have we done the things that we say we were going to do as an organization? If we have great, how can we grow that if we haven't? What are those opportunities for growth, for the organization? And really having a facilitated conversation in that is essential. So we're all sitting down at a table. You know, we've had conversations. I love your idea. It's hard to do strategic planning. I know we're kind of limited for public consumption of the of the dialog that would take place sitting at the dais. I love the strategic planning sessions where we're all sitting down and we're having conversation in a facilitated conversation regarding what's happening today, what are some of those dilemmas that are causing us not to be able to reach where we want to be, and what are some of the things that we need to be changing the way that we do business to get us to where we need to be in the future? But these are the kind of things that you do a yearly kind of kind of strategic priority setting, but you have quarterly check ins from the standpoint of saying, okay, this is where we are. These are the things that we said we were going to do. These are kind of the milestones that we have developed and said, hey, this is how we're going to be able to gauge success, because I think one of the biggest things in strategic priority setting is really developing what those outcomes would be as well. And what does success look like from a council perspective and really hear from staff as well? What are those kind of measuring sticks to be able to show proof of those outcomes being able to be achieved as an organization? I think those are some key things. As we get into a strategic planning conversation. One is what are those priorities that we're looking at, trying to say are the key things that we're going to tell our story as an organization to is going to be what are the outcomes that show us? Have we been able to achieve that? And three, what is the reporting mechanism back out to not only the council but to the community? How are we being transparent regarding the things that we have discussed and the things that we say we were going to do as an organization, and getting that out to the community where anybody, anybody coming to know what is Portland about and what is the direction of Portland, that they can easily be able to tell by the priorities that we have set, the vision that we have for our community, and how we say we're going to achieve that vision and turn that vision into a reality for us. Those are some of the key things that we have to be able to achieve coming through a strategic priority setting situation meeting to really give some sense of direction and roadmap to the whole organization about how will the organization be moving forward. And that really gives clarity. And as you say, that north star to our bureau leadership's regarding the type of budget requests that they need to be bringing forward in the future, you know, how do what do I need to be emphasizing as we have executive leadership team meetings with our bureau and director leaderships about the direction that we're heading? I received my direction from the elected body. I'm not making up my own strategic direction on that, you know, and you get into fuzzy ground when you have to do that. And I want to make sure that everybody has alignment regarding not agreement, but alignment on where that strategic direction is heading. Us as an organization.
91 Thank you. The floor is open and I turn it over to you then and just keep the dialog going. Yeah. Thank you so much. Would you like to be called mr. Lee city administrator lee, what's your preferred pronoun?
92 Or way to be addressed? Yeah.
93 I'm okay with raymond. With what? With raymond. I'm okay with raymond. Thanks.
94 Wonderful.
95 I don't know what to say.
96 Yeah. Councilor. Clark, I think this can be pretty casual, too. We have, you know, about ten ish minutes, and folks can just hop in and ask questions, give comments.
97 Thank you. Council vice president, thank you so much. I'm so glad to see you here. And so happy that we're talking about this, this very topic. I remember back to when you first met with us as a full council and we talked about this. We touched on this, and I didn't get to ask my question at that point, but I will ask it now is one of the things that you mentioned. And I love this alignment versus agreement. I love everything that you're saying. You mentioned pre-work, and I didn't have a chance to ask you, what is that pre-work? I will ask you now because I am anxious to sink my teeth into this and to get going. And anything that I can do in advance of a process, I would love to start. I think I have friends on colleagues here that are also anxious to get going. So what can we be doing now before we set up a process? You have some pre-work that you would like us to do.
98 I would always say from a pre-work perspective, because all of this is pre-work, to really developing a strategic plan for the organization. The priorities is just one of those building blocks to towards building a strategic plan for the organization. What I would say for some of the pre-work, really think about what are those key things that you say the city has to do no matter what?
99 Councilor Clark, were you that like overachiever, always trying to get extra credit? Student absolutely. I can see it. Councilor Ryan, is your hand up again? Yeah. Go ahead.
100 And what I would throw in there as well, besides thinking about those things, we also have to be thinking about before we go in that room. How will we show up in that room as as professionals, as colleagues? How would we show up in that room to be open, to be honest with each other and have a dialog about how we move things forward as a collective group? That's going to be essential for us to be able to come away out of this meeting and really thinking about what is the future of this organization. You know, you have different books and I'll share some things with council, but one thing that I want council to be really tuned in is how do we become future focused as an organization.
101 And councilor Clark, in all seriousness, I have been so grateful for your commitment and openness to doing this work. You've been excited about it since day one. Did you want to say anything else?
102 I just want to make sure that I love your number one point, that what must we be doing as a city? And I would just say we must be taking care of what we have, folks. We must be taking care of our asset management. That is my number one issue. So thank you.
103 When I've done these before, I've seen people get lost in language. So there's words like goals. There's words like priorities. There's words like strategies. There's words like tactics. And maybe that's why you have a facilitator.
104 Exactly. And that's something that we work to as well. I think.
105 That the pre-work question made me want to get to this line of thinking. I think I think defining those clearly would be important. I think all of us coming up with our top five goals for the city will be the easiest. All you have to do is listen to the campaign of 2024 and every like all almost 200 candidates have the same goals. Sometimes they would say priorities, sometimes they'd say strategies. But to me they sound like goals for the city. We need more housing. So is that a goal? Is that a priority or is the big picture like there's big bucks goal housing? What's the priority within that? Exactly. How are you going to define success within that? What are the three metrics you're going to measure. And then those metrics below that there's tactics that start to be more like sub indicator goals that influence that strategy. So that's my way of saying I think it would be really helpful if we got a glossary of the language so that we can all get on the same page at least, and accept it. So it would make the conversation go smoother. Does that make sense?
106 That made perfect sense. And that was actually some of the conversation. And after I was watching the meeting, I saw different councilors interchanging strategic planning with priority setting. And those are two different disciplines. One builds upon the other, but they're totally two different things. And one thing that I would want the community to know, the citizens of this community to know is anytime you go through a strategic planning process, you're going to want engagement from the people, the business community, the civic community. You would want that engagement from them. And there's different ways to go about getting that to developing that comprehensive strategic plan. This is just that first phase of it to have some sense of direction of where we're heading as an organization that builds upon that and building that momentum of creating a true strategic plan in the near future for this organization.
107 And I think the language of counting, I think you used the word counting widgets. Widgets. Yeah. And so that's like those are inputs. Too often government says, oh we, we fed x number of people. We another group says we picked up this much trash. Well it's sad that there was that much trash to pick up. So perhaps the goal wouldn't be keep picking up more trash. It's more like have less to pick up. And yet we never get to that because our outcome is the input. And so I think we need that type of discipline. How when you've been with other bodies, how do you incorporate the mayors list with the council's list? And then there's the leadership in your team. And obviously when we're all rowing, paddling in the same direction, we're going to have more impact. So collective impact, it's that slide where the arrows are all going different directions. You go in a circle and start digging a hole. So how can we make sure that there is at least with a few things, there's some alignment between the three branches. Do you think it all starts dangerous?
108 No doubt it starts here. And you know, that question, you know, is the million dollar question for a lot of organizations about how do we get buy in. This is a little unique situation, though with the structure and the form of government we have, it gets easier with, you know, with a council manager form of government because the mayor is just another elected member on the city council. This is a unique setting where the mayor is not a member of the city council, where he is sitting kind of in that that executive seat where he gets to chime in. The one thing that I have seen, though, no matter what city I have been in, the key focus here in the priorities for cities predominantly the same. I don't care what city you're in, they're pretty much the same. When you get to the heart of the essence of providing government services.
109 I think the goals are the same. But I don't always think the priorities are.
110 The priorities are the same because when you look at.
111 Goals and priorities are the same.
112 Not for most of they are. I've never met a community that didn't say they want a high quality of life.
113 That's real aspirational. Okay.
114 That's how you get that. We have to build that. What do we say success looks like? We have to co-create that. But I've never seen a community that didn't say they want a safe and secure community. So some of these priorities like priorities as we look at you're looking at kind of themes of what you're trying to achieve as an organization. And those things are pretty or pretty simple from that standpoint. Now how you achieve that is uniqueness for that community. But those overarching themes, key focus areas are pretty set for a lot of different cities that, you know, you can come up creative housing for all. Now, that was one of our key focus areas in my previous community, because we wanted housing through the spectrum of housing, not just affordable housing. We wanted housing for entry level home, first time home buyers to executive level housing. As we were recruiting new businesses to our community. So those are some common themes. Now, what that vision statement that is attached to that priority will be different for this community and be different for other communities of how they're trying to achieve that. And what does that truly mean for that community? But when you look at these overarching themes that we can get behind and have some alignment on, that's what I'm really looking at when I look at a priority setting strategic planning session on that topic, and some of that is going to have to be co-created from expected outcomes. Does council have that same understanding of what that is for us to be in that meeting? And I think that's why it's so great. If some of the pre-work of having a facilitator come in and really kind of setting that groundwork for us as we build to that actual retreat date of having this conversation. But that's kind of what I was leaning to. The goals of how you achieve that, that's separate than the actual priority.
115 Okay.
116 The goals will show how we are able to achieve that priority. But the priority is a overarching theme.
117 Okay.
118 Good good. Okay.
119 You can do it different ways. Just it's getting the common language context.
120 I think the common language, the common words. And also having kind of some common underlying facts is really important. Yeah. That's I have like three directions I want to go early. As we talked about this process, my reservation was that we would get stuck not getting past the what. Because the things you just said for the what we're all going to agree to. But this council has a lot of strong opinions about the how where we don't agree. And I think it's really important as we have these conversations, that we both find the alignment on those places where across our city, we are all calling for the same what, but that we also start to explore the different how's. Because otherwise I fear that we leave, that we leave that to disconnected debates on policy or to interpretations by folks within the administration who haven't gotten full direction about where we are. And so I just would encourage us and you and everyone on council who's thinking about how we set this up to make sure that we give ourselves the space both to have those opportunities to show where we are very much aligned, and also to dig a little deeper. I also hope that we get some of those big questions in advance. The pre-work you talked about, what must we do? I also think it would be interesting to ask what the top issues that each of us want to make an impact on are, but also what the top issues that each of us want us as a whole to make an impact on are because I think the answers to those might be different in some cases. And so I hope that whoever is leading this work. Gets out to council a few big questions that we can chew on beforehand, maybe get to the facilitator, maybe just bring in with us to start to get us thinking more broadly about why it is that that we're coming together in this way. I also want to make sure, before we end this discussion, that we get to brass tacks a little bit because I have a concern. We passed a resolution calling for this work to be done by the end of the month, and council operations has done some polling on dates to see if there are times when we can all come together. But if we are truly talking about an outside facilitator, when we first passed that resolution, I think we were looking at having the city administrator lead the discussion. And if we're doing this work with you, I think we can still meet that deadline. But if we are bringing in an outside facilitator. I'm not sure how we do that. And so I just would like to name that. And I don't know if folks here have any thoughts on whether we need to bring our colleagues an amendment on the timeline, or whether we need to give some clear direction to the city administrator on how we want to run this. If it's more important to us to have aa2 day retreat versus a retreat sooner, a facilitated retreat versus getting this done by that deadline, I think it's worth, if anybody has strong opinions there, putting those out right now. Yeah. Because I am a little bit worried about how we get it done. The project seems to me like it is growing in terms of formality and scope. From what I thought we first talked about, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing, but I don't think it's a thing we can do in the short timeline that we gave ourselves.
121 Thank you. Can I make a recommendation at least? Let's start. I think the sooner the better. So I would even pare it back if we did the pre-work, got on it right away, and somehow raymond lee's staff was able to digest all that or put it in some put it together that I would like to try, that we do that with our new city manager as a as a first step. And if and if we don't get too far or not far enough, then we can we can do more. But I just think it's imperative that we get on this now, as soon as possible. Well, we're all we're fresh with you. I mean, we're all new to you, and we have kind of a blank slate here. So I think it's important that we get going as quickly as possible and do as much as we can without outside help. And if we can't manage that, then fine. We'll go back to the drawing board. That's my $0.02.
122 I think we have an opportunity. We have this resolution that just says, sit down and do this quickly to do exactly what you just laid out. And then if that is successful, because I know some of our colleagues are worried it won't be if that is successful and our council leadership and, mr. Administrator, you would like to do a more in-depth look, we can give ourselves more time. Maybe in March, maybe after the budget to sit down and dig deeper. Maybe at the start of next year we do something deeper. I don't think that doing what you just said writes off the possibility of doing something more in depth, and maybe that's what we need to do, is run now quickly and then pause and decide how much deeper we want to go after that.
123 Well, I'd like to see us get as far as we can before the budget. So this informs the budget if possible.
124 Okay. Yeah, I, I think we have to be careful not to let perfection get in the way of good. So we've never done this before, so anything's better than nothing. And so I think if we get started with the pre-work, we will have something landed. And we could probably meet that deadline. And I'm sure we'll find at least three that we can all get some majority consensus on. Thank you.
125 You know, as we look at this and, you know, I can fall victim of that myself because I've been in situations where you only get one shot to be able to get this before people say, you know what, this is a waste of my time and they won't sign up for it again. And I just want us to be strategic about how we move it forward, that we're not creating an environment for people to say, see, I knew this wasn't going to work. And they say, why invest in this moving forward? I wasted my day. We couldn't get this done. And sometimes you need someone that is an expert in facilitating some of these tough conversations, because there will be some very tough conversations on this day regarding the direction of where we're going for the future of this city. And I don't want to just waste that opportunity, and it may not be a waste if we can get some alignment on certain things as a collective group, but we run that risk and we just need to be aware of the risks that we have associated with this, but also the opportunity we have with this as well, because there is opportunity to really set a foundation on how we move forward. I'd just like to lay out both of them to the group and make sure you are making the most knowledgeable, informed decision that you can make at this time.
126 Well thank you. I really appreciate what you just said. I understand the risk, and I think we need to make that real clear to everyone that this is just a first step, a small step. We need to take a small first step forward and make it clear that this is could be imperfect. It could be it could melt down. I don't know, but we won't know unless we try. And I just feel that the time is of the essence. Maybe we don't invest so much in it that it gets so built up that what you're saying is true, that, oh, I'm never going to do this again, that we just take a small step here and and see how far we can get. But I appreciate your highlighting the risk.
127 Okay.
128 Go ahead.
129 I think we experienced a year where the mayor had a real clear priority, and the whole city knew about it, and then where we going to let them finish that priority or not? But what's your priority council question mark? We can't have another year like that, people. And ideally we'd be aligned with the mayor on those. And then you'll see a city that works. Yeah.
130 I'm glad you just said that, vice chair Ryan. It's making me think about having councilors really articulate. What are you for? Not just what are you against? I liked how council president was talking about us being able to bring our own priorities, goals forward for our districts, for each other, for the. Yeah, and also district specific that we can bring district specific stuff. I am very encouraged by all of this. Really appreciate your time with us, mr. Raymond. It's been great and look forward to more meetings with you. Is this the first committee you've come to?
131 I step in a little.
132 Bit.
133 Okay.
134 I actually stepped in on the finance committee for a brief little minute before I got pulled out of that one.
135 Wonderful.
136 So this is one and a half. All right.
137 Well, thank you so much. Really appreciate your time.
138 Thank you as well I appreciate the invite.
139 Yeah.
140 All right. Keelan, will you please read the next item.
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141 Item number four, discussion and reflection on governance committee.
142 Thank you. So for our first governance committee in the new year 2026, I wanted to provide some time on our agenda to reflect on the previous year. 2025 was the first year our city was operating after major charter changes. For many of us, myself included. It was our first year serving as an elected official, and for all of us, it was our first year serving specifically as a Portland city councilor. So I wanted to take this opportunity as a committee, as committee members, to reflect on governance. What do you believe has worked well? What could have been improved? What issues of governance would you like to see explored in the coming year, and in the transportation and infrastructure committee? Earlier today, we had a chance to have some of this sharing and it was really helpful. So I welcome comments from my colleagues. I can also kick us off if you'd like.
143 Please.
144 Well, thinking back over the last year, I will say this is a committee. I'm excited to go to that I, you know, generally enjoy going to I'm sincerely proud of the work that we've done on the governance handbook. I think it can be a valuable resource not just for current council offices, but for the public and for future electeds elected officials. I know I would have loved to have a handbook, and I look forward to discussing it more. I am proud of the work on the abcs, on the advisory bodies and commissions. I know that it's a long road and there's more to go, and there's a lot of work to do, and I'm so grateful that my colleagues are going to continue to bring up these things that we need to make sure that we hit. I'm glad that we established procedures on council tiebreaking. Thank you for that. Was us right, councilor Ryan? We worked on that. Thank you for your partnership on that. Yeah. Yeah. I believe it's important to note that actually, the mayor has not yet needed to break any tie for us, that at the full council, I want to acknowledge the role of the governance committee in working with and continuing the work that the transition team had started, that gtac, the government transition advisory committee had began, and stuff that had come forward from community. I'm looking forward to what we were talking about today, this work of continuing strategic planning and norm setting. I am excited about the idea of progress on establishing the city council as a body, just not a collection of individual councilors. I am. I'm looking forward in this year to some more in-depth work and opportunities to improve in areas when it comes to our city budget, and I want to note that many of the topics that we've gotten discussed up here, we've been able to bring in some other councilors into those conversations and hope that we can continue discussions around how we can have some more council wide discussions about governance issues. Thank you, councilor Clarke. Do you want to go ahead?
145 Sure. I'm still thinking through it, but let me give you what I have so far and then give other folks a chance. I well, thank you, chair. I think you've done a great job chairing the committee, setting the agenda, keeping us moving forward. I really appreciate your work. I am also appreciative that we took the time to take the geotech seriously from the very beginning, that we took their recommendations and incorporated. Some of them had some really great dialog around all the investment of time that they made before we got here. In the future, I would just say that I really hope we can help in paring down the abcs, that we put the pedal to the metal on that and try to try to reduce the number and figure out a process for their work and the committees. I'm wondering if we can't help with the priority setting and the strategic planning. Possibly there could be a role for governance there, and one I guess small regret I have is that we didn't really get deeply into decorum, and it's very uncomfortable given last week's discussion, because I think we could have used some more decorum or respect of our fellow colleagues in that regard. But I think overall, this has been a great committee. I can see it continuing in some form, whether it gets I mean, who knows what's going to happen in the future with the committee, but good job. I think we've done a good job. And I know at different times I've said to you all here, my colleagues, that I really enjoy coming here. I enjoy making making progress. Sometimes it's tedious, not so fun, but but good job.
146 Go ahead. Councilor thank you.
147 Chair, I want to thank chair and vice chair Ryan, because I think that this has been a really effective committee for a few different reasons. I think this committee has done an incredible job of making sure as we tackle some big issues, that our colleagues not on this committee also have a lot of thoughts on in bringing in additional voices through creating time and space for our colleagues to sit at the table and present on amendments in a really comprehensive way, and the balance between ensuring that we're still up here as the committee that our colleagues voted to assign to take on the decision making on those issues, but that we are also bringing in those other perspectives, has been struck in a really effective way. I think that we have been very collaborative and thoughtful, and I've seen it different times. Each of the five of us be a bit of the odd one out, while the other four moved forward with something, and we've done that thoughtfully, respectfully, but also courageously. I think each one of us in a way that speaks to the way we've been able to work together. I also really appreciate that this committee has done an incredible job at the the iterative process of bringing something forward as a discussion item, talking through it while it's midway through drafting, but not fully through the reviews yet, going back and finishing the drafting and then bringing it back for debate and and passing and having that process where we have something before us that has already gotten some feedback, we've addressed the biggest legal concerns, things like that, but it's not quite done yet so that we can make sure we catch any big changes that our colleagues might be looking for. Before we ask our staff to do. The final reviews, I think has allowed us to bring forward better policy on multiple occasions, and I think we've also done it in a way that allows us to really respect our staff time, who are doing the drafting and review with us, and I think that's happened in other committees as well. But I've seen it done especially well multiple times in this committee, and I really appreciate that iterative work that we've been able to do together. There was a lot of conversation at the midpoint in the year when we were talking about committees and their roles, about whether we should have a governance committee. I think having this space to do some of that pre-work, even as some of these things need discussion at council, is helpful. But if we do end up making changes to the governance committee space within this body, I would encourage us to think differently about how we govern the city versus how we govern ourselves as a body. So, for example, today, I think we had one of each on the agenda. And while we might decide in the future, and I'm certainly not advocating for this, but I know that many people will, that the way that we govern ourselves should be discussed by the whole body first, and not by a committee first. I do think there's a really important role for us to be looking at how we govern the city, things like the abcs in a committee where we can dig in a little deeper and do some of that, that pre-work for our colleagues. So I would just encourage us, if folks are thinking about changes that might come forward in committees, to not discount the importance of a governance committee, even if only for those those more city wide governance issues, I think they're really important, and they do need a space where we have councilors who are really focused on that piece of the work that we do. Just my initial thoughts and truly my gratitude to all of my colleagues here, but especially to our two leaders of this committee. Thank you.
148 Council president. I don't want to assume this. Which of the two items were in which category today?
149 The. That's fair. The abcs to me seem like how are we? How is the city governed? How is the administration running? How are we interacting? I think you could argue that the strategic planning is a a how is the city governed? But I think you could also argue that that like the conversations about about our, our structure and things, decorum, for example, are how we govern ourselves.
150 That's fair. And I think sometimes it's both. Certainly on a lot of the items.
151 On many of the.
152 And I love that you brought this up because it was really helpful to think about the fact that many times it's an and.
153 And on abcs we do include in there how does it go through the council process and the committee process, which gets a little bit to how do we govern ourselves? But I think much of the abc work is how do these other bodies operate within our city? So I'd put it in that other category. But you're right, there's always going to be overlap. And if we I'm not advocating to separate the two, but I know that that may come up in the future. And if we do go in that direction, I think we'll have to there will be gray areas. Yeah. And hopefully we can allow folks to make the call on the gray area and move forward, knowing that no one ever makes the gray area call the same way as some other person would.
154 Yeah, I.
155 I really appreciate that framing. I think for me, you also got to what I thought was positive about this committee and why I've enjoyed being on it. I think, first of all, I've never served on a community organization that didn't have the following two committees a governance committee and a finance committee. After that, they've always been ad hoc based on the priorities of the organization and the mission of the in. Those tend to be more adaptive to the year and the priorities. So and I think as we are building a new council, it made a lot of sense to especially have an internal system builder, because in the handoff from one form to the next, we we didn't have a chance to be in the reality of this. And so that's why the g tack like dialog continued in the first six months. It was important. So I would say that all that said, I think we need more clarity sometimes. It's been confusing on. I do think it's important that we think out loud about these before, like going to this whole council with a blank slate doesn't seem to be a winning proposition yet. Going to this council with a slate of any sort means that there's going to be reactions, because they're independent thinkers. But the getting back to this committee, I think, reminds us that we're nonpartisan and that we're focused on the well-being of the city. This isn't a caucus, and it's so important that we come together as a whole body to do what's best for the city and what's best for the decorum of the elected officials to move things forward. I think we got halfway on the tiebreaker. I think we continue to I think there's going to be a lot that this committee talks about that in time. We might talk about again, because it's going to be continuous improvement. I personally have found sitting through countless votes last week to be an example of like, I think when I asked my average friend out there, they're like, why isn't the mayor breaking the tie? That's one reason I voted yes on the charter. So I think we've had some tough calls and we've had some fascinating conversations with legal, and I don't think we figured that out yet, and I think the public would agree with that. So I don't think we should ever pat ourselves on the back that something's ever really done in this committee. That's the hard part. You're constantly building and improving and that's that's the pro is that this is the committee where I feel it's the most nonpartisan and we have the most transparent dialog, and we're less rooted into caucus speak. And I appreciate that. I think the authority of this committee has been questioned, constantly experienced that when we had a bcs or when we even appoint people, and then we have to reappoint them when it goes to the council. Not good or bad, but sometimes this does feel like it could be a committee of the whole. Like there's a lot of our issues that just need to quickly go to the committee of a whole, because it's going to happen anyway. And I think more so than the other three committees I sit on. I experienced that with this committee. Like when we finally do bring something, you would have thought that no one cared. The fact that we have thought about it and spent some good time working on it. And so there's that. So I just want to say that we I think we've been open I think we've proven that you can be people that are labeled by the community, maybe as being a different. Caucuses can work together for the good of the order for the city, because this is about how we work together, and we have to keep improving that, because that's what we're expected to do. As as people serving portlanders. So I hope that a variation of this continues. A lot of times it's been the leadership that guides the governance committee. And then you might bring on a couple at large people. So I think it made sense that the two of you were saying, well, you should be the chair, you know, why would you? But but I get, you know, everything can be reevaluated. But I do think it's very important that you have leadership guiding this committee because it always comes back to the leaders. Anyway, on a lot of the nuances that we discussed. So it's been really valuable for me to sit with the the four others on this committee, and especially with the leadership. But I think we're just in the middle of building something that's really complicated. And it continues and I appreciate that. So thank you for knowing that. It was good to just reflect a little bit. And I'll just say the priorities conversation was, you know, the one that I'm glad it took almost a year to land, but we landed it so we can springboard into 2026 with more aspirations and more expectations of us as leaders. Yeah, thanks.
156 Thank you for all of that, vice chair Ryan, I will say one of the highlights of the last year has been getting to serve alongside you and work with you. I think back to when we were sworn in, and there was that photo of us giving each other a high five in the middle of the stage, and that was the first moment when I was like, I want to get to know that guy. And it's been great getting to know you professionally and personally. Thank you for being such a great partner.
157 Welcome.
158 All right. In future governance meetings, we expect to after working with amanda garcia, snell's team bring forward a resolution around the next steps of the advisory bodies enhancement project. We also are looking forward to the council president providing updates to city code 3.02. I think that will come at the next meeting. And all right, it looks like it's time to adjourn this meeting of the governance committee. Thank you.
159 Thanks.