The record · Transcript
Council Session — 2025-04-23
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Session summaryEditor-reviewed
The Portland City Council held a special meeting on April 23, 2025, at 1001 SW 4th Avenue, with roll call, rules of order, and agenda approval completed before proceeding to three carried-over agenda items. The first item concerned an ordinance authorizing revenue bonds of up to $80 million (with related figures cited inconsistently, including an estimated $81.2 million) to finance curb ramp and street improvement projects. Discussion covered ADA ramp compliance under a settlement agreement, coordination between ramp work and paving schedules, cost increases for ramp construction, budget impacts, and questions about future bonding needs. A motion to close debate on this item failed to pass; outcomes are recorded in the vote ledger, and the ordinance moved to second reading. The council then opened agenda items two and three together: a resolution on funding for a workforce pre-apprenticeship program and Summer Works youth employment initiative, and a resolution directing PBOT to evaluate the Sidewalk Improvement and Paving Program (CIP). Committee summaries, invited guest testimony, and public testimony addressed workforce development, youth employment, and sidewalk equity, particularly in Districts One and Four. An amendment moving Summer Works oversight to the Bureau of Human Resources passed; a separate motion to call the question failed. Item two was adopted as amended. Item three was not reached before the meeting concluded at noon, with continuation planned for the next meeting on May 7.
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0 Good morning. I am going to call our special meeting. That's what we're calling this. Our special meeting to order. It is April 23rd at 1001 keelan. Could you please call the roll?
1 Canal? Ryan here. Koyama Lane here. Morillo here. Novick here. Clark. Here. Green. Here. Zimmerman. Avalos. Dunphy. Here. Smith. Here. Pirtle-guiney.
2 Got an o.
3 Here. Apologies. Could our attorney please read the rules of order and decorum? Ordinances?
4 Welcome to the Portland city council. To testify before council in person or virtually, you must sign up on the council agenda at wwe Portland.gov/council agenda. Information on engaging with council can be found on the council clerk's web page. Individuals may testify for three minutes unless the presiding officer states otherwise. Your microphone will be muted when your time is over. The presiding officer preserves order disruptive conduct, such as shouting, refusing to conclude your testimony when your time is up, or interrupting others testimony or council deliberations will not be allowed. If you cause a disruption, a warning will be given. Further disruption will result in ejection from the meeting. Anyone who fails to leave once ejected is subject to arrest for trespass. Additionally, council may take a short recess and reconvene virtually. Your testimony should address the matter being considered. When testifying. First, state your name for the record. Your address is not necessary. Second, if you are a lobbyist, identify the organization you represent. Third, virtual testifiers should unmute themselves when council clerk calls your name. Thank you.
5 Thank you. Councilors. The first item on our agenda is agenda approval. Are there any requests to amend or reorder the agenda? Seeing none, do I have unanimous consent to approve the agenda?
6 Yes.
7 I'm seeing head nods. Keelan and no objections.
8 A bobblehead moment.
9 So, councilors, because this is a special meeting, we don't have some of our other regular orders of business. We're just going to jump right into our regular agenda. All three items on our agenda are things that we did not get to last Wednesday. We are scheduled for two hours from 10 to 12 today, and I know there are some folks who have either conflicts that they have to leave early for or hard stops right at noon. So we are going to end either at noon or if somebody is mid-sentence a minute or two after. And if we are not able to get through all of these agenda items, we'll need to carry them over to a future meeting. I apologize to potentially have to do that twice. With that keelan, could you please read the first item on our agenda?
10 Item one authorize revenue bonds in an amount sufficient to provide not more than $80 million to finance curb, ramp, and street improvement projects.
11 Thank you. And I believe christopher haire is our council operations staffer today. Perfect. Chris, can you read your committee staff summary for us?
12 Good morning, madam president. Madam vice president, councilors. For the record, my name is christopher haire, council policy analyst with council operations, and I serve as staff to the finance committee. The ordinance before you document number 2025131 was considered in the finance committee on April 7th, where it was referred to council with a recommendation to pass the ordinance authorizing the issuance of revenue bonds pursuant to ors 287 .150 and related statutes in an amount sufficient to provide not more than $80 million to finance certain curb, ramp and street improvements and related costs. The ordinance provides additional amounts sufficient to pay capitalized interest, accrued interest on any interim financing, and estimated costs related to the revenue bonds authorized. The principal amounts of revenue bonds to be sold is estimated not to exceed $81.2 million. The full impact statement on this item includes a financial and budget impacts and analysis, and information on potential community impacts and community involvement. There was no verbal or written testimony on this ordinance prior to committee action. This concludes the committee staff summary. Thank you.
13 Thank you, counselor Zimmerman, you presided over that meeting. Is there anything you'd like to add?
14 Thank you. Just a very quick note. In terms of items that come before the finance committee, I know that there will be some questions today about the operations that this finance mechanism is financing. And I think those are appropriate questions. But that is not a line of questioning that the finance committee got into. We really took it from a position of the authorizations of bonds for other committees or other city operations who have already, quote unquote, vetted that plan. And so while I recognize that there'll be some questions today, I have them as well. And I think that's completely appropriate. The finance committee spoke with the cfo and team regarding what this meant in terms of cash flow and what it opened up and the bonding aspects of that. And so I'll leave it there. Thanks.
15 Thank you counselor. Counselors, because this is an item coming from the administrative side. We don't have a council carrier to talk about the why or the reason for bringing it up. But city administrator jordan, is there anything that you'd like to add before we continue?
16 No, madam president, I think there are staff in the room to be able to deal with the questions, either financial or operational.
17 Perfect. So counselors, often what we do is ask technical questions first, but save our broader discussion until after public testimony. Keelan do we have anyone signed up for public testimony?
18 No one signed up.
19 Okay, then why don't we do both of those things together? If you have questions about the item before us or discussion and points that you'd like to make. Let's just have folks jump in the queue for both. And we do. As city administrator jordan mentioned, have both our finance staff and our PBOT team here to answer questions. Counselor Ryan, would you like to kick us off?
20 Sure. Hello. I probably should come up for this question. My. I'm in support of this. I just wanted to ask an operational question. Asking for a friend. Constituents. A couple in irvington have stopped me recently and complimented the work of the upgrades to the ramps. Their confusion is, and you're probably know what I might say. When they're there, there's a pothole on the street that remains a pothole after they're done with their work. Of course, they should ask a question like that. And then I get the opportunity to ask you here in public.
21 So the question is.
22 Question is explain why you would do this work on for curbs on the same street where there's a pothole and you would leave the street with the new curbs, but the potholes remain?
23 Absolutely.
24 Portlanders scratch their head at such moments. You can understand that.
25 I do understand.
26 Thanks.
27 Good morning. City council millicent williams, director of the Portland bureau of transportation. Thank you very much for having us here this morning. I'd like to address your question. There are several factors that are part of the decision making around how we will go about either replacing or repairing ramps and attending to the adjacent roadway needs sidewalk needs. So first we'll start with meeting the expectation around compliance with the ramp design and needing to make sure that slopes are appropriate, and all of the things that go into the technical effort to ensure that it's appropriate. So we do that first, and there's funding that is allocated to ensure that we're able to do that work. In that body of work, there is often a pavement component, but it's a pave back component. It's not necessarily driving down the street or not physically, actually, literally driving down the street, but looking down the street to see if there are other opportunities to address asset condition further down the road. That would be a separate pot of funding, a separate set of activities. And often we're able to coordinate those activities, but sometimes we have not always done that. We have in recent months developed a new set of criteria around how we will look at the broader picture and go up more than the feet that are right in front of us, a more of 1000 foot view, so that we can look at the entire community that's being affected by the ramp work, and see if there are improvements that we're able to make there. So deidre davis, who runs the ADA, ADA program now, and actually jody yates, who is our maintenance operations deputy director, can speak to how we are looking comprehensively at doing that work. We recognize, however, that for many years, as we've been doing this work, that has not always been the way that we've approached it, but we're working to make sure that we have this comprehensive effort that does allow for portlanders to scratch their heads less regarding the work that we're doing, but we recognize that as that had been a gap, and that's something that we're working toward making sure that we fill as comprehensively as possible, recognizing that we need to be good stewards of both the investments that go into the ramp work, but also making sure that the work that we're doing does make sense for portlanders.
28 Thank you. And that's I was able to explain the restricted funds for that restricted work to be in compliance with ADA. I, I appreciate their question about the comprehensive operational look that you're planning, and it sounds like that's the standard that you'd like to move towards. So maybe we'll hear about how that movement is going.
29 You will.
30 Okay. Maybe that's why you're going to say.
31 Do you want to hear that now?
32 I'll take whatever I can get. Is this good for all my colleagues? I'm sure I'm the only one that's got this.
33 We got a lot. We got tons of.
34 Don't you go ahead and share a little bit there, and then we can move on to the next question.
35 Fantastic. Yes. Deirdre davis, division manager for the ADA curb ramp division, which is a new division within PBOT. First, I'd like to share, especially in irvington, one of the things that you could share with constituents, if they see a lot of curb ramps in their neighborhood being done, most likely that's part of our grind and pave and our fixing our streets program, and we do our ramps about 8 to 12 months ahead of the paving. So sometimes it is perceived as you just did all these ramps, but you didn't fix the streets. And then a year later we come through and we pay. But in that delay, I think it can cause some confusion. And so part of our greater efforts is also around communication plans and engaging with our community more and being able to get out ahead of that. So when they see the curb ramps, they know the paving is coming a year later.
36 So communication plans a strategy.
37 Is the communication plan, but also the strategy is that. So we have a paving list and the paving list is a three year look ahead. But in order for us to pave down the street, we do have to make sure that in advance of that paving, the ramps are done. So in the case of the constituent who asked the question, there's a pothole 50ft down the road. Why do they? Why didn't they deal with that? We will, but it will be a year before we do that.
38 Councilor Dunphy.
39 Thank you. I well, actually, I was not going to talk about that, but now that I mentioned, I got to say, I find that actually pretty frustrating. And I think from the constituents perspective, that's a color of money question. I understand from a bureaucratic standpoint, you are an enormous bureau. It is enormously complicated, and I don't want to minimize that. But from the experience, especially on my side of town in the east side, to have the excitement of a construction crew coming in and actually improving the built environment, but not fixing the things that are literally next to the truck is just it. It creates a deeper level of distrust in our government. And I found that extraordinarily frustrating because I understand the limitations of why we have to do things the way we do, but it is leading to bad results. So I just wanted to voice my frustration. But my other my specific question was to the ADA ramps. You know, I appreciate that. You know, I've been seeing the work crews out all over town, but I've also been hearing from a number of constituents who are in the process of doing remodels or to open new businesses that have done something that triggers a need to do a frontage improvement. And it has come to the point where those improvements that are unrelated to the development are now crippling those opportunities for those. Specifically, I have two music venues that have called me and have said they're trying to open the new doug fir in the location of the old montage and the trying to convert the dancing bear strip club into an all ages venue. Each of them have been given. I've been told they are now having to improve these these storefront or these these ramps at their cost. How are we deciding when it is a constituents responsibility to fix the curb ramps and in some cases, fixing curb ramps that were replaced less than a decade ago versus when we are spending the dollars we're authorizing today.
40 Sure. So in the case of the two venues that you're speaking about, and we've had extensive conversation about how we can support doug firs efforts to open that business right in front of that business, there are no ramps at all. It's just you step in off of the higher than desired curb onto the street. And so when there is increased foot traffic, when there are, there are several triggers that inform when we would, through the development process, encourage or require businesses to make the investment to upgrade the frontage of the location that they're proposing to inhabit. And so we recognize that for some that is a bit of a surprise, but we have the opportunity to continue to have the conversation about how we can work with them to best realize the necessary outcomes. And so, in the case of doug fir, we have had as recently as yesterday, a conversation about how we might be able to support the effort, they have agreed that there is a responsibility on their part, and we've agreed that there's a responsibility on our part to work together to define the best path forward. So sometimes the requirements do appear to be or in some cases maybe even are a little onerous when those instances occur. We do encourage folks to reach out to us so that we can have the conversation, and we can work together to identify solutions. We receive calls and comments all the time, and often those calls and inquiries come directly to me. I work directly with the team to make sure that we come up with a meaningful solution. In the case of doug fir, we're working in hand in hand with pnd to make sure that we have the best outcome for that establishment, and I believe that will be communicating that within the week, within the next several days, by the end of the week, about the plan for the path forward so that we can make sure that they can open. And if there's any mystery around how code applies and when it can or does not need to apply, we have some opportunities to reevaluate what we what we do there. Inasmuch as there's a blanket that covers the expectation, we do handle everything, frankly, on a case by case basis.
41 Great. I do appreciate that. And I, I am grateful for the work that is happening, and I know that it's vital to making sure our city is the kind of city we need, but also want to just recognize we're at a moment of economic precarity. And anybody who's investing in our city right now shouldn't be, especially when we're investing $80 million into doing the rest of the curb ramps. If that's the difference between someone bringing a new business to our community or creating public, vibrant vibrancy, especially in areas that are going to be either are currently or historically have been part of either tif districts or, you know, areas that are historically underdeveloped. I would hope we would find as much flexibility as we can because our, as we've heard over and over, our local economy is hurting and there is a sometimes a $20,000 bill is the difference between a business succeeding or not.
42 And we don't want to be a burden. We don't want to be a barrier. We want to be a partner. And we look forward to working with everyone who is expected to based on their development needs, figure out the best path forward.
43 Perfect. Thank you.
44 Councilor Smith.
45 Thank you, madam president. Thank you all for coming today and I appreciate you all giving us this agenda item and want to go back to us. Identifying funding before the mayor's budget is dropped. I had conversations with finance chair and the president about how we go about requesting money in this budget cycle, and, director williams, could you tell me, is this process of identifying the $80 million in funding? Is that going to be something that helps the mayor to balance his budget when it is released? Does he need this $80 million project to help balance his budget?
46 Going to ask it? Jonas berry, dca or chief financial officer sure. Okay. Come forward.
47 Thank you. For the record, jonas berry, the dca budget finance and chief financial officer so councilor, if I understand your question around the question is, does this financing help the city produce a balanced budget? And the answer is it does, but not. Not out of necessity. So the financing as it's proposed achieves two objectives. One is it fills a project gap. So it allows around 10 million ish a year for the next couple of years, I think 10 million in next fiscal year, 25, 26 and 16, if I remember correctly, for 26, 27, it allows that project gap to be filled. So those projects can can proceed without having to identify 26 million in additional resources over those next two years. The second reason the objective of this financing is to produce one year of cash flow savings. So by financing over time that the amounts that would have otherwise been cash funded, plus that gap, we can achieve the first objective and also receive around $12 million in savings in fiscal 25, 26, 6 million to the general fund roughly and 6 million to the transportation fund, which will prevent the city from having to identify cuts that would otherwise. Have to occur if we didn't proceed with the financing.
48 So the answer is dca, barry, is that it has a significant impact on balancing the budget. I'd say 10 million, 25 million, 26 million. That is a huge gap considering we have a known gap of 91 to 93 million in deficit. That's fine. And that should also be something that you all lead with because leading with needing to do this now because we're going to have, you know, we're going to have a huge deficit in the next 2 or 3 years. I think it would have been had it would have been important and necessary and critical for us to know that this is a significant way that the mayor is balancing his budget, because we were told that we could not bring any financing tools forward until he dropped his budget. I was told I could not bring anything to the finance committee. Others were told that they could not bring anything to the finance committee as a result. But this piece of information is so critical why we are doing this now, as opposed to after the mayor drops the budget. And so he's going to have to if this fails today, he's going to have to figure out how to balance the budget.
49 Yeah. Understood. And if I if it helps to add a little bit of context about what brought us here to this action today, this generated from a budget note that was included in last year's budget that we look at. We assembled a work team with PBOT, myself and other stakeholders to look at a way to fund the gap. And so that was the genesis of this action. That work occurred in the fall of last year to identify a recommendation of which this was that was provided to the city administrator last calendar year, and was reflected also in the city administrator's recommendations as a as a concept that was on the table at that point. So I just want to provide council members with.
50 I know exactly what it was. I saw the budget note. The budget note said, give us some some remedies and give us some tools. And it was supposed to be turned in to the city administrator by the end of January. That report was not made available by the end of January. And so here we are in April, and now we're trying to identify ways in which the mayor can balance his budget. And so that's key. It's not in addition to needing to pay for this early, it is it is to actually help him to balance his budget. And that should be made clear, even though he is the one that's dropping the budget, we were given direction not to bring any of these things forward until after may 7th. And so that that is the point that I'm trying to make about this, not that I think it's important. I think it's critical. I think we will be able to get some of those ADA ramps in district one and district four, where it's going to be really important, and there are ways that we can marry this request with hopefully cip, if it passes, so that we can make sure that the most vulnerable of our neighborhoods will be able to have sidewalks that they can walk on. So I just wanted to make a note of that. Thank you.
51 Councilor Green.
52 Thank you, madam president. Thank you for presenting today. I just have a technical question. Maybe it's operational too, but does this were we behind, I guess on the pace of our compliance and if so, well, I guess how does this help us in terms of our compliance requirements? And does it like, does it put us in a more advantageous position as we look at the broader asset management work that we need to do in this city?
53 We are on pace. We have been completing the required 1500 ramps that that came about as the creek settlement. Every year since the settlement was initiated, the agreement was initiated. So we are on pace. The issue is that, as has been reported and shared with several of you, delivering on ramps is an expensive venture. And frankly, the general fund allocation that the bureau has received to date is largely used to cover the cost of those ramps. And so we look forward to having, I think, what I would call assurance or insurance that we would be able to deliver on the stated objectives as has been dictated by the creek settlement, in their case, against the not the bureau, but the city helping to ensure that we're meeting those objectives. But we are on track. We can give you the numbers that we've produced each year, year over year and have that data available readily available for you.
54 Thank you. So do you think it would be fair to characterize this, to say that this this tool allows us to make sure we continue a pace with our compliance and not face any upstream risks for that.
55 That it would help tremendously. One of the main drivers, as we look at any project and to ensure our overall delivery is how are we paying for this? And if we aren't able to pay for it, sometimes we have to think of other alternatives to include stopping. So this would allow for us to move forward with a strategy that allows for us to really understand how we can best invest over the course of the next several years, how we can work with all of those who are contributing ramps. And I wanted to mention that there are four ways that we have ramps that come into this program. They are through the developmen. Developers, when they're developing, do have the requirements to provide ramps. We have ramps by request. People call in to indicate that they have a need. Our team goes out and does the evaluation, and we count ramps through that mechanism as well. We also count the ramps from the cip or the capital improvement program. So all of those major transformational projects like fourth avenue, hundreds of ramps all along fourth avenue that we're able to count. Now, those are not paid for by this funding source. They are paid for by the cip, or they're paid for by development, or they're paid for by utility work that's happening. So the ramps by request and.
56 The grind and.
57 Grind and pave ramps, those are what will be covered through this funding source. But there are four different ways that we are able to get to that magic number of 1500. And some sometimes those levers, depending on how development is going, whether a cip project is on schedule, change. But at the end of the day, that's how we get to the 1500, and we appreciate the opportunity to be able to comprehensively plan for how we will get to that end in meaningful ways.
58 Thank you. And I'll just close my questions by just commenting briefly. I really sympathetic to councilor Dunphy's. The issue that that he's raising, I tend to think that, you know, bonds are a really appropriate tool to use to pay for long lived assets like ADA, curb ramps or sidewalks in general. And as we go down the road here, we'd love to see opportunities to bond out those types of expenditures more so than relying upon the kind of frontage, individual cost approach which I understand the intuitive appeal, but it does have that effect of stymieing development in our city when we need it the most. So just wanted to raise that.
59 Thank you.
60 Councilor Zimmerman.
61 Thank you. I think my question probably is similar to councilor Ryan's with respect to the type of quality of projects. So one could walk down fourth avenue outside city hall right now, and we could see a particularly at the park here, a very large, what I would call the taj mahal of ramps that I've ever seen in my life. And one might say, wow, what a great accomplishment. I'm not in that perspective because fourth avenue. Turns out we had ramps all the way down this darn street, and we continue to rebuild ramps in parts of Portland that already have ramp. When at 16th and montgomery, I've got a curb for a constituent who is nine inches, and it's just a nice drop off. It's like the grand canyon of ramps. What I don't understand, and I have said this before and I think is it deirdre, you're the new program manager of this. I am looking forward to finally getting an answer from somebody in the city organizations for why we continue to replace existing ramps with my words. The taj mahal of ramps, when there are far more streets who don't have any ramp at all. And I say that as a person representing downtown Portland, that I feel like if I'm using grade school grades here, the c plus ramp was doing the job. There are other places that have f's, and I would rather we got the whole city to a b-minus kind of grade before I brought fourth avenue again into the highest category of ramps. I just don't understand that. And director, I did hear you say that fourth avenue is paid slightly with a different fund. That's that's news to me. So I'm going to learn a little bit about what that means. But this is the type of situation that is similar to councilor Ryan's question, which is the everyday member of the public sees something and they say, boy, I've gone down that ramp 100 times. I'm not sure why it's getting replaced when the one that is near my home, or the one that's on this other street, doesn't have one at all. Help me communicate this to everyday portlanders in a way that builds faith. Or tell me you're working under a requirement that is silly and you need us to change that requirement. Because the ADA advisors upstairs have told me these are not a requirement. So I'm curious.
62 So I'll start. And then I've asked alex bejarano to come up as well. He's our chief engineer and responsible for engineering services for the city to help to explain from the broader perspective, as well as deirdre explaining, I will tell you that I walked out of the Portland building one day and I knew the fourth avenue project was coming. Of course, I've known it's been coming for seven years. And so I was looking at a ramp that I know had been recently rebuilt, and I said, I know we just rebuilt that ramp four years ago, five years ago, when something was done inside of the Portland building, as we were doing the, well, the Portland building, as we were doing the upgrade of the facility, sorry, as we were doing the upgrade of the facility and I said, if I have questions about us rebuilding this ramp, what about john and jane? Q. Citizen, I know that that's a question. So we talked about the communication strategy. Certainly we need to do that and help people to understand more universally what needs to happen. But there are tolerances within our guidelines based on not just the creek settlement, but ADA guidelines that require us to have slopes of a certain degree. If something is outside of that scope, if the ramps are off center, which many of the ramps on fourth, fifth and sixth are, we need to adjust those things. Some of the ramp corrections are slight. It's grinding down a little bit. It's adding some pavement somewhere. You know, there are small adjustments that we need to make. Others more universally have to be adjusted. And so we'll talk about the triggering for ramps and why we've chosen the ramps that we have as well, especially given the fact that there are hundreds, thousands of ramps that are in need of or to exist at all or are in need of repair or replacement. So deirdre and alex.
63 Thank you and thank you for this opportunity. So plain and simple. It's a federal trigger. So it's not even within our city. So if we pave there's pavement requirements and we have to upgrade that corner to current ADA standards. So we have our inspection team which is under my division. They do a condition assessment. And if they deem that it is not up to standard then we have to redo the ramp. The good news is that federal law also says that if you trigger the ramp, but you have your inspection data and it was in compliance at the time of construction per ADA, then you don't have to redo the ramp. So the great news is, is starting in 2018, due to the creek settlement, we have comprehensive inspection data now. So now when we go through and let's say the ADA standards change, and we had an insured ramp in 2020 and we trigger the ramp, we say we don't have to do that ramp now because now we have that data for that. So the lion's share of the ramps that we do in the city are triggered by federal mandate. We do have a discretion, some discretion around ramps, around 100 to 200 ramps. We wish it was more. And what we do with those, we call those our strategic ramps. And this is a new initiative that we're doing. So when a community member calls and requests a ramp through the ramps by request, we look at it, span out and look at the entire neighborhood and we say, okay, we have curb cuts here, so let's skip this corner. Let's go here, let's do here. And let's connect parks with our community center and to a school. But we're only in that time when we can be strategic. We only do corners that do not have any curb cuts. And I think we're almost fully aligned. I will say that c plus ramps can cause wheelchair tipping can be very challenging for blind, visually impaired folks to navigate. And so the goal is to bring it up to ADA standards and then have that inspection data so that when we come back through in 5 or 6 years, we're not doing what we have to do now.
64 Thanks. I'm hearing that as saying that the federal government's regulations are why this park over here now, there is new concrete that rivals the size of some small studio apartments. I I'm struggling to understand why the federal government says we had to pump out, pop out. Excuse me. The concrete on that versus just creating. And I understand that the angled ramp, which I think a lot of us grew up with, it comes off a sidewalk. And if you're in the crosswalk, you kind of got to go to the angle to come up. And I and I hear you on that. But the grinding to allow straight on approaches doesn't also require us to pop the concrete out in the in a large. And here's why I care about this. That ramp over there means a couple other streets in my district don't get any ramp at all. And while the old model may not be the safest, it is still better than my constituents having to walk another block down go down a hill. Particularly, you know, I've got the southwest hills. So these are these are already kind of delicate paths, I'll just put it that way. And so I look at that in the most serviced corridor in our city, fourth avenue, I'm not sure that I am understanding, even with your explanation, why it continues to get redone. When others are not at all, because I didn't see the paving, and I don't see the standards that say you have to pop it out and go really big. That's that's the part I'm missing here. I'm understanding there's some triggers. I do get that. But right now I'd love to know what discretionary points that we have in the future. And I don't know that we need to answer today, but discretionary points in the future, because I think we should highly examine those what are aspirational and what are absolutely required by law and only by law. And then it goes with my second question, and I think it's at the heart of some of this is the cost increase for ramps is notable. And I'd love, madam director, how you plan to communicate back to the council how we are going to monitor or at least assess whether or not that ramp is worth it to do it if it's going to cost that much. Because maybe we put that one on hold and we go do two others for half the price, and we look at some opportunities. I don't know what the feedback loop there is. It's probably the transportation committee, but this cost growth is concerning. And when I see curbs like that versus what I think could happen, it's hard to have faith in some of these answers.
65 Sure. Thank you, councilor Zimmerman. I'll share. I'll answer both questions regarding fourth avenue, taj mahal of ramps. That is. First of all, the fourth avenue project is a capital improvement project that took many years to plan and has many funding sources. And it started as a fixing our streets project. We got additional investment from metro and from the county, and from TriMet to make the corridor to transform the corridor. And so in doing the transformation, there were choices that were made about what the street design would end up being. And so we have the bump outs to create the pocket for parking to create a greater opportunity for pedestrians who are at the crosswalks to stand, especially in locations where there is a park. So there are more people. There is a building that a lot of people come to, so there are more people. And so some of those choices were made based on the intended use of each of the intersections. The you will continue to see significant improvements happening along this corridor. Again, it's a $25 million project. Could we split it up and spend it in other places? Absolutely. No we couldn't. The funding has been dedicated to this particular location for a particular set of objectives. And so over the course of many years, as we worked through design, worked with community to land on something that met their needs and expectations, that's how we ended up with something like that. In the case of the other projects where we, because we were asked, could we could we just not do forth and spend it over here and spend it over? That would be potentially a great idea. But actually, no, the dictates, the mandates of the funding dictated that we deliver the program, the project where we identified. So you'll see a variation in the ways that ramps actually show up even along this corridor. So I would encourage us as we continue to move through, maybe we can take a walk and talk about all of the different components and why we made this choice here, why we made this choice there, who it benefits. And, you know, with every project, with burdens. And our hope is to alleviate those burdens in as much as we can, as we're working on that ramp work regarding the cost of ramps, we recognize that it has gone up exponentially, or at least based on our early estimates over the course of the past six years. So when we started with the negotiation with the creek team. The estimates were. We think it will cost this, and there are some 5500, 8000, $10,000 ramps. But we did a lot of the easier ramps earlier in the program. And now we are at the harder ramps, ramps that do have to consider drainage ramps that are connected to signal poles, utility lines, all of those things, vaults and ceilings, making sure that we're dealing with drainage and inlets. So all of those components add up to making the ramps exponentially more expensive. So we have a pretty broad range from 20 to 60 at this point. But this team is working to help to control those costs. We brought all of the ADA work under one umbrella. It was spread out around the bureau in multiple parts of the organization. We brought that together to, first of all, ideally, ideally gain efficiencies, make sure that we were delivering consistently, making sure that we were not finding ourselves building, rebuilding and rebuilding ramps and to create greater control around process as well as the cost. And we are already seeing the benefits of those efforts. I know that we've talked about some ramp rebuilding. One of the things, and deidra and alex can speak to this better than I can. One of the things that we recognized that in our effort to move through getting ramps built quickly, we would engage contractors both to design and build. We are no longer doing that. We have brought all of the design for ADA ramps in house. They are a part of the ADA group. They span from engineering services and maintenance operations. They are able to field fit where there's more extensive design that's required. They're doing that, but we're doing that in house because we know how to do it, and then we know how to build it. And I often tell jody the ramps that her team builds. You can slice a tomato on the edge of them, and that's the quality that we hope to be able to bring. And as we work with contractors, in the case of fourth avenue, brown is the contractor, our contractor, our construction inspectors are out there every day making sure that they're meeting the expectations and the goals of the project and doing so in a way that is not burdening the project with cost, helping to contain those costs. So we know it's a problem. And that's why we've done some of the things that we've done internally. And we'll continue to work to improve. We can provide some reporting on that.
66 I appreciate it.
67 I mean, I'll be supportive of this. I think it's worthwhile to conversation to have in terms of faith and faith in the operations. And I'd love to be able to cut a tomato on a ramp, I guess, but.
68 I don't know if you want to eat it. But, you know, we got to bring the cleaning back to do the is.
69 It raises the continual concern that there are parts of the city who go continually unserviced. And I think that our eye to that would be so important. I believe the work we're doing out here is top quality work. Don't take my words any other way. It's about what quality do we do so we can spread it out, so to speak. So thanks for answering it. I appreciate that's all.
70 Thank you.
71 Councilor Kanal.
72 Thank you, madam president. Just prefacing I am also sympathetic to the argument raised by councilor Dunphy, and I think removing somewhat illogical barriers to private investment is a good administrative priority and also a good policy choice for this council. I'm also very happy to hear what you just said about the design work being in-house and not contracted out. I have three questions. First, I want to follow up on councilor Smith's question with a question to dcr berry or potentially administrator jordan dcr. Berry said this would raise $6 million of general fund revenues for next fiscal year. Does the calculation of a $64 million of a $64 million deficit, which is the 92 million figure often quoted minus the mayor's new ask of 28 million, which is an ask rather than a deficit? Does that 64 million include this 6 million? In other words, when you quote us, are you assuming that we're going to adopt this or is this going to make it better? Because and I ask this, I want to just clarify the reason I'm asking.
73 This is.
74 Because the very fact that we were quoted 92 million at all, anticipated that we would approve the mayor's ask for 28 million. So I have to ask what's being assumed?
75 Yeah, it's a great, great question. So as again, as was reflected in the city administrator's February document, this was identified as a component of the math that went into that February recommendation that the 6 million in general fund savings and 6 million to PBOT savings was included as an assumption among many. Within that February document. And I would flag that's also why it was highlighted. Specifically called out in that February document was to try to put a little bit of daylight underneath that.
76 Thank you.
77 So second question, it seems like we're focused on federal triggers for deciding which ramps. And the rest is by request. And I hear your response to councilor Zimmerman as saying, you're doing this now so you don't have to do it again in 6 or 7 years, I think was the timeline quoted, but also that we're currently doing it now after having done it 6 or 7 years ago. In the case of fourth avenue. And while I do believe it's a champagne problem that the councilors to my right would probably love to have more crews going to the wrong part of my district rather than work crews never coming to my district at all. I am sympathetic to the to the point that councilor Zimmerman made about taking something that's a c plus and making it an a plus while ignoring the f grade areas. So my question, given that I listened to that entire exchange, is what parts of the mandates of the funding which dictate the program are adjustable by council, if any? I understand you said most are federally mandated, but outside of the most, what are the rules that council could change that would allow more flexibility, if any?
78 I don't know that there are rules that could change. What we anticipate being able to do is identify where we can deliver projects to ensure that we are meeting the expectations around whether that's sidewalks, streets, ramps, what we've done at the bureau over the course of the past several years, many years is requested funding written for funding for projects. Much of our work, the lion's share of our budget is not locally funded. It is from grants and other entities that have contributed, or that we've written and been successful in being awarded to be able to deliver projects. And so what we have done as a bureau is identified areas of greatest need, and identified opportunities to match funding to those areas of need to be able to deliver projects. So I know 82nd avenue is one, but we have many in in districts all across the city that are informed by a series of factors to include how equitable our delivery of project and programing projects and programing has been across the city for the past at least since I've been at the bureau and I came in 2017, there has been a very specific focus on east Portland and outer east Portland to ensure that those places that had been woefully underinvested did have the opportunity and the benefit of having projects in those neighborhoods, in those communities, we have significant investments now in the cully neighborhood that is in your district. Because of our obvious data that that that that demonstrated that there are gaps. And we needed to work to fill those gaps. And so we write specifically to ensure that we're able to deliver projects in those locations with the discretionary funding. Say we were able to receive this funding through this mechanism, we would be able to use that same data, our our ped pdx plan, our street condition maps, all of those things that help to inform our daily work on a maintenance basis to determine how we could prioritize. So there is some opportunity, and deirdre and jody can speak to some of the ways that jody is doing this work on a daily basis in terms of maintenance. But the maintenance crews see, they they're doing other things, but they see that there's a need. And so if we're able to through this process or any other, bring together a solution that allows us to not just look at the ramp, not just look at 50ft down from the ramp, but look more comprehensively at how we can deal with issues. I think that you would be able to realize and see the benefits of that. So there is some direction that we would be able to take from you in terms of how we prioritize and focus. But there is there is some discretion. We get to pick some, but it's not not a lot right now, just based on the lack of the funding to allow us to have this a bit of a flexibility that, that we would like to have.
79 And I'd also like to add to there's also an opportunity that we have to be better at community outreach and making sure that we have our materials translated into multiple languages and going to communities and, and engaging with them on, on the ramps by request program. Because again, it's predicted to us, right. The community member reaches out to us, but we have an opportunity and we are working on that currently to do better outreach specifically for english language. So they have access to this service as well.
80 In a perfect world, we would have teams that go around all corners of the city that lights out. Somebody put in a work order, get the light replaced, there's a pothole there, somebody's put in a work order, get this location, get a get a base repair done here. This corner is out. We shouldn't have to be so reactive. We should be able to be proactive. Given our current funding. We. Our proactivity is incredibly limited. And so a lot of our response is based on people calling in to say, I have this problem. But again, from a maintenance operations perspective, they do have a multiple year look ahead on what's going to be done, but it is in fact limited.
81 Thank you. In the interest of time, I won't ask my third question. I'll just close by commenting that I think while it is really important and I support the idea of creating accessibility through things like translation, I would also add that there is a significant portion of the city that doesn't engage or ask questions for reasons unrelated to access, but reasons related to trust. And I think a lot of the conversation we talked about earlier in this, and this is not specific to PBOT by any stretch of the imagination, is based on the idea that people will put in requests or ask for things when they believe that they will receive them, and it's very disproportionate in the city who has trust that they will receive whatever the services they're being provided. So I would like to see that be emphasized broadly around the city as well.
82 Thank you.
83 Councilor Kanal, and I'll share that. We know that when we did the big pothole push last year and jody yates can speak to that, we went where we went because we knew that people were not reporting. We had the data that said, this is where the potholes are. We are not getting the reports. We need to use our own eyes and our best judgment to look comprehensively at what needs to be done and address the needs in that way. And we did a block by block effort to ensure that. Jody, how what did we do exactly?
Procedural episode · turns 84–92
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84 The effort that director williams oh, sorry. Jody yates, maintenance operations deputy director for PBOT. The effort that director williams is discussing is a two week effort. Last spring we called it March madness. Okay. Very creative. We're very creative at maintenance operations. So it was two weeks in March and we approached. We went through road by road, all the crews for the street systems division were assigned to go and work and drive every single road in southeast. I'm sorry, east of 82nd, all the way from the river to the county or city boundary with Clackamas county. And they drove and proactively filled all the potholes, repaved a few of the streets through there. And I think we filled 1700 potholes in that two week time frame. And I don't remember the exact amount on the repavement that we did, but we know that's an area that does not report potholes, but it doesn't mean they don't exist. And this came right behind. If you all remember the January snowstorm that lasted about 11 days with all the downed trees, that hard freeze is actually really hard on our roads and creates additional potholes. And so it was a married up event to go in into these areas and proactively take care of them. So we do have a report on that if anyone would would like to see. And we can share that forward as well. So we do understand that areas of the city are less likely to be in that. Tell us where the problem is and we'll go and fix it. So we do have to take a proactive approach at times.
85 Councilor Smith, I believe you already asked a question, so I'm going to jump to councilor Clark in the queue.
86 Thank you, madam president. Excuse me, I'm having allergies. If I lose my voice, I want to say that I think this has been an excellent discussion. I've learned a lot. You've clarified a lot of issues from fourth street to the complexity of the ramps. And I'm hoping that when you develop your communications plan, that you'll share it with us, because we have a responsibility to informing the public about the choices that get made. And like other of my colleagues, I get asked this all the time, why are we doing this? And we're not doing that? So that would be very, very helpful, I appreciate that. I also want to say that I appreciate the ramps, having pushed my mother around in a wheelchair. When you don't have a ramp, it's a real drag and finding access for a wheelchair, so I do. I very much appreciate the fact that we're doing this on behalf of people like my mother. Madam president, I would like to move that we approve the ordinance to authorize the revenue bonds to finance curb, ramp and street improvement projects.
87 Second is a.
88 Motion. And a second, are you moving to call the question, or are you are you?
89 This is I'm calling the question and making the motion. Thank you.
90 Your.
91 Oh our attorneys have a question.
92 So this item is a non emergency ordinance. So it will pass to second reading for a final vote at a future meeting.
93 So I think councilor Clark we can continue discussion or you can move to close debate.
94 I would like to move to close debate given the short time frame we have today.
95 I will second.
96 I believe we don't have discussion on this motion. I believe we move straight to a vote. Is that correct? Okay.
97 Keelan canal.
98 With respect to my colleagues still in the queue, I'll vote no.
99 Ryan.
100 Similar thought no.
101 Koyama Lane.
102 Yes.
103 Morillo I'd like to hear what my colleague has to say. No.
104 Novick.
105 I don't know. Yes, but with reservations.
106 Clark.
107 Green.
108 I.
109 Zimmerman.
110 No. Avalos. No.
111 Dunphy.
112 No.
113 Smith.
114 No.
115 Pirtle-guiney.
116 I believe that's passed with or without me, so I will vote no or failed, rather with or without me.
117 So.
118 No, no.
119 Okay. Thank you. So with four yes votes and eight no votes, the motion fails.
120 Councilor Smith.
121 Madam president, I have just a quick question. Deputy director yates, could you tell me how many additional ADA ramps that we have to go to complete that project in total in the entire city?
122 I'm going to refer that to deirdre, the ADA program manager.
123 Thank you.
124 I want to clarify your question. Are you asking how many ramps still need to come up to compliance in the city?
125 Yes.
126 I do not have that at my fingertips. I can get that for you.
127 But 1500 ramps a year for the next six years is what we have to deliver.
128 So if we do the math and every time transportation comes before me, y'all make me do math in public.
129 I'm sorry. I can answer the question.
130 We do 1500 a year.
131 It's 7500 ramps.
132 2400 a year times six, right?
133 That's right. Is that 77.5?
134 That's 9000.
135 9000, 9000 ramps. Sorry.
136 I have 9000 more ramps to do. And we will.
137 Under the order under the under the order and its potential, there's potential that we would find ourselves in the same position that we were in in 2018 with a suit coming to the city requesting that we complete.
138 You believe that there's going to be another ADA.
139 Suit that could potentially be one.
140 Okay, so we got 9000 ramps and the cost of those 9000 ramps, because if we didn't know the number, I would find it very difficult to figure out how to pay for this $80 million if we don't know what we're what we're reaching for, why are we even asking for the $80 million in limited revenue bonds?
141 I think what we're reaching for is to fulfill the creek agreement requirement of the 1500 a year through to the end of the settlement agreement at that point, and I don't have the exact numbers, I would say we're probably a third, maybe further along on getting all of the ramps in the city up to compliance at that point. So the work still needs to continue. But yes, to director williams point, our guess is that because there are so many more ramps to be completed after the settlement agreement, that they will reengage for another.
142 I'm just concerned about the settlement agreement because we're issuing bonds to pay for this. And the key is. The number, the number that we have to reach in the next 6 or 7 years. Because I looked at your your budget note, there's a possibility of us asking for additional funds in two more years to do the ADA ramps. So we're going to have to come back to this question again. Do we issue another $80 million in those bonds? The other question is did the suit tell you where you had to put the ADA ramps. Or are you just making that up as you go?
143 Well, again, the so it's yes and no. So the ones that are federally triggered that we have to do those ramps. And what the creek agreement tells us is that we need to do that by the 2010 ADA standards. They more predict how we do the ramps that are triggered. Then there is a section of the settlement agreement that talks about ramps by request. And then there's another section of when we have those discretionary ramps in which order to do and I believe government buildings is first and then it goes there. Schools. Et cetera. Down that priority list. So we engage in that priority list when we have those discretionary ramps. So when I was speaking earlier of when we get a ramps by request and then we span out and we connect, that's when we engage in that part of the creek settlement on our prioritization.
144 And deirdre, I don't want to get confused with our overall mission to do ramps. I'm really concerned about the ADA ramps that we're going to be issuing bonds to. And so I don't want to confuse the council either. I want to make sure that we're talking about the same things. I'm talking about the ADA ramps. They don't tell us where to put those ADA ramps, or we just pick where we want to put them.
145 In the settlement agreement. What it tells us is that when we go to no, they don't tell us where to do the ramps.
146 Okay.
147 We informed the settlement team of the locations where we would be delivering the ramps. They provided the guidelines around what was required. And so, as deirdre has mentioned, the federal triggers is one of those places. One of those ways, when we're looking at our cip, based on the fact that many of our capital improvement projects are federally funded, we are using that guidance now. Again, we count those ramps. Those are not ramps that are paid for by what's proposed with this funding source. But we're talking about for the funding that is in question, right. $80 million would be applied to the remaining 9000 ramps.
148 Okay. That's that's what I needed to know. And just a quick comment, director yates. I know you all did 1700 potholes and in east Portland, but I can tell you east of 82nd on stark street, there are so many potholes still left that were not done that it's really shaky. And I would appreciate us going back and that, I mean, we have a couple other agenda items that we'll talk about cip, and that's why I think we need cip to make sure that we close that big grand canyon gap that we have in east Portland, where we lack sidewalks, paving and pothole filling. And we'll talk about it a little later. But thank you so much for doing that. Over that two week time frame.
149 We will happy to get the locations after this and send crews out that way. We also have stark is on the paving list. This summer or next summer, I can't remember which didn't bring that information forward with me today.
150 And his cip is approved. We might make that earlier than later.
151 I have stark in Washington around the gateway area are already programed for paving.
152 Perfect, perfect. Thank you.
153 President pirtle-guiney, may I mention.
154 One thing? And this is to address points that both councilor Smith and councilor Dunphy.
155 Briefly.
156 Please.
157 Because we.
158 Do have two more agenda items.
159 Yes. One of the things that I think I know that is a concern is that we do a ramp, we do whatever we're doing, and we don't go all the way down the street because we know something is coming in a year. Could we fill the pothole today? Yes. Would we be throwing good money after bad? Yes, because we know we're going to come and do something more comprehensive, more sustainable. That will last longer later. And so I know that that is unsatisfactory in the moment, but that is the rationale. That is why stark wasn't done, because we knew it was on the paving list to be done within the next 18 months. And instead of spending $300 a pothole to fix the pothole, let's spend 3000 or $10,000 to actually repave that street. So that's that's the some of the.
160 And the reason why I know director williams is because I travel down stark street from here, all the way down to, you know, what we call the numbers. I live in the numbers and stark street is sometimes the easiest, quickest way to get on the east side instead of going through 84. And then you have to take into account how is that going to mess up your tires and others. But I appreciate it. Thank you so much and keep up the good work about the ADA because we need those. We need those ramps.
161 Director, I hesitate to ask questions because we're running short on time, but I do have two very.
162 Quick questions.
163 I hope they have very quick answers. You are coming to us for $80 million in bonding, so that we can keep up with the lawsuit needs. Do you expect that you will need to come back to us for additional bonding in the future to fulfill the lawsuit needs? After this batch of funding?
164 Yes.
165 Okay. When should we expect that? Is that two years out? Three years out?
166 Yeah. I'll answer the question. So we recognize there is a six year tail of projects. We didn't think it makes financial sense and prudence to ask for all of that potential need up front. So as we often do at the city for borrowing strategies, we carve off kind of a couple of year of projects. And so that's what we're addressing now. Recognizing that doesn't fill the gap for those remaining years of the settlement agreement. So the intent is to look at where we are. It's probably 18 ish months, 18 to 24 months from now, in advance of that next budget conversation, two years from now, and see how close are we? Is the gap smaller? Is the gap larger? Do we have different resources? What is that trade off look like at that point? That will then determine the potential project need and potential timing and repayment structure. So short answer. Yes. I think it's likely there will be a request at some point in the next 24 months for a second round of borrowing. Longer answer is we don't we don't want to presuppose what that size may be. Frankly, hopefully it's smaller because we've had other resources and abilities to address that gap. Otherwise without having to come back and ask for borrowing.
167 Thank you. Second question very briefly. If we don't approve these bonds, should we assume that that's both additional money that will need to come out of the general fund for these projects, and also likely money from other parts of your budget, and therefore less work happening on other transportation projects?
168 Yes.
169 Okay. Thank you counselor. Seeing no one else in the queue, I am going to close our conversation on this ordinance. It will move to second reading at our next meeting and open a conversation about items two and three on the agenda. Counselor Smith, I believe you asked to hear those two items together. Is that correct?
170 Yes, madam president, I did.
171 Okay.
172 Keelan, could you thank you all for being here. We may have some of you back up in a few minutes, but keelan, in the meantime, could you please read agenda items two and three?
173 Item two, direct funding for the workforce pre apprenticeship program and a summer works youth employment initiative. Item three. Director, bureau of transportation. To construct and maintain sidewalks while addressing pavement maintenance deficiencies throughout Portland. Improving safety and accessibility for all residents through the sidewalk improvement and paving program.
174 Thank you. And we have ashley hernandez here to give our committee staff summary. And for folks in the audience or watching online, just a note that we ask our committee staff to read a portion of their summary so that everybody hears some of that same critical information, but there is actually a full summary with even more information posted online on each of these agenda items. Ashley, please introduce yourself and go ahead.
175 Madam president. Councilors. For the record, my name is ashley hernandez and I serve as a staff to the labor workforce development committee. The resolution before you document number 2025 156 was considered in the labor workforce development committee on April 10th, where it was referred as amended to city council with a recommendation that it be adopted. Signals. The city council council's interest in allocating funding for summer youth program for fiscal year 2025, 2026. And ensuring sufficient to meet portland's future workforce needs. The resolution outlines objectives established by council for community opportunity and enhancement program and the summer workforce initiatives to include not to be limited to delivering high quality training opportunities across varieties of trade sectors. Assisting participants in obtaining industry recognized certificates. Fostering collaboration with local businesses, local unions and educational institutes to enhance effectiveness of the program. Executing outreach efforts to engage the recruitment diverse array of participants. The resolution directs. The summer works initiatives will be operated by work systems, inc. And staff by councilor Smith's office. It also calls for the formation of an advisory committee to provide strategic guidance. Additionally, summer works in is to deliver an annual report to portland's to prosper Portland and the city detailing the programs, demographics, outcomes, and areas of potential improvement. The committee adopted amendments prior to the meeting to moving the item to full council, the effects of amendments on the original resolution draft are summarized in the sum and the committee summary. Staff. The full impact statement in this item includes financial and budgetary impacts, community impacts, and community involvement, financial and budgetary analysis. At the meeting on April 10th, one person submitted written testimony during the meeting, a general theme include a discussion of a correlation between apprenticeship programs and how they support community and share a report from labor education research center. Thank you.
176 Thank you. I'd like to call.
177 Before we move on. We have opened both items, so I believe that was the summary for agenda item two. Ashley, could you actually give us your summary for agenda item three as well? That is, I don't have the number before me. Document number 20 2595.
178 Yes. I just gave the summary for document 2025 2056. And she she will be given the other one.
179 Got it. We have that from claire. Perfect. Thank you I apologize claire, if we could have the second committee staff summary, that would be great.
180 No problem. Good morning, madam president and councilors. For the record, claire adams from council operations and staff to the transportation and infrastructure committee. Item three, the resolution document 2025 0095 was heard in the transportation and infrastructure committee on March 24th, where it was referred to council as amended. With the recommendation it be adopted. The resolution directs the Portland bureau of transportation to evaluate options for delivering the objectives of the sidewalk improvement and paving program, or cip, for short. Cip objectives include improving safety and accessibility for Portland residents through constructing and maintaining sidewalks and addressing pavement. Pavement. Excuse me? Pavement maintenance deficiencies with particular focus on areas within Portland that are historically underserved or have the greatest maintenance needs. The resolution specifies that PBOT will develop a four year project list and project delivery framework, and create a public website and dashboard with details on project plans andelie resolution further directs PBOT to utilize existing transportation and to seek neighborhood specific public input to inform project prioritization, it clarifies. Pbot will partner with specified entities as part of the city's inclusive contracting practices. Finally, the resolution directs the creation of a subsequent resolution to evaluate options for financing the sidewalk improvement and paving program developed and consult with the city budget office and considered by the finance committee. It specifies that any future funding considerations for cip related to the Portland clean energy community benefits fund are to be reviewed by the climate resilience and land use committee. I will note that the committee adopted amendments prior to moving the item to full council. Some of those were summarized in what I just shared, but the effects of those particular amendments on the original resolution draft are summarized in the full committee staff summary. The full impact statement on this item includes a financial and budget impacts and analysis from the city budget office, community impacts and community involvement, and 100% renewable goal information for public testimony committee. Five people testified during the committee meeting on March 24th. Three people submitted written testimony prior to committee action, and an additional five people submitted testimony after the committee meeting and prior to the full council agenda posting. The general themes of the testimony, both written and verbal, included emphasizing sidewalk development on the busiest streets, particularly in east and southwest Portland. Considering bicycle facility development at the same time as sidewalk development, encouraging the use of existing plans such as the citywide pedestrian plan as a resource to guide implementation of cip, highlighting the role of sidewalk infrastructure in decreasing traffic emissions and improving pedestrian safety. Recognizing the link between well-maintained sidewalks and economic success and opportunity, and noting the opportunity to recommit the city to its vision zero goal to eliminate traffic deaths and serious injuries on Portland streets. And that concludes this committee. Staff summary. Thanks.
181 Thank you, ashley and claire both so much. Councilor Smith, you presided over these over over one of these work sessions. And I believe councilor Clark presided over the other councilor Smith as the carrier. And one of the presiding chairs. I'll have you go first. Is there anything you'd like to add to either of these reports? And then we'll turn to councilor Clark?
182 Yes. Just quickly, I'd like to say with this resolution, my aim was to address the urgent need for targeted support to empower underserved residents and underrepresented minorities and enhance apprenticeship opportunities, particularly for youth. Both the summer works program and the community opportunities enhancement program offer pre employment opportunities for folks who don't typically have easy pathways to good jobs, and marrying that with the cip program seemed like a perfect marriage. And these programs not only aim to enhance job readiness, but also seek to inspire a new generation of entrepreneurs who can contribute their unique perspectives and innovations to our city's economy that have an enormous amount of opportunity to be successful, especially if they are hired to work on publicly owned projects like the city of portland's bull run watershed project filtration project. Two major state projects like the rose quarter and interstate bridge, and like the cip, if it is approved to prioritize district one in district four.
183 Thank you, councilor Clark, do you have anything to add from the discussion in your committee meeting.
184 On the third, the.
185 Third item, agenda item number.
186 Three, this comes to you from the transportation infrastructure committee, where we had extensive testimony on the condition of streets and sidewalks and a presentation from vision zero. As a matter of fact, the piece I just handed out was testimony that was received from PBOT, where the greatest need exists for sidewalk improvements, which are both in district four and district one. And then I know there's a number of amendments, and I'll have an amendment to this as well. Thank you.
187 Thank you, councilor, councilors, I believe we have public testimony signed up. And because we are short on time, I'd like to move straight to public testimony so that we can hear from members of the public. It looks like we have a few small amendments submitted, but nothing that will create drastic changes where I think we need to introduce it first.
188 Madam president, can we bring up our speakers to the table?
189 The folks who have signed up for public testimony?
190 How many folks do we have?
191 Keelan. How many people do we have signed up between these two items for public testimony?
192 Seven.
193 Okay.
194 Eight.
195 Fantastic.
196 We have some testimony from invited guests that I think we need to have first.
197 Okay. I didn't know that we had invited guests today. Councilor, that's something that we usually save for committees. Because you've invited them. I don't want to ask them to leave. So why don't we start with that and then we'll move to public testimony.
198 Thank you. Thank you, madam president.
199 Keelan.
200 Do you have the names of our guests to invite them up?
201 I believe councilor Smith has the names.
202 Yes.
203 She asked me.
204 To do that. And I told her about the guests prior to andrew mcgaugh from work systems, inc. Derek albert from albert and associates, and the national organization of black county officials.
205 Please introduce yourselves and go right ahead.
206 Andrew, could you go first, please?
207 Sure. Good morning. Councilors. Thank you for the opportunity to speak today. My name is andrew mcgoff, and I'm the executive director of work systems, which is the Portland metro workforce development board. As the workforce development board, we are designated by the governor to receive and manage federal and state resources, to improve the quality of the workforce and support the regional economy. We combine and coordinate these resources with a variety of other funds and partners to build a comprehensive, sustainable approach to workforce development. The regional public workforce system consists of more than 40 public education community based partners, who collectively served more than 25,000 people last year and is a critical resource in addressing some of the region's most persistent and significant challenges. The city is an integral partner in the regional system, both in terms of thought leadership and co-investment. We work together on several initiatives, including support for registered pre-apprenticeship programs and expanding work opportunities for low income young people, registered pre-apprenticeship programs are essential for preparing workers to fill jobs in the region's construction industry. They provide hands on training and direct pipelines into registered apprenticeships, ensuring Portland has the skilled labor force it needs to build and maintain housing, transit and climate infrastructure. From an economic perspective, the construction industry is a cornerstone of portland's economy. The regional construction industry currently employs over 60,000 workers, is expected to add nearly 17,000 new jobs over the course of the next few years, and offers family sustaining wages without requiring a four year degree. Another major partnership we've enjoyed with the city is summerworks. Summerworks is currently co-funded by a variety of organizations, including the city, Multnomah county, the city of Gresham, TriMet, and work systems. Together, we have served more than 11,000 youth since the program started in 2009. Summer employment programs provide young people with critical early job experience, exposure to career paths, mentorship, and income. Research shows that summer jobs significantly reduce involvement with the justice system, improve school retention, reduce dependance on public assistance, and increase lifetime earnings in a time of rising youth homelessness, violence, and economic uncertainty. These programs are not optional. They are a foundation of safety, opportunity and hope. Portland has long prided itself on being a city that leads with equity, youth, employment and pre-apprenticeship programs are precisely the kinds of proven investments that reflect that value, especially in tight fiscal times. If we fail to invest in these young people, in emerging workers today, we will pay far more tomorrow in public assistance, emergency services and lost productivity. I urge you to protect and expand funding for pre-apprenticeship and youth employment initiatives in this budget cycle and beyond. Thank you for your leadership and commitment to portland's future.
208 Thank you. Go right ahead.
209 Good morning, madam president. Thank you, councilor, thank you for this opportunity to speak with you all this morning. My name is derek albert. I'm the cochairman of the national organization of black county officials, as well as president and ceo of albert and associates, a national consulting firm based in bloomfield hills, michigan. I'm coming to you today to talk about the different organizations that I've worked with throughout this nation to help summer youth programs from memphis, tennessee, chicago, illinois, new york city, atlanta, all over this nation. Personally, I had the privilege to be in the summer program about 40 years ago. Came from a single home. My mother was unemployed and I was given an opportunity my junior year in high school to work in county government and actually shelby county, tennessee. With that job did for my family. That summer was helped me and helped my mother be able to pay our bills. What it did for me long term was give me the opportunity to work in government in different branches. The first year I worked, I actually worked in security. Some life stories about these jobs are interesting that actually play a huge role going forward in life. Little did I know, guarding a parking lot will give me the opportunity to get to know the sheriff of the county, get to know the mayor of the county, and get to know a lot of the county officials. It was a good job until one day the alarm went off in the credit union. When that alarm went off, there was an old police officer named rooster cogburn there. And he said, albert, we're going to go up to the fourth floor. We're going to kick the door in. We're going to save the people from getting robbed. I looked at rooster and I said, well, I don't have a whistle, I don't have a stick, I don't have anything. Can I quit because I'm not going to get killed? On my first day working in county government as a student. I didn't quit, but they did reassign me over to the county health department that summer, and I had an opportunity to do different things and understand blood and the intake of blood and different things like that. The second year I worked there, my senior year had an opportunity to be an assistant for the county commissioners, and I worked as a legislative aide that year. Believe it or not, I got a chance to meet a guy named jim routt who was the chair of the commission, who was a republican, who became the mayor. I didn't know that that job that summer would take me to heights of becoming a chief of staff for a congressman after graduating from college. But prior to that, I worked in lamar alexander, who was a who was the governor. I worked in his office as a as a legislative aide while I was in college, and I also worked for al gore, both sides of the aisle when I was in college. And it all came from that summer job the second year when I was a senior. But my freshman year in college had an opportunity to go back for a third time, and I worked in the public defender's office, working in the public defender's office. I had a job where I was assigned with an attorney to interview people who had been accused of murder. Can you imagine those three experiences? Those three years changed my life. It made a huge difference. The first year I was able to help my mom out. The second year I was able to build character and morals and understand things and helped me throughout life. Later in life, you know, as I was looking at this, the chart here and it was talking about earning money while building their future. I was able to do that, but then most likely to return to school and complete school. That freshman year, when I came home from school and I was working in the summer at the at the county, I was planning to quit college because I wanted to take care of my mother because she couldn't afford anything. And jim routt, who was the county chairman of the county commission at the time, had become the mayor. And he saw me. He said, hey, how's everything going? I said, well, I think I'm gonna have to drop out of college so I can help my mother. And jim routt at that point said, no, we're not going to do that. Let's help your mother and let's help you. Little did I know that just building those relationships, the foundation of those relationships 40 years ag, would play in my career today, and it made a huge difference in my life and turned my life around. I didn't quit college. Not only that, the next seminary says most likely to enter a post-secondary education. My undergrad degree came from the university of tennessee at knoxville, volunteer, my volunteer, and my graduate degree in finance and an mba from finance came from georgetown university. Had I not had the opportunity to work in those summer programs, I don't think any of that would have occurred. Today, I have one of the most successful businesses in this nation. You know, I'm I'm proud to say, I know you guys love the Portland trailblazers, a great, great team. My next door neighbor where I live now owns the detroit tigers and the detroit red wings. On one side of me, on the other side of me, my neighbor owns the detroit lions and little caesars pizza. That all stemmed from being able to work in one of these summer jobs and grow character, and grow a person to help me develop skills that are beyond life. I know that there are so many other derek alberts around this nation that need those opportunities. I would strongly encourage you to support the youth because you can support that. Those funds positively and help educate and grow young people. Or you can take those same funds and support it negatively and support the criminal justice system. It's one of how do you want to spend your money? Do you want to spend it positively or do you want to spend it negatively? That's my personal testimony, and I would encourage you on both sides of the aisle to support something that would really make a difference in your community, because it makes a difference in every life, no matter what side of the political spectrum that you're on. Thank you for this opportunity.
210 Thank you both so much for being here.
211 Thank you.
212 Keelan, could you please invite up our first panel of public testimony?
213 First up, we have david barron, antonio jackson, and marita ingalsbe.
214 Thank you. And while you're making your way forward, we do have a councilor who needs to leave at 1130. So councilor, Ryan, you had just one brief comment to make.
215 I'll be. I'll be brief. I'm actually leaving because I have to head to the Portland children's levy allocation committee meeting, where such items will be discussed. I've had the pleasure of knowing councilor Smith for a couple decades, and where we came together was around workforce issues and some highly supportive of everything that's coming forward today. Thank you for seeing that through. Especially on the trades. It doesn't get enough conversation. This is our lever, colleagues. This is our lever to do something about equity. This is our chance to have a student on the workforce side go from pre-apprenticeship to journeyperson within the scope of a big project. That's called progress, and that's called building generational wealth. It was great to see andrew here. And welcome to Portland, Oregon. That's for those who aren't football fans. That's what people call tennessee volunteers. Yeah, I'm a college football junkie. So anyway, I just want to say thank you for bringing this forward. There's two things that I just would want to talk about later, and I hope that you all get to it. I think they're both very solvable. And one is how this works out with the deliberations of our budget. And then two, operationally, it needs to be operationalized into the enterprise. And so I don't know if it's procurement or hr, but it needs a home. And as someone that had to launch projects out of a commissioner's office, which is a little bit easier because we had executive authority, I just think we have to be careful not to ever do that. So those are my two little.
216 Councilor councilor Ryan, I will be introducing a amendment to put this back into the human resources department.
217 Great, great. Anyway, I'm very supportive. I hate to miss the rest of the meeting, but it's for the kids. See you later.
218 I need your vote.
219 Thank you. Councilor.
220 I'll call in later if you if you need it from the other building.
221 I'm not sure if we'll get to a vote today. We do have to end at noon, and we have about 20 minutes.
222 For that first item. Took a while. All right. Thanks. See y'all.
223 Go right ahead. Thank you both for being here.
224 Thank you very much. My name is david barron. I'm here to share a little bit about my organization friend. First, I'd like to thank you, madam president and vice president and councilors for having me here. Thank you. I'd like to read some familiar words to you quickly. The workforce pre apprenticeship program and summer works youth employment initiative represented a transformative investment in portland's workforce, bridging critical gaps in skilled labor while fostering equitable economic opportunities. By directly funding these programs, the city of Portland has taken an approach to ensuring residents, particularly those from historically underrepresented communities, have access to career pathways in high demand industries. And this comes from your committee. These words thank you. On March 22nd, alex zelinsky of opb published an important article highlighting what portlanders are experiencing in real time, a city increasingly defined by economic strain. He cited the 2020 u.s. Census data revealing how deeply income inequality and cost of living pressures are impacting communities of color. According to the city of portland's 2024 community survey, 72% of respondents cited housing affordability and the high cost of living as major challenges affecting their families. Portlanders are increasingly identifying these economic burdens as their top concern, not just in terms of rent and mortgages, but also in access to sustainable jobs and opportunities, upward mobility and overall financial security. The pressure is not shared equally. It is hitting black and brown low income communities the hardest. Deepening generational inequities and creating even more barriers to success. Here are some of the high points. The average monthly income for black households in Portland is around $3,500 a month. Latin communities 4500. In comparison to the white average households of 6400. More critically underscored are portland's bipoc communities are disproportionately impacted, with data showing over 41% of portland's black and latino residents are living with incomes under $35,000, compared to just 20% of white residents. And while Portland continues to diversify, people of color make up approximately 28% of the population, according to the 2020 u.s. Census data, a figure that is expected to grow. Yet opportunities for upward mobility have not kept pace with the demographic shift. That's approximately $3,500 gap for every single black portlander. Our summer camp is two days, and we work with 13 to 19 year old girls and boys to encourage them to become firefighters or pursue a career in first responder. We will be holding this camp July 17th and 18th in district one at Portland fire and rescue training facility. This is a great opportunity. I encourage all of you guys to attend and show support. Thank you.
225 Thank you so much for being here and for sharing that with us. Go right ahead.
226 Good afternoon, madam president, president and council members, my name is antonio jackson. I am the co-founder and executive director for building blocks to success. We are a local nonprofit in the Portland metropolitan area, working with youth k through 12, getting them excited about science, technology, engineering and math. We're a pathway program, and what we try to do is create access and opportunities for youth in our community to see that there are career fields that are attainable for them. And the summer works program is so important because it will allow us to continue to employ young youth in these areas of science, technology, engineering and math. It will allow us to continue to impact our community in a positive way, showing them that there are opportunities for them to work in these areas that are different from working at mcdonald's or at walmart or safeway. We want to create career pathways for them and show them that there is hope, there is opportunity, and there are programs like ours and many others that are out there that are creating spaces for our young people to get the skills so that they can be contributors in our community. It's so important starting young and creating a foundation, creating a foundation of working in an environment where they're being coached, they're being mentored, they're being supported with other people that are helping them align their path, their paths for success, for higher paying jobs in the future. We need to show them that there are these these opportunities, and that's what we do within our programs. We're we're a year round program. We partner with many other organizations universities, Oregon state university, university of Portland. We have kids on a college campus on a regular basis. So they're they're seeing that college is an opportunity for us. So creating these these opportunities for young people to work with us through the summer works program, to become mentors, to become coaches, to really be an example for our youth is so important. So continuing to support this program today and beyond is so important and something that's needed and it's needed for our, our organization and many other organizations out there. So thank you.
227 Thank you so much. Thank you both for being here.
228 Thank you.
229 Next up we have marita ingalsbe lisa caballero. Lynelle mccauley. Luisa boracay.
230 Welcome. Thank you for joining us today.
231 Thank you so much.
232 Should I just start.
233 If you want to scoot a little bit forward so the mic picks you up and then go ahead and introduce yourself and you can jump right in.
234 Thank you.
235 Madam president. Vice president councilors I am so my name is lisa caballero and I'm from southwest Portland. And I am so happy about cip. And so I would like to thank all of you for that being here. I'm here today to speak in opposition to one of the amendments, and that's the amendment that strikes the words district one and district four from the text of cip. The problem with our sidewalk problem in Portland is not just money. It's in large part money, but it also has to do with status quo. And I'm going to focus on southwest Portland, because that's what I know best. And I'm wondering if you've heard my joke. How do you say sidewalk in southwest Portland? White stripe? Okay, that's a status quo problem. City of Portland is perfectly fine. Putting white stripes on the asphalt, calling them sidewalks. That has got to change. And to change that is going to take the enthusiastic cooperation of a lot, of a lot of bureaus and entities in the cities in Portland, the city of Portland, including development review, the city attorney's office, bts, and the water bureau. And we're not going to move from the status quo. We can put all the money we want into this. And southwest Portland is still going to get white stripes until we change the status quo. And that's why I want the word district four to stay in in that text, because we need to be reminded of that, and it needs to be held accountable, or we we're going to continue with white stripes forever. And money is not going to solve that problem. That's all I have to say. Thank you so much. Thank you everybody.
236 Thank you so much for being here and sharing that experience with us.
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237 Thank you.
238 Lanell mccauley. Luisa boracay. Leslie hammond. That completes testimony.
239 Okay.
240 Thank you very much. It looks like we lost some folks when we had to reschedule, unfortunately. But I appreciate those of you who were able to still be here today, especially after that reschedule. Councilors, we have two items open so that we can discuss them together. And then when it comes to votes, we will take them in order if we have time today. Agenda item two first and then agenda item three, we are going to have to end right at noon. We have a couple of colleagues who have other events that they need to get to. Councilor Smith, would you like to kick off our discussion?
241 Could I ask a point of order before we do that? Just unclear of how we're approaching this. So like, are we going to we're talking about both of them interchangeably. So like if you're signing up to speak like you could speak on both items 2 or 3 or we because.
242 We had. Because we had some comments on both. We opened them both together. But when we are proposing amendments, we'll take them one at a time. I suspect we may have colleagues who have comments that are about the full program, where these two items kind of go together, support each other. We'll keep discussion open for both, but if you want to get in the queue on just one or the other, that's fine. And when we get to amendments which anybody can propose at any time, we'll then move into just discussion about that amendment on that item. It's a little bit messy. It allowed us for the best. Overview, I think, with public for public testimony. Councilor Smith.
243 Yes, thank you, madam president. I would like to put an amendment on the floor for item two. And I heard my colleagues loud and clear about summer works, and I would like to change summer works. And who reports to summer works and where it it reports from back to human resources.
244 So this would be an amendment to change the reporting structure for the program to bhr the bureau of human resources within the city.
245 Yes. And we've handed do you have the amendment clerk?
246 Yeah. Let me let me see if we can pull it up.
247 Here.
248 I don't believe is this on the website keelan.
249 I believe it is, but let me confirm. Yes, it's on the website.
250 Yes. And so I wanted to make a motion to change that. I have so many.
251 So councilor Smith, is that is that the first. Excuse me? Not the first. The be it resolved, the summer works youth employment initiative will be operated by work systems, inc. And staffed by the bureau of human resources.
252 And will remain within the bureau of human resources.
253 Second.
254 Okay, councilors, I'm going to go through the queue to see if there's discussion on this amendment. Councilor Kanal are you in the queue on this amendment? Councilor Novick no. Councilor. Clerk. Councilor. Avalos. Councilor. Green.
255 Yes. I thank you. Thank you, madam chair. I support this amendment. I think it's responsive to one of the primary concerns that we heard during the labor and workforce development committee. So I appreciate that willingness to kind of listen to your community colleagues on on that. I had previously suggested that I was going to bring forward an amendment that opposed language that was specific about the megaprojects in our region. I decided not to do that today. I think I'm on the record opposing our the city's strategy for prioritizing investment in freeway expansion megaprojects. So I don't need to belabor that issue here, so I'll yield.
256 Okay.
257 Any other discussion on the amendment? Keelan. Could you please call the roll?
258 Yes.
259 Ryan Koyama Lane.
260 Yes.
261 Morillo.
262 Yes.
263 Novick.
264 Yes.
265 Clark.
266 Yes.
267 Green.
268 Yes.
269 Zimmerman.
270 Yes. Avalos I.
271 Dunphy.
272 I.
273 Smith.
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274 Yes.
275 Pirtle-guiney.
276 Yes.
277 The motion is approved with 11 yes votes.
278 Madam president, I'd like to call the question and take a vote on this.
279 Okay. Do we have a second for calling the question second?
280 Here.
281 Please call the roll. This is a vote on whether to end discussion and move to a vote on agenda item two.
282 Now I see three other councilors in the queue and I have including myself, and I think we've had a conversation about whether calling the question is appropriate here. I will be voting no on pretty much all calling the question motions from here on out.
283 No Koyama Lane because I haven't.
284 Heard from any of these folks, I vote no.
285 Mario. No Novick. No Clark.
286 I thought the people who had their hands up were not interested in discussing this issue. So I'm going to vote yes.
287 Green.
288 I'd like to hear what my colleagues have to say. No.
289 Zimmerman I.
290 Avalos.
291 My hand is up to ask questions about the bill. So we haven't even had time to talk about the larger bill. That was just about the amendment. So I vote no.
292 Dunphy, no. Smith.
293 Yes.
294 Pirtle-guiney.
295 No.
296 With three yes votes and eight no votes, the motion fails.
297 Moving back to discussion on the now amended underlying resolution, councilor Smith, did you have more discussion or should we move to councilor Canal?
298 No, ma'am. Go ahead and let's move this on because I want to get to a vote today. We have been pushed off twice before, and I'm it is my understanding that we have to leave at 12:00, which I think is unconscionable to do, to put it back on and take a vote at another time. It's. That's ridiculous.
299 Councilor Kanal just to clarify, madam president, you said on item two, are we discussing both together? Still?
300 You're welcome to discuss either.
301 Yes.
302 So I'm broadly supportive of agenda item two and would intend to vote yes on it when it when it gets to that point. And I don't know where everyone else is at, but I am very comfortable moving forward on that. My concerns are entirely with agenda item three, and I'm happy to discuss those at a later time after the amendment is formally moved, and I'll wait to do that. Thank you.
303 Councilor Clark.
304 I'm sorry, I forgot to lower my hand.
305 Councilor Avalos.
306 Yeah. So also struggling to figure out how to go about this. Like, I have amendments for three, but I'll start with two and then, I guess, get back in the queue to propose my amendments for three. Or is that not what I should do?
307 I think either either of those are fine and like I said, it's a little messy. It created our best process for public testimony.
308 Okay, well then I'll start with my question on two and then I'll talk about my amendments on three. So my question on two is for councilor Smith. I'm just curious, based on the financial and budget analysis that was refuting some of the claims of the resolution, I guess I just want to know if you have an answer to those or thoughts about what was presented and how some of the information seems to conflict with your resolution.
309 I councilor I don't know what you're talking about. Are you talking about the cost of the summer jobs program?
310 I mean, I guess I'm talking largely about it because there's a couple things in the financial impact statement or whatever that has like.
311 You know, yeah, let me speak to that for. Agenda item two, we had talked about the coed program and I was told that it was going to be cut. Human resources did cut the summer jobs program, and I wanted to get some input from the council to see if this was a program that we should keep. It has a no revenue consequence. I have since since I dropped this talk to human resources and with the mayor, and I'm not sure exactly what it's going to be, but I understand that we're going to have some support for this. The second piece it's a non revenue cip is a non revenue bill. It is just asking to mandate that PBOT create a four year plan to identify district one and district four as priority areas to fill potholes, create sidewalks. And if you all look at your paper that I sent you a map, this shows where the sidewalks have the greatest need. And if you look at this map, it's in district one and district four.
312 Okay, well let me just move on to my amendments then. So I would like to get my two amendments on the table and then offer an explanation for them before we have discussion. Is that preferred to just put both up like put it, put one up, ask for a second, put another one up.
313 Madam president, if we don't have any more comments on the summer jobs program, can we take a vote on that?
314 I was actually.
315 Just going to ask if anybody else was in the queue or had amendments for agenda item two, or if we should get that out of.
316 The way. I have a question.
317 Okay. It looks like councilor Morillo is in the queue on agenda item two. Councilor Avalos, I told you to do all at once. But are your amendments both on agenda item three?
318 Yes.
319 Are you okay? If we move to councilor Morillo, potentially get agenda item two off the table and then come back to you if we have time on agenda item three, or start with your discussion when we open this back up at a future meeting.
320 Okay?
321 Okay. Councilor Morillo. Go ahead.
322 Thank you. I am generally supportive of item two and I just have some questions about the implications of having within the whereas clauses that talk about construction, having the expansion of, you know, there are specific programs listed here the interstate bridge replacement, the rose quarter bull run filtration. I think some of those are necessary, like bull run. Some of them are very controversial in the community right now. And I'm just curious what the implications are of having those specifically listed out, or if we can talk about construction projects generally without having those in there.
323 Are you looking for.
324 A policy response or a response from our lawyers about whether having that in a whereas clause signals support or binds us to anything specific on those projects?
325 I think a policy response and a legal response if possible.
326 Madam president, since I wrote the bill, can I give her the explanation of why we put it in there? Because they don't know why I put it in there.
327 Yes. Let's. Have you.
328 Used as an example of the number of projects that we have actually in the city. But I'm going to go deeper than that. Currently we have 117 projects, which I didn't list. I just listed a few. Those were the big ones, but we got 117 projects in the queue in the Portland region that need apprenticeships. Forget the three that you see here. We're not promoting those projects. We are not saying that this is where people are going to go. It was just to give you a large scale view that with those projects alone, we need 22,000 people. I was trying to make the point if we cut our apprenticeship program, if we cut our pipeline with our summer works program, that that goes into the pre apprenticeship programs, we're going to be cutting the opportunities for folks to have good paying jobs in this community and city. I don't want to get into the politics about any of those three programs, because that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about making sure that we spend city resources with underserved kids in underserved projects. And the project that I am trying to get these underserved kids on is the cip project that is to put sidewalks, potholes, and paving in the city of Portland and district four and in district one. That's what I'm trying to do. I don't want to get sidetracked. I don't want this to get diluted about other things. We need to be very clear on who we are and cutting from the budget resources for our young people. That is just a no no. We shouldn't do that. We've invested in this program ever since 2009, and to cut the program at the rate that we're cutting it is simply wrong.
329 Okay. Thank you for answering my question.
330 Can we turn to our attorney and get an answer on whether there is any implication by including certain projects in the whereas clause, that council is specifically supporting those projects, or whether as a whereas clause and not a resolved, those are just exemplary examples of the types of projects that could come up in the city.
331 This is.
332 We're looking at item number three.
333 Item number two in the whereas clause, a few projects are called out. And I believe the councilors question is whether by calling out those projects and voting for this resolution, she would be supporting those projects, or whether because it's in a whereas and not a resolved clause, we could call those just examples and not a signal of council support. Is that correct, counselor?
334 Yeah. That's correct. Just making sure it's not legally binding us to any specific construction projects. I'm generally supportive of this. Councilor Smith.
335 Our city attorney, robert taylor, will speak to the issue.
336 Hi. For the record, robert.
337 Taylor, city attorney in the whereas clauses, those are factual or rhetorical statements that serve as background. They're not legally binding. So those would be examples of projects. But they're not they're not binding.
338 Okay. Thank you.
339 Mr. Taylor. Please.
340 Is there any other discussion or are there any other amendments. And because we have folks in the queue, I'm looking for a nodding of heads here on agenda item two.
341 Okay.
342 Counselor Smith, I know that you'd like to keep us moving on these. I'm comfortable with us taking a vote on agenda item two, and then we'll need to come back to agenda item three at our next meeting. Is that comfortable for you?
343 No it's not, but we can take agenda item two. I think we need to do agenda item three as well. I'm not sure how many people have to leave at noon, but we need to take an opportunity to do it.
Procedural episode · turns 344–352
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344 We'll need to end there. But if folks are comfortable, why don't we move forward with a calling the roll on agenda item two.
345 You asked me.
346 If I.
347 Ordered and I told you I wasn't, so.
348 Point of order though. Is this an emergency ordinance to.
349 This is a resolution. So it actually only comes before us at one meeting.
350 Got it.
351 Thank you.
352 Yes.
353 Canal.
354 I'll keep this brief.
355 I appreciate all the work that councilor Smith has done on this. And as I said in the labor and workforce development committee, I support it broadly. I my only concerns are going to be discussed in item three. It's around that same clause that councilor Greene raised points about. But given the attorney's guidance, I don't think we need to talk about it here. Thank you again I vote I.
356 Koyama Lane I.
357 Morillo I.
358 Novick whereas and whereas is just a whereas I.
359 Clark I. Green I.
360 Zimmerman. I'm going to take a point just here because this is a big vote for me. Councilor. First and foremost, I think that my dedication to summer works is well proven over my career and it goes back many years. I remember the first year Multnomah county commissioner Loretta Smith secured $1 million for this program, and that was a hell of a coup. There were a lot of people who have attacked summer works for years, and there are a lot of us who have continued to support this effort from your leadership, and I'm proud to support this today. And I think about. Running the internship for one of my divisions. And out of my 6 or 7 in that first year, all black and brown young Portland students, three of which are still employees at Multnomah county today, one of which, I had to teach him how to tie his tie, and he runs the internship program now for Multnomah county. But they changed the face of one of the holdout divisions, kind of the old guard division at Multnomah county. And those young students are now ten years into a career. The testimony we heard earlier today, summer works, internship programs, mentorship. That's what happens in this program. That doesn't happen at mcdonald's, but mentorship happens in an internship program. And I am so proud to see you continue this legacy on this side of the river and to reinvigorate it. And I am so proud to support it, I vote I.
361 Avalos. I Dunphy.
362 I Smith.
363 Thank you counselors. I just like to say I invited state representative ricky ruiz to speak.
364 On my other interns.
365 Exactly. And ricky ruiz is currently a state rep who is on the ways and means committee. He was one of my interns in the summer works program in Multnomah county. And then he went on to Gresham to go into government relations. And then less than a year later, he put his name on the ballot to run for state rep, and he won the first time. So this is not play. Play here. This is real. This is giving folks who are black and brown and underserved from from every color, an opportunity to have an opportunity. Those of you in this room, derek is probably the only one that knows about the old ceta program. The cda program turned into the jtp program, which is now the whio program, and those federal dollars matched with our local dollars are put into this program to make sure that people who would not ordinarily and typically work in government, city government, county government, state government to give them an opportunity to be here. So I am proudly voting yes for this pirtle-guiney.
366 I am. One of the first things I did in my career was work on expanding apprenticeship, and I had the opportunity after that to work on workforce policy at the state level, work directly with the summer works program and the wioa program that councilor Smith mentioned. I am proud to continue to support that work here at the city. I.
367 With 11 yes votes, the resolution is adopted as amended.
368 Thank you. Councilors, I know that our colleague would like to continue, but I also see a few people getting antsy because they have other places to be. And I promised when we scheduled this meeting that I would end us at noon so that you all could get to your other commitments for the day. So with my apologies to my colleague, councilor Smith, I am going to close our special council meeting and we will pick up agenda item three. Near the top of our agenda at our next meeting.
369 Is that next week?
370 Councilor, let me answer that. The meeting is closed, but our next council meeting is scheduled for may 7th.
371 Okay.