The record · Transcript
Council Session — 2025-07-16
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Session summaryEditor-reviewed
The Portland City Council held a special meeting on Wednesday, July 16, 2025, beginning at 2:32 p.m., with roll call confirming attendance of the full body. After the Council's attorney reviewed public testimony and decorum rules, the sole agenda item was a resolution referring a five-year local option parks levy to the November 4, 2025 ballot, intended to fund parks maintenance, natural areas, and recreation programming. A staff presentation outlined the levy rate, budget history, and proposed uses, including capital maintenance, oversight reporting, and partnership development, though figures describing capital maintenance funding and backlog amounts were stated inconsistently across speakers. Council members raised technical questions about fund distribution across districts, system development charge policy, and performance metrics. Public testimony included representatives of parks advocacy groups, business and labor organizations, community members, and residents, expressing both support for and concerns about the levy's cost, oversight, and scope. Following testimony, the Council considered multiple proposed amendments addressing capital maintenance language, performance indicators, community center hours, and restroom facility funding; votes occurred on each, with outcomes recorded in the vote ledger. The Council then voted on the amended resolution and accompanying exhibits as a whole, with the outcome recorded in the vote ledger, before adjourning the special session.
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Procedural markers in this session
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0 This is councilor. I'm just trying to do a mic check.
1 Hi councilor, this is christina with the council clerk's office. I don't think they've turned on the audio yet, but I can hear you. Great.
2 Okay. That's great. I just wanted to get on early in case it got weird. Thank you.
3 Hey. No worries. Thanks.
4 Good afternoon. Colleagues. I am calling to order a special meeting of the Portland city council. It is Wednesday, July 16th at 2:32 p.m. Rebecca, could you please call the roll.
5 Koyama Lane?
6 Yes.
7 Morillo here.
8 Novick here.
9 Clerk Green.
10 Here.
11 Zimmerman here.
12 Avalos, here. Dunphy.
13 Here.
Procedural episode · turns 14–22
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14 Smith.
15 Canal here.
16 Ryan.
17 Here.
18 Pirtle-guiney here. And could I have our attorney please go over the rules of order and decorum?
19 Welcome to the Portland city council. Testify before council in person or virtually. You must sign up in advance on the council agenda at w-w-w. Portland council agenda. Information on engaging with council can be found on the council clerk's webpage. Individual 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, state your name for the record. Your address is not necessary. If you're a lobbyist, identify the organization you represent. Virtual testifiers should unmute themselves when the council clerk calls your name. Thank you.
20 Thank you very much. Keelan. Could you please read our first agenda item?
21 Agenda item one refer to the voters a five year local option tax levy for the November 4th, 2025 election to maintain safe parks nature affordable recreation through five year levy.
22 Thank you very much, colleagues. This agenda item came out of a work session, not out of a committee. So there is not a committee staff summary. This is a measure to refer a five year tax levy to the voters to maintain safe parks, natural spaces and affordable recreation opportunities in our city. The current levy expires next year and without this new levy, we'll see 50% cuts in our parks and recreation department. With the new levy, we will see levy rates increase to $1.40, which will allow us to maintain the investments that we worked hard to put in the budget this year. Generally, when something comes to council, we don't have a full presentation, but because at the last work session we talked about the levy conceptually, but not about the final details. And because this is a referral and so it is a little bit different from our normal agenda items, we are going to have a short presentation today. I am going to have us start though with comments from the carriers, like we usually do in our council meetings on other agenda items. After that, I will turn it over to donna paul and to sonia shymansky to give us a little bit of information about what ended up in the final levy that will be discussing today. Well then, as usual, take technical questions, move to public testimony, and then have the bulk of our debate. So that is our plan for today. We have, I believe, 2.5 hours scheduled. I don't know that we'll need the full amount of time, and I hope that by the end of our session today, we can refer a levy to voters with strong support from this council. So with that, this is an agenda item that is co-sponsored by councilors Novick and Morillo and myself and councilor Novick. Would you like to kick off a bit of an introduction about the levy before us?
23 Sure. I want to focus on what this levy does and something about what it does not do. As the council president said, we it was concluded that a $1.37 is what it would take to combined with general fund resources, maintain the park system where it is now, which means after the add backs, that the council made many of them one time to the mayor's budget. So this is a levy which will enable us to continue providing services at that level and thus to some extent, making up for the fact that some of the resources we used were one time something that we've discussed is what do we do about capital maintenance, given that we have a hundreds of millions of dollars capital maintenance backlog? And what we're proposing is we acknowledge that and recognize that we need to do something about it, although we're not going to be able to do a hell of a lot in this levy. So $0.03 of the levy are set aside for capital maintenance projects. We anticipate those will be kind of small scale capital maintenance projects like fixing bathroom roofs. There's also a provision in the resolution that commits the council to following a policy which is adopted in 2015, I believe, but which is not been followed in recent years. The description in the resolution is somewhat technical. It's the second, whereas in page three, a somewhat simpler way of describing it is a policy that at least 50% of any excess ending general fund balance, and 50% of any one time general fund resources available in the annual budget development process is dedicated to major maintenance or replacement of existing assets. That's all infrastructure assets, not just that's not just parks. That could also be transportation. So this, again, is a signal that we take infrastructure maintenance seriously. And the language also recognizes that we will ask the council will probably ask the legislature to clarify that we can use systems development charges for maintenance. And it also recognizes that we will at some point need to think about a major maintenance bond. So with that, I'll turn it over to councilor Morillo.
24 Thank you, councilor Novick. I appreciate you covering all the technical stuff so I can do the other fun stuff. This was a big decision for us with regards to how it's going to impact portlanders, and I think that that all of these decisions have been weighing heavily on us. There is no question that portlanders and people across the country right now are really struggling economically. So whenever we make decisions about what changes we're going to be making to the fees and things that they have to pay for to get the services that they want, that's something that we have all really heavily considered. And I also want to talk about the fact that this levy is going to bring a lot of benefits to portlanders. People really need their parks, they need recreation. They need third spaces to play, live and thrive. And we need to ensure that we are still using our social contract and collectively working together to ensure that working families do have those options available to them. So I want to assure portlanders as well, who are listening to this, that we are going to have direct oversight over this as a council. We're going to make sure that these dollars are being spent responsibly by your city government, and that we're going to be delivering the services that you care about, the new form of government, our district system, our budget listening sessions all gave us an incredible amount of feedback about which programs and services you care about, and we are going to be watching this very closely to ensure that every dollar that we receive, as the public body is going to be going directly to the things that matter most to you. Our city is going to be responsible for this, and it's not just going to be private entities that are, you know, profiting off of private partnerships. It's something that is a public good that the city should be taking ownership of. In partnership with our community. We also there's no question that we need to look up sustainable funding models in the years to come. We can't continuously rely on a parks levy to bail us out, and so we will be working as a council to ensure that that's something that we have an alternative for moving forward. And with that, I will pass it back to the council president.
25 Thank you. Councilor, colleagues, parks are a fundamental piece of what makes Portland a great place to live. It is a fundamental piece of what attracts families to our city. It is a fundamental piece of what helps us build community. This levy is our opportunity to continue our investments in our open spaces, our recreation programs and our neighborhood parks. These are the places that connect our communities and provide our kids with natural areas close to home, and offer hundreds of hours of classes of programs, classes, and programs each week. This is our chance to continue funding those programs, and it's also our chance to make sure that we are talking about the way we fund those programs and the way we want our parks system to operate. And what you see in the measure before you, as our colleagues have touched on, are increased accountability measures, increased clarity around what the levy should be used for, and the start of a vision for how we want our parks and recreation department to operate. As we move through the conversation today, I hope that we can talk about some of those pieces, because I think they are important portions of what we're doing today. Before we move into the presentation, though, I just want to very quickly thank the many people who helped bring this together. All of you have provided feedback over the course of a few months on what this measure should look like. We had stakeholders from the employees who work within our parks department to businesses across the city, to our advocates within friends of groups and the parks foundation and the parks alliance, and many other people all around the table talking about what a levy should look like in order to truly reflect the needs of our community, the ability of our community, and the type of park system that our community would like to support. So a big thank you to all of those groups, and to all of you, and to all of the portlanders who have already testified in support or with concerns about the levy before us today. It's with all of that input that we were able to bring this proposal forward. With that, I'd like to turn it over to dca donna paul, who I believe is going to kick off a brief presentation to make sure that we all have a clear understanding of what the final proposal before us looks like. Go right ahead.
26 Good afternoon, council president and councilors. I'm priya paul, the deputy city administrator for public works. I'd like to begin by saying thank you for all of the work that you all have been engaging in for the last several months, and for some of you, for the last several years, to bring us to this moment as the dca of public works. I'm honored to now have parks and Portland parks and recreation as a part of the public works service area, and I have appreciated learning more every day about the work these teams bring do to care for portland's treasured park system and the funding needed to deliver those services. Portlanders care deeply about their park system, and I've been inspired by how many people, whether during budget meetings or meetings about parks levy specifically, have showed up and submitted testimony to have their voices heard. And while I am new to this particular levy process, I'm not new to stewarding systems that serve people, nor to the deep responsibility of holding public trust. I've been following the conversations to date, and look forward to partnering with you on the work to come. And with that, I'd like to pass it on to sonia shymansky, the acting director of Portland parks and recreation.
27 Thank you. Good afternoon. I'm sonia shymansky with Portland parks and recreation, and I'm going to be so brief that I'm managing my own slides. Rebecca said it's a heartbeat delay. Okay. Thank you for having us back. This hearing follows two council work sessions in June and a hearing of the climate resilience and land use committee last week. The time and care that you've taken in this conversation is felt and appreciated. For the next just few minutes, I'm going to do a quick recap of where we are and how we got here. And then I know you're eager to get to community testimony. Two national comparators to start. First, Portland parks and recreation is ranked number nine in the national trust for public land review of park systems and the 100 most populous united states cities. Using the. The metrics you see on the slide here. We've been in and out of this top ten for many years, and it is a point of pride for Portland. Secondly, we you have rightfully pointed out the challenges of recurring five year levies, particularly when they're not sequenced as part of a long term financial plan. And we are not the only park system in the country that uses this type of funding to sustain operations. Zooming into Portland and looking forward, we have learned through polling and community surveys and anecdotally every day, what portlanders value and prioritize most in their parks and recreation system. They want it to celebrate our natural environment, be safe and cared for, and be open to all. Based on those priorities and your guidance. The package before you today focuses on basic care and maintenance, environmental care, and resilience and affordability. It will fund daily cleanup and maintenance of our parks. Small but high impact fixes to park amenities, and our park ranger program to keep these shared spaces healthy, safe and welcoming. It will support tree planting and maintenance of trees and parks, keep our natural areas healthy and reduce risk from wildfires. So portland's unique and special natural areas stay that way. And finally, it will keep the events, classes and programs that portlanders use and value open and available to everyone. This includes free programing like summer free for all and free lunch and play ongoing now and class discounts, so the cost is not a barrier. These slides have a bit more information, but we're going to go quickly through them. And the purpose of these is to show you how we got to the rate that's before you today, because that was heavily informed by the budget process that you just concluded it was a difficult cycle for parks and recreation and required cuts well beyond those taken citywid. To close the deficit, the parks team advanced a large number of reduction packages to the city administrator. In developing his proposed budget, mayor wilson restored key programs you see up in the top left, including some schools, citywide sports, which is home to golden ball and the potential closure of a neighborhood community center. He did this through a combination of cuts elsewhere in the bureau and increased revenue. When that proposed budget came to you, you made a number of additional changes which added really significant funding back into park care and maintenance. And you partially restored community center hours. You did this through a combination of one-time and ongoing funds. So the net of all that on the personnel side is reductions of about 20 positions within the central teams that support service delivery, a few reductions to park care work, and significant reductions in the urban forestry division, although about two thirds of those were added back on the pad side, so they're not lost to the city. The net of all of that on the financial side is that the rate needed to sustain current operations went down. We were talking about $1.60 for a while. We are now talking about $1.37, the levy package before you today sustains those current service levels and also includes, as you mentioned, small but meaningful investment for high impact capital repairs like fixes to pools, bathrooms and playgrounds. It also includes a new investment that I'll touch on in this next and final slide. I have here a summary of key city direction included in this referral action, either in the resolution, in comments elsewhere, or in the accompanying exhibits. Some of these things will be carried out by organizational leaders like us, others by you, directly. Through this action, portlanders can expect, as was mentioned. Thank you both immediate and long term steps toward solutions for the deferred maintenance backlog at parks and citywide ongoing oversight with annual and regular reports cadence to be determined, including in conversation with you from the bureau, from a community oversight committee, and at least once from an independent auditor that speak to the financial and performance outcomes of the investments, you'll see no impact to the Portland children's levy, which will be reimbursed for the compression impact of this levy. And you'll see, I hope, and anticipate a much stronger connection and support of partners and volunteers who are part of delivering this system, with the particular emphasis on revenue generating opportunities. So that's the end of this presentation.
28 Thank you very much, sonia. Colleagues, before we move to.
29 Public testimony and then our broader debate, are there any technical questions about what is included in this final proposal that sonia has laid out for us? Councilor Ryan?
30 Yes.
31 Thank you, council president. I don't have a technical question. I have a clarification. We've been in dialog about this for the last couple of days, sonia. And in the whereas that's at the second, the second page. Yeah, it talks about the city of Portland recognizes strengthening partnerships with the private sector, philanthropic community volunteers and grassroots that area. I wanted to put a little bit of teeth into that with a friendly amendment that would add a sentence that we are talking about this morning and yesterday that would have some indicators that we'd actually measure. So if we're two years into it, we'd see it going from the 1% it's out now to hopefully a higher percent and include that for earned income too. Because if we go through this five year cycle and nothing really happens with this, whereas that actually indicates that we landed, that people will be mightily disappointed, including me. And so I want to make sure that we have that type of accountability. So when we do our annual updates or or whenever those are, we can actually look at that data. So my question is like in our conversation earlier, you're good with that friendly amendment, but you want me to specifically tell you what that is? I thought for some reason, we got off the phone that you were going to magically put that in there. And so I apologize for not tracking that.
32 No, not at all. There is a resolution that came from your office. Thank you. That does put a somewhat finer point on what the work will look like, including a dedicated staff person. Focus on private and philanthropic dollars. It doesn't speak to particular metric. I would welcome that direction, either in the resolution or here in the legislative record, and I would consider it guidance either way.
33 Okay, give me a minute or more than that to figure that out colleagues and I'll, I'll go ahead and bring that to you before we vote. But I wanted to at least indicate that to people who are going to testify. So they knew that that might be added into this just in case.
34 Thank you. Councilor.
35 Does that make sense? Okay. Thanks.
36 We do have we have some of we have your original language included in the proposal. It sounds like you have additions to that.
37 Based on the meeting we had yesterday with some stakeholders and a dialog, a couple of conversations this morning, I think people would just like to make sure that it's so transparent that we're tracking it and that the voters do that. So again, we're not this isn't the 2020 levy. It's a different levy.
38 And colleagues, I know there are a few others who have amendments that you plan on bringing forward as well. Without introducing those, why don't we open up the opportunity for people to just put on the record and, you know, a sentence or two what you have coming so that folks who are testifying know what that is. Councilor Avalos, go right ahead.
39 I don't have an amendment. I have a question. Okay. I on the be it further resolved that says that starts with be it further resolved that the $0.03 for capital projects is intended to be distributed between the four council districts. That section. I guess I'm just trying to understand what is the intended process for this? Is this a area that could benefit from using the city's building belonging framework? And how, I guess, like, I don't know, is this a decision the parks director is making? How are you going to determine the equity in the distribution to each district? It just seems really prescriptive. I obviously understand the intent and also the fact that it has a section here essentially saying, let's see, city council members in each district will recommend which projects. I understand the intent. I'm worried about the application and it being equitable. So I'm curious if you can speak, you can speak to that. I'm assuming that would be to director szymanski.
40 And acting director szymanski. I believe that the distribution of these funds would be part of the regular budgeting process. So council would have the ultimate decision making authority here. But if you can speak to how how the bureau might bring forward a recommendation, that would be great.
41 We have dialed in the scope of the universe of projects that would be options for this investment with the scale of the $0.03. So that kind of fixes the overall scale that we're talking about. And it is things like playgrounds and bathrooms and somewhat smaller scale neighborhood park amenities. So the first thing we would do is gather all of those. What happens between there and a final list that you approve in the budget is something I hope we can figure out together. It would involve a lot of dialog with you, and I would I would happily take your guidance about what that conversation looks like and how it's processed.
42 You have a process.
43 Right now for rating deferred maintenance needs. That includes a number of factors, including things around likelihood of failure and danger and equity. Is that correct?
44 Yes.
45 So could we assume that the proposals you brought forward would be run through that same lens that current projects are run through?
46 Yeah, we could definitely do that.
47 Councilor Avalos, does that help answer your question?
48 Not fully, but I'll follow up. Thanks.
49 Okay. Councilor Green.
50 Thank you, madam president. As we get into the substantive part of the discussion, I will be bringing forward and have filed an amendment to the body of the resolution, not the exhibits. I want to be careful not to upset a delicate balance there, but that changes one whereas clause. And they therefore be it resolved, a clause that really speaks to the question of kind of using a fiscal stewardship and responsibility lens, given that we're going to go in with a lower recommended levy that tries to extend what we get in terms of capital maintenance. And so the basic spirit of it is to clarify and, and sort of suggest that we continue to use system development charges that extend the useful life of restoration of existing capital assets. And, you know, recognizing that we do need to build new assets and parts of the city that are poor, it will hopefully reaffirm that it's okay for the city to do this, that we have done it in the past. And it's a really good way, I think, to use already existing funds. So that's what that's what that will be about as we get into it. And I hope that if you're following along in the public, it's on the website, it's councilor Green. Thanks. Council Green number one.
51 Thank you, councilor, councilor Zimmerman.
52 Thank you for just in terms of your intent, madam president, to highlight where we might be offering in the second to last, be it resolved. It starts with be it resolved that the $0.03 for capital projects. You know, I think that one of the things I've talked a long time about have been, you know, taking care of the basic infrastructure in the parks and particularly in our district, in district four. I think it's been a challenge in our bathrooms. And so in that, be it resolved, I will be proposing an amendment in the middle of the paragraph after, along with annual estimates for available funds for each fiscal year period, the 3%. This is the amendment. The 3% for capital projects will be spent only on bathroom facilities, period. That's the extent of the amendment. And then it continues on with the city council members in each district. Et cetera. Et cetera. So I just wanted to highlight that, and I appreciate you having these at least aired out so that if public comment has opinions, we can we can be forthright about it. Thank you. That's all.
53 Thank you. Councilor. Councilor canal.
54 Thank you, madam president. Colleagues, I've emailed you the exact text of the amendment that I will be proposing, but to describe it briefly, it is an amendment to the body of the resolution, not the exhibits. It would ask parks to direct $139,000. Sorry, $139,169, which is 0.23 $0.02, or just under a quarter of a cent from within the existing dollar 37 to a pilot project that would extend community center hours at one community center per district on Friday and Saturday nights in the summertime to 11 p.m. To promote access to free third spaces for all portlanders, in particular young young people, and promote student achievement, community safety and youth development. It would be an extension of hours without programing, but I'm sure that the existing text around volunteerism and my personal pledge to donate to sets of dodgeballs to any community center in need would help with ensuring that there are activities for people to do. Thank you.
55 Thank you councilor. Councilor Novick, do you have a proposed amendment?
56 I have several possible proposed amendments. One thing is, and actually, the parks alliance brought this to my attention, there's a number of places in the resolution where there's reference to capital projects. They've recommended that we in each case clarify that means capital maintenance projects, which is the intention rather than just perhaps imply that we're talking about big, fat building new things. There's a variety of places where that appears. I also realize that the whereas at the top of page three, which I actually proposed, I kind of screwed it up. Whereas city council recognized the parks and recreation system has an extensive backlog of major maintenance needs, and the 2025 parks levy will begin to address those needs. But only a small fraction of them. I concluded I made a mistake in saying major maintenance, because we're not talking about using the parks levy to do big fat things again. So I'm proposing changing major maintenance to capital maintenance there as well. And then there's a couple of other additions that the parks alliance suggested, which I thought were worth discussing. They wanted to add a whereas saying whereas paris shall, as part of the annual budget process described to council the approximate percentage of its operations and number of fte, which will be funded by levy resources, and then after the whereas that that I was referring to before which discusses it says the parks and rec system is extensive backlog of capital maintenance needs. Et cetera. Et cetera. And it says the council will continue to work with our community on a long range financial plan with a variety of components. They've suggested that we say that we will adopt this long range financial plan by the end of fiscal year 20 2728. So I just want to actually I just wanted to put that out there for discussion.
57 Thank you.
58 Councilor. Councilor Ryan.
59 Yes, thank you, council president, to bring some clarity to what I mentioned earlier, I would propose adding a whereas it's very basic, it would say this, whereas on or before December 31st, 2025, parks leadership and collaboration with stakeholders will submit ten key performance indicators for council's approval. These kpis will form the levy performance dashboard. And I'll make sure we email that to everyone by the testimonies going on. Thanks.
60 Thank you. Councilor colleagues, are there any other potential amendments or technical questions before we move to public testimony? Okay. Acting director shamansky donna paul, my suspicion is that we will ask you to come back up for our broader discussion after we hear from the public. So please don't go too far. But for now, before we move into that discussion, I'd like to have us hear from members of the community about their feedback on the levy proposal before us today. Rebecca, could you please call up our first panel?
61 Jessica Green, allison berman, suzanne ho.
62 Welcome and thank you all for being here today. Go right ahead, jessica.
63 Thank you. Council mayor I'm jessica Green. I'm the executive director of the Portland parks foundation, a citywide parks nonprofit whose mission is to mobilize support for parks, natural areas and public spaces. I'm here today to affirm pbf's support and commitment to leading the levy campaign in partnership with the intertwined alliance. And you once referred. I also want to take this time to thank you, councilors, mayor wilson and all of your staff for the collaborative spirit in developing the levy over the course of the last several months. Six months ago, you were faced with the question of whether to refer $1.60 to the may ballot, and you made the bold decision to hit pause and discuss what this levy should be and could be. The pause allowed the proposed levy in front of you to be informed and shaped by the public through polling and various forms of testimony, by conversations with each other. Key stakeholders that council president mentioned earlier the business community, labor cbos and parks partners. And by a hard look at the parks budget during this year's budget cycle. This has been a really thoughtful process, no matter how rushed it's felt in the final weeks, days, hours, minutes. And I really want to thank each and every single one of you for carving out the time and being open minded, coming to the table curious and with creative ideas. As commissioner Ryan said during a meeting yesterday about this, everyone in this room has had to compromise on some level, and it really shows the partnership of the city. Ultimately, the levy maintains a parks and recreation system that we know and love and is essential for a thriving, livable Portland. In addition to the levy proposed today, the process really is also reignited a couple very important conversations the need to address the 600 million plus backlog and capital maintenance, and an opportunity to do more with partnerships in order to advance an equitable park system. The commitment towards some capital maintenance in this levy signals a shift towards prioritizing our capital maintenance needs in our parks, but as you all know, it's only just a start and we are committed to work with you and other parks leaders to develop a long term, long term strategy to address parks operational and capital needs. The levy also recognizes the power of partnerships. I recommend prioritizing investment also in existing partnerships, looking at how the city works with them. How can we streamline systems, remove obstacles, invest in a culture of creativity and collaboration. There are hundreds of partners looking to do more together and in true partnership, ppf and the intertwined alliance are ready to partner with you, city council on this future levy. Thank you for your time now and in the past.
64 Thank you. Go right ahead, ali.
65 Thank you. And just echoing jessica on the thoughtful process that has gone into this. My name is ali berman, and I'm the chair of the Portland parks and recreation advisory board, a tier one advisory board within the city. I'm representing the board today to strongly advise the city council to refer a levy renewal at an increased rate for the November election that will allow community centers to remain open, stop programs from being substantially reduced, and ensure ongoing park maintenance as well as capital maintenance. This is vital for the health of our city, especially in light of the cuts penner has already faced in this year's budget and projected further cuts in fiscal year 2627, as well as the proposed pause on sdc collection. Right now, city councilors get to determine what kind of city they want Portland to be. The board believes that an extensive, vibrant and robust park system is essential for portlanders, that parks are one of the main reasons why Portland is so special, and that parks are a material driver for both new residents and businesses. But a great park system requires both operational funding for programing and maintenance, and capital funding to preserve and expand systems. We're excited to build on the 2020 levy, which was very successful in fulfilling what was promised delivering recreation programs, removing physical barriers to parks programs, prioritizing services for communities of color and households experiencing poverty, and planting and maintaining trees. The 2020 levy allowed the park system to be more robust and more equitable than before. The board asks council to refer a levy renewal to ensure the kind of park system that would be best for Portland and their constituents. The board also asked council to not underestimate the popular support for parks and parks programing. The support has been seen in polling and, more importantly, to the recent response to the budget. Thank you for your consideration and all of your work on behalf of parks. The board is committed to working alongside you, Portland parks and recreation staff and the broader community to ensure a vibrant, equitable and sustainable future for our park system.
66 Thank you. Go right ahead.
67 Good afternoon everyone. I am swen ho. Today I am speaking to you not as a board member of the Portland parks and rec advisory board, but as a Portland citizen asking you to refer the parks levy at a higher rate to care for and maintain our parks system. I want to share a beautiful evening experience with you at 6 p.m. This past Sunday, when the temperature finally dropped to 90 degrees at ventura park, myself and 700 other portlanders cheered as the summer free for all concert began. Portland taiko filled the stage with their big japanese drums. The invigorating drum beat inspires so many little kids to dance and wave their colorful streamers. Such pure joy. Edit or share backyard. The magic of the two hours of applause filled performance did not just randomly pop up. It took Portland parks staff months of planning and coordinating volunteers, cleaning and maintaining the park ahead of a scorching hot day. Multiply this effort by all the other parks events this summer by the quick run to the restroom between laps, up and down the playground. Slide by the long hikes on your favorite trail, and by all the other year round, reliable, well loved outdoor indoor programing in community centers that are clean and cared for by park staff. None of this would exist at this scale or be functional without parks levy. With the parks levy, this work is done daily, oftentimes behind the scenes, so that we, as park users, can enjoy our beautiful parks and recreation spaces and programs. This park levy is an essential piece of portland's next five years and beyond. It maintains the services and programs that are critical to community and the health of our city. I sincerely hope that you will decide on a levy amount that maximizes children and adults being inspired by our wonderful parks, programs and facilities for years to come. Thank you.
68 Thank you very much.
69 Next. We have elizabeth. Peralta. Whoever you are. Elizabeth milner, karen turay, and john isaacs. Elizabeth is online. You can go ahead. Elizabeth.
70 Hi there. Good afternoon. Councilors. My name is elizabeth milner, and I'm the development and engagement director with Sellwood community house. Apologies if it's loud. It's we're full of summer camp today. Thank you so much for the opportunity to give testimony again regarding the parks levy. And thank you so much for the careful time, consideration and thoughtful thought you have obviously all put into this process. Now that you've settled on a dollar amount for the levy, Portland really needs to know what the specific vision is for how those dollars will be spent. What will this levy mean for people in their daily lives? The last council session, one of the slides presented measured the health of ppr by comparing the number of full time staff to other cities park bureaus. By that metric, Portland is in the middle of the pack compared to other comparable cities. But how well does that metric really measure what's happening in Portland? Minneapolis, where I lived for several years, employs just slightly more full time staff per capita than Portland, and yet operates 47 community centers, dozens of free summer park programs, and hundreds of free concerts, movies and community celebrations all over the city so that residents on any given day can find fun activities to do with their families. Portland, meanwhile, operates 22 free lunch and play programs from 10 a.m. To 2 p.m. And a smattering of concerts and movies that, for most of us, require advanced planning and transportation in order to enjoy. Portland has so much potential. We have new music venues going in the wnba, great local festivals, and Portland parks and recreation should be at the heart of a vision for a vibrant and engaging city that attracts and cares for its citizens, and we are just not quite seeing that yet. So it's heartening to see the new language on partnerships, but please don't consider partnerships as an opportunity to outsource the work of Portland parks and recreation, but rather as an avenue for achieving a shared vision of Portland that we all have a stake in and then support them, work with them, collaborate with them, and pave the way for them to help achieve that shared vision for our city. As someone who engages with hundreds of families each year, organizes events and parks, and is a parent who has accessed or tried to access parks programing for the past 16 years, here are my suggestions for this levy. Please make our parks and recreation more fun and less complicated. We need activated parks in every district. Vibrant community centers, activated rivers and streets, and citywide sports, art, music and nature education. So same summer park staff in between playing with kids all day can clean bathrooms and remove trash just like they do at the shack in Sellwood park, which the Sellwood community has activated this summer. Where ppr doesn't have the staff or capacity to program yet truly partner with and support the friends groups, neighborhood groups, business alliances, etc. To take on those programs and finally shake off the past. Just because we've done things one way doesn't mean we have to keep doing them that way. Current levels of service doesn't necessarily equate to optimal delivery of service. This is an incredible opportunity to start fresh with a bold vision for Portland parks and rec. For the 21st century that is more robust, not less than the one we enjoyed in the 1970s. Thank you for your time.
71 Thank you very much.
72 Karen is also online. Karen, you can go ahead.
73 I believe you're muted.
74 There you go. You're unmuted.
75 Can you hear me now.
76 We can we can hear you karen.
77 My name is karen turay resident of district three, business owner in district one and a member of stadium hood. And while I recognize the importance of parks and recreational facilities in our community, I believe that we as taxpayers have reached a breaking point with new taxes. I'm all taxed out. As a business owner, I already contribute significantly to the city's revenue through various taxes, permits and fees. And yet I see little return on this investment. The promise of improved parks and recreational services does not justify the additional financial burden on residents and business owners, especially when many of us are struggling to keep our heads above water due to the rising cost of living and doing business in Portland. In the four block radius of my store stadium superette within the stadium neighborhood, we have seen over 19 businesses close or move in the last few years, and just found out today that another will be moving in September. Most of those are due to taxes and safety. The proposed tax rate of the 1.4 per 1000 assessed value may seem small, but for many of us, it translates into an added monthly expense that we cannot afford. At a time when our local economy is still recovering, it is essential to prioritize the financial well-being of our residents and small businesses. Furthermore, while the city emphasizes the operational needs of our parks, I urge you to reconsider the allocation of existing resources instead of placing further financial strain on taxpayers, we need to ensure that the current funds are being utilized effectively before seeking more money from the community. I implore you to listen to the voices of residents and business owners who are concerned about the implications of this levy. Instead of proposing new taxes, let's focus on finding innovative solutions to manage and maintain our parks with the funds we already have. Thank you.
78 Thank you very much.
79 Council president pirtle-guiney and councilors. For the record, my name is john isaacs. I'm the executive vice president of public affairs for the Portland metro chamber. I prefer he him pronouns, and I'm a resident of district three in southeast Portland. The chamber is the Portland region's chamber of commerce and oregon's largest business association, representing about 2400 members, over 80% of which are small businesses. I'm here today to express our strong support for the parks levy resolution and explain why the chamber chose to endorse it, and because I cannot be here tonight, I want to also express the chamber's support for the directly related action you will take at 6:45 p.m. To formally have Portland join the international swimmable cities alliance in 2023, governor kotek and the central city task force called for a three year moratorium on new or increased taxes. With our full support since 2022, taxes have advanced without our support and both were soundly defeated. This levy is the only significant tax increase we've allowed to advance without opposition during that moratorium. Here's why. Because portland's parks are more than amenities. They are core economic assets. For decades, portland's growth was built on livability, safety, strong public schools, quality transit and a reasonable cost of living. But over the last decade, that foundation has eroded and is now crumbling. We overregulated housing and small businesses, increased business taxes by 84% since 2019, and adopted the second highest marginal income tax rate in the nation, with little focus on results. Killed our housing production market at the very worst time, allowed core public safety services to degrade and let our core infrastructure decay. The result? Portland is losing over 1 billion a year in taxable income. Businesses are leaving, layoffs are growing, and private investment is drying up. Population growth will turn into negative territory by the decade's end, so without question, Portland will need to compete with other cities for people and growth. We will only do that successfully by unleashing private sector growth, adopting a competitive tax burden, supercharging housing production of all types, and investing in our core competitive assets. This includes parks, and if they are core academic economic assets, then they must be maintained and maintained and in the services delivered in a manner worthy of the beloved treasures we say they are. This levy must be the beginning of that transformation. In 2019, the Portland parks and rec budget budget was $5.6 billion. Just six years later, its budget is $8.2 billion, and during this time services have declined. Deferred maintenance was ignored and trust eroded to do the due to promises broken. Still, we support this levy because parks remain essential to our competitiveness, livability and economic recovery. And we believe the longtime Portland spirit of collaboration and innovation can make change possible. I want to be clear, the support of the chamber and our partners is contingent on change. We expect accountability, fiscal discipline and adoption of national best practices, like an expansion of public private partnerships to drive increased economic and cultural vitality, develop development of more diverse revenue streams and performance based budgeting. Most other cities, including all of our peer markets, formally work with the private sector to manage and activate parks to attract investment talent and drive economic and cultural vitality. Portland must do the same next year when you have to consider more cuts to the parks general fund. The chamber and our partners will hold the city accountable to ensure levy.
80 Thank you. John. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, john, but we've got to move on.
81 From the general fund.
82 As possible. Thank you.
83 Thank you.
84 Brian and mary ruble. Rob martineau.
85 Councilors, mayor brian orndorf live and work in district four. Parks matter. Since moving here 17 years ago, I've been a strong supporter of parks both through treasure and time. The treasure includes over 25 million parks, sdc fees generated through seven mixed use towers I've had the pleasure of working on. I've also spent significant time volunteering on the south park blocks, couch park, and the soon to open darcelle 15 park in the west end. The proposed increase of the park levies from $0.80 to $1.40 per thousand of assessed value is a sharp jump that warrants careful scrutiny, especially when the bureau still faces a $600 million maintenance backlog. This proposal does not meaningfully address the backlog. Instead, it sustains the current operations operations that many residents believe have been poorly managed. The recent dismissal of the parks director, paired with an ongoing city review, raises serious questions. If the audit uncovers fiscal mismanagement, it would only deepen public concerns about how the tax dollars are being spent. It is essential that the parks audit be released before tax related measure is placed, before the voters. To withhold it until after the election would be a serious breach of transparency, and could reasonably be seen as an attempt to obscure facts that would inform voters decisions. With housing affordability at a breaking point year over year, increases in property taxes, often overlapping with duplicative services, places a growing burden on portlanders. We are a generous community. We value public spaces, but many of us at our financial breaking point. Here are three things I ask you to consider one. A moratorium on new tax measures until audits are complete and publicly released. Two a requirement for clear performance metrics and cost controls tied to any future levy. Three a mandate that capital backlog plans be fully scoped, costed with a gmp if possible, and scheduled before seeking additional funding. Well run, fiscally responsible parks matter. Thank you.
86 Thank you very much.
87 Good afternoon. I'm mary ruble, district four. I have been involved in Portland parks for over 25 years, having served as board chair of the parks advisory board, as well as the Portland parks foundation, and currently a Portland parks levy oversight committee member. I'm speaking as an individual, not as a representative of these groups. I encourage city council to refer this parks levy to the November ballot. While I am no fan of additional taxes in Portland and agree with our previous speaker, I do support this levy at $1.40 because I believe in our parks system and its importance to the city. As a member of the plock, the parks levy oversight committee, I believe I bring unique insights into the way that levy can. Oversight committee has been run, and I have three things that I would request from the council. One is that the appointments to the role after application by people interested in involvement with the plc be made by a select group of city council and mayor's office representatives, with input from the bureau director and appropriate staff, as opposed to simply by the bureau itself. Secondly, I recommend involvement in levy committee meetings by appropriate members of the city council and the mayor's office and their staff, and I would like to see an opportunity for levy committee members to provide input and advice on specific use of levy dollars, because this group has a lot of insight into how the dollars have been spent. The bureau has done a very good job of ensuring that the levy committee understands the use of the dollars, and we have certified that use as appropriate in the past. I believe that should be what we do going forward. But with additional input from the levy committee in the future, the parks levy needs to focus on daily maintenance, cleaning and care for our parks and natural areas, as well as additional tree canopy. We need to keep our parks usable and prevent further degradation. But it is also my belief that we need to focus on maintenance, and so I encourage the city council to also look to the future and to a bond for capital maintenance that will be that will make a difference. The 3% is helpful, but it will not make a meaningful difference in that. $600 million back backlog. Thank you very much.
88 Thank you for being here and sharing those ideas.
89 Good afternoon. My name is rob martineau. I am the president of afscme local 189 and first vice president of the northwest Oregon labor council. Both of these organizations I represent have been a partner and supportive of past levies and Portland parks and recreation. I hear the capital maintenance. I hear all of the things that need to happen. The city does a, I think as well a job as it can at times in asset management. Asset management is a critical piece of this, whether we call it, you know, capital maintenance or or however we're looking to ensure these parks remain. This is something that the city is not new asset management. What we haven't been able to do is fund that. We've been able to do it in our other infrastructure systems. But this is one that has not moved forward with a clear plan. I am supportive of this levy. I represent nearly 1100 people, city employees who live, work, play and worship in Portland. All of us are beneficiaries, beneficiaries of this park system. I think about when the people I know from out of the area come to visit, and it's hard to think of something I do or that they want to do, or how we spend time that doesn't involve our parks. I said, what do you want to do? And my brother said, I got to eat voodoo donuts. I don't know why I needed a bowl of cereal on my donut, but we ate that at waterfront park and he said, we got to go eat at a food cart. We took that and blankets and went up and spent time on tabor, Washington park, or zoo, all of the things that are in our area. It's hard not to end up at a park. These are part of our identity. These are part of what we deserve to support. And I'm sure all of us have those same examples of where we started to do one thing and ended up in our parks. This levy has got to be well defined, giving Portland parks and recreation clear direction and accountability. Our community should rally to support and pass this levy. As a member of organized labor, I expect to be a partner and I expect and look forward to that opportunity as we develop and lay out a vision and mechanisms for our parks, a vision that will ensure portland's parks and services thrive to buoy and support our community as critical infrastructure. This levy is not going to fix everything. That's very, very clear. But this levy is a bridge to the future where we fund the park system we want and deserve. As portlanders. We owe you our new form of government, an opportunity to raise up our parks rather than oversee their decline and loss. This levy and new council are the only next step for the public spaces and places we all deserve. Thank you.
90 Sundeep, devika, mic check Ryan sotomayor.
91 Thank you for being here. Go right ahead.
92 Let's see. Okay.
93 My name is sandeep debacker. I live in district four downtown council Green. Actually, I heard you say at some one of your meetings that not many people live in downtown. I beg to differ. There's a lot of section eight, low income housing, a lot of elderly people living in that downtown area, a lot of high density housing. I've been a resident there for about nine years now. One of the things I truly enjoy about Portland is the fact that we have the ability to use these public parks scattered all over the city. I studied urban design in graduate school, and parks are essential in high density urban environments because they function as backyards for people that don't have backyards. These parks were a godsend during the pandemic when people were cooped up. Which brings me to the matter under discussion today. The parks levy, the parks we have today are not usable, and not for the reasons that I heard today. I walked through the south park blocks on my way here. There was a drug deal that went down in front of me. There's needles over there. There's a group called Portland people's outreach project that hands out needles and food at 4:30 p.m. In the south park blocks in front of the art museum. There's a preschool on the next block. The children have to worry about the needles and human excrement when they come out to play in that park. I was at couch couch park day before yesterday for a drawing class. Same thing. Needles, tents, homeless people and drug use. So it's very difficult for me and my neighbors, many of many and many of the neighbors are older and they like to go sit in the park, which they're afraid to do because there's an 80 bed shelter going in two blocks from where I live, three blocks from south park blocks. We went to the shelter. They said they have no plans to do anything except clean around the shelter. None of us were given notice about the shelter. We heard about it in the newspaper. And these. This is a no barrier shelter. These people have guns and knives. They've been stabbings and shootings in that area. This is five blocks from city hall. They will be let out at 7:00 in the morning. They will be in the parks. So why should we be paying $1.40 more on everything that we're already paying, when we can't use the parks that we have? So I urge you as a city council, to please do your jobs and make the city livable. Thank you.
94 Thank you very much.
95 Micah. You can go ahead.
96 Okay.
97 Thank you. Thank you, council president and the rest of city council. My name is micah meskell. I'm the urban conservation director at bird alliance of Oregon, a local nonprofit whose mission is to inspire all people to love and protect birds, wildlife and the natural environment upon which life depends. Building and maintaining the regional system of parks, trails and natural areas has been at the core of our urban conservation efforts for decades. Our goal is to ensure that every person in the region has access to nature within walking distance of their home. To that end, bird alliance of Oregon has focused a significant portion of its efforts on ensuring that there's adequate funding for parks, trails, and natural areas and the maintenance of those. I'm representing the organization and our over 10,000 plus local members in urging you to refer the parks levy renewal to the ballot in November. An increased rate of $1.40. This isn't enough, especially to meet the maintenance backlog that the system is hampered by, but it is better than the status quo rates and will allow for you all to take iterative steps towards reducing the backlog while working collaboratively with partners, including community organizations, towards securing a more sustainable funding path. Pathway for Portland parks via future bond measure or other strategies for alliance has helped shape and passed several bond measures and levies over the past 30 years and plan to play a role alongside rob and other community members who have offered today in helping make this one past the finish line. In November. As many city bureaus are, Portland parks and rec is struggling, especially in light of the cuts that ppr has already faced in this year's reduced budget, both on the maintenance side and on the urban forestry side. Projected further cuts in 27, 20, 26, 27 also loom, and the proposed pause of the sdc collection. With all of this in in place, it is essential that right now you all as city council, give them a lifeline to remain, providing services and protecting the resources that portlanders cherish and rely on. Thank you.
98 Thank you very much.
99 Ryan ryan's. Online. You can unmute and begin.
100 Good afternoon, president. Council president pirtle-guiney and city council, it's very nice to see you really appreciate all the work that has gone into this. We really appreciate all of you who've opened your offices to us and have come to talk to workers out in the community, out in the parks. We look forward to further collaboration around the parks levy and also our working relationship with the Portland city laborers and recreation contract. I'm going to back up and explain that I'm Ryan sotomayor from laborers local 483. So we represent city of Portland workers in both the pcl contract, which covers Portland parks, maintenance workers, and then on the recreation side, the recreation contract folks in community centers, folks that are involved in summer programing like summer free for all lunch and play, and seasonal maintenance workers. And we represent folks from lifeguards up to millwrights. Everything that happens in the city of Portland is somehow touched by folks in the Portland city, labor's contract and the recreation contract. So we appreciate your work and not only collaborating with community partners, but also meeting with labor that is meaningful and we appreciate the engagement and the investment. We appreciate the energy that's being brought by the community. The Portland parks foundation, the Portland parks alliance, all the community groups that have brought energy and spoken to the important resources that Portland parks and recreation are, and also supportive of the workers of Portland parks and recreation. So we really appreciate that and look forward to the partnership moving forward. We fully support this levy going forward. We are in it to win it. 483 was the folks that were texting and phone calling in the 2020 parks levy. We used a panos texting infrastructure, but it was folks from the parks alliance and from the foundation and from 43 that brought this home. And we look forward to partnering with labor, partnering with all of you, and partnering with the community partnerships to make sure that the levy is passed and that there is accountability on the other side. We really appreciate the look into the budget that the mayor has been doing and that city council has been doing. We know that it's difficult work. We appreciate your leadership on that. We appreciate your looking forward to your leadership around all the struggles that we face around transportation and livability and all of the things. So we appreciate your leadership. We look forward to seeing you in person. Thank you for your important work, and thank you for your time and your consideration. Thank you.
101 Thank you very much. We appreciate it.
102 Slaughter, bob weinstein, ashley murray.
103 Hi, I'm lena slaughter. I did not think I was going to go right after Ryan sotomayor. I am the union rep for liuna 43. I live in district two. I'm here to also state my support for the levy. We appreciate city council, the mayor for working on this. I know it's been hard and you haven't been in your position for that long. I will say we I am very supportive of continuing programs, which I've been a fitness instructor from lead, and I worked at grant park during the summer doing fitness teaching, hula classes. And this levy will help our teens, our our youth who are employed for summer camps for these summer programs. And if the levy doesn't pass, I'm not sure if we could continue those programs. So thank you so much. I look forward to working with you in the future.
104 Thank you very much.
105 Am I next okay, council members and mayor, my name is bob weinstein. I speak today on behalf of the concerned citizens. We urge you to revise the proposed parks levy before referring it to the voters as written. The ballot title risks misleading the public and several key ways. First, the ballot title blurs the critical distinction between routine maintenance within operations and major capital maintenance. The language implies this levy will help address the city's staggering $600 million major maintenance backlog, but the actual portion going to major capital maintenance is minimal, and nowhere is that made clear. Why not specify the initial major capital maintenance allocation $2 million so voters understand what they're truly being asked to approve. Second, the language maintains excessive discretion for parks leadership. This vagueness enables the same mismanagement and imbalanced spending between overall operations and major capital maintenance that created our current crisis. We do not need more blank checks. Third, the ballot title masks the true cost impact. Nowhere does the ballot language acknowledge that this is a 75% parks levy tax increase from $0.80 to $1.40 per $1,000 in assessed value. Voters deserve transparency. This should be stated plainly on the ballot, the measure states. Also, it may increase taxes by more than 3% without explaining that 3% is the constitutional cap on assessed value growth. Making this sound routine when it's actually an override exception. Fourth, the timing is particularly concerning affordability, and Portland is facing death by a thousand cuts with recent huge utility hikes, large increases in parking, rideshare and other fees. And now a major tax increase in this levy. This comes as we await an audit of the parks bureau and following the recent departure of the parks director, we recommend two changes. First, significantly increase the share going to major capital maintenance. $0.03 out of $1.40 generates about $2 billion, not enough to make a dent in a $600 million backlog. Second, revise the ballot title to clearly state this is a 75% tax increase. We also request that parks and recreation audit be released prior to the election. The current proposal asks for trust for a bureau that has demonstrated poor fiscal stewardship without transparency and accountability measures. This levy will perpetuate the same problems that created our parks crisis. We urge you to be honest with voters. Voters can make informed choices only when they're given the full picture. Thank you very much.
106 Ashley is online. Ashley, you can unmute.
107 Okay. Council members, my name is ashley murray, executive director of solid community house and district four resident. I want to say thank you for how much time, coordination and effort has gone into bringing this levy forward. It's been complex and a demanding process, and your dedication truly matters. That said, as we look toward November, I'm asking us to make a shift beyond spreadsheets. Over the last six months, I've had dozens of conversations with park and rec leaders, park foundation staff, campaign strategist volunteers, nonprofit partners, and many of you. In every single one of these conversations, I've asked the same simple question who's shaping the vision for Portland parks and recreation? Every single time. The answer is the same. It's a really good question. That's not an acceptable answer anymore. Portland does not currently have a public unifying vision for its park and recreation system. And this isn't just my observation. It's widespread. No one can clearly articulate where we're headed or what kind of future we're building together. We cannot move forward, not effectively, not meaningfully, without a shared vision and a visionary to lead it. We are not in a vacuum. Voters, partners and staff feel the same uncertainty. Where we going? What are we working towards? What is the future of Portland parks and recreation look like right now? We're asking portlanders to support another tax increase without offering a compelling, inspiring vision and return. Maintaining current service levels is indeed necessary, but it is not inspiring. People are hungry for purpose. They're eager to be part of something bigger, and they deserve more than operational upkeep. They deserve leadership that shows where we are and being bold enough to lead towards something better. The 1.0 fte partnership included in this levy is a start, but without a shared vision, what does that position building towards? Is it approving paperwork or is it creating strategic collaborative relationships rooted in values like equity, belonging and joy partners? Stepping in to meet the community needs should be seen as co builders coauthors, not just as applicants that require intention, investment and alignment. We need someone who doesn't just say, yes, your program is approved. We need someone who can say, this partnership reflects our values and meets a critical need. It brings our vision to life and we're doing it together. So I'd like to say it again Portland currently does not have a vision for its park and recreation system. That's a leadership gap, and we are asking clearly and urgently for council and parks leadership to make the creation of a shared, bold vision a top priority over these coming months. We cannot keep answering the most important question who is leading the vision of Portland park and recreation with? That's a good question. We must start saying, here's where we're going. Come with us. Thank you.
108 Thank you very much.
109 Jim schulan.
110 Thanks for accommodating. Appreciate it. I'm jim keelan. I am representing the Portland parks alliance today. I'm also a volunteer with the 40 mile loop land trust. Thank you very much for this opportunity. As a resident of district three, I really appreciate it. I'm going to read a letter into the record from the Portland parks alliance. The Portland parks alliance is an informal alliance of volunteer based and professionally led, not for profit organizations that are allies and supporters of Portland parks and recreation and their programs. We are representative of 60 participating organizations who are concerned about the sustainability of pa's financial model and the long term sustainability of its assets. Our purpose is not to advocate for individual programs or assets. Rather, we exist to advocate for the entire system of parks, natural areas, trails, community and cultural centers, and for programs that are desired by the community that ppnr is uniquely able to provide. Prns documentation tells us that the amount of deferred capital maintenance total 600 million. You've heard that about five times today. This list includes everything from worn out playground equipment, restrooms with failing roofs, buckled pathways, sidewalks and sports courts, inefficient lighting, park lighting, poles that are subject to failure, and the failure of entire structures such as the Multnomah art center. Because of our concern about the deterioration of pa's assets nearly a year ago, we came before city council to question the process of simply renewing the parks levy of 2020 without also addressing the deterioration of pa's assets. Since then, we have met and spoken to most of you about our concerns, the budgets. The city's budget office recommends an annual expenditure of 60 million just to maintain pa's asset base, never mind addressing the $600 million backlog. In recent history, the city has appropriated 5 million per year, $0.03 specified by resolution 20 2025 281 will add about 2.1 million per year. You could say it's a start, and the ppa appreciates it as a good faith gesture. In a time of financial stress for the city. The ppa. Ppa also appreciates council's renewed attention to its own statement of intent, made in 2015 to address the city's capital maintenance backlog. Clearly, we have a long way to go, and we wish to continue working with you to find a sustainable funding model for Portland parks and recreation. Thank you very much. Thanks. Special thanks to councilor Novick for bringing forward a discussion on the amendments that we proposed. Thank you.
111 Thank you very much.
112 That concludes testimony.
113 Okay, colleagues, that moves us into our discussion. And as we heard, we have a number of councilors who have amendments to propose to the resolution before us. When we take our vote today, we will be voting on the resolution as well as the exhibits, which are the materials that will actually appear before voters. The resolution will guide us in our work as we implement this levy. Moving forward. So I would now entertain a discussion on the underlying materials or amendments to that resolution that folks have brought up previously. Councilor Green.
114 Thank you, madam president, and also thank you to everyone who came out today to testify and share your priorities, concerns. I think the amendment that I want to bring today is responsive to a theme that I have heard since taking this office, which is sort of voter and taxpayer trust. And my approach to this conversation is not necessarily from the standpoint of taxpayer fatigue. I think if you know me, you might think that that's not my position. I see bob smiling there. But but I also think from the standpoint of stewardship of our existing resources and how we use our money. And that's that's an area that I think I'd like this, I'd like this amendment to speak to. So if you have the amendment in front of you, I'll just read what it is. Well, before I do that, I just want I just want to motivate it. I think that we have a narrow interpretation of what is it, ors two, two, three, which begins on dot 297 and runs through. I think it's two, 316, which, which is the state law that governs our use of system development charges. And I'll direct you to the section on authorized expenditures of system development charges. Basically, we are allowed to spend sdcs only on things that are capacity increasing capital improvements. And they give us a number of definitions for what that means. And they say specifically, an increase in system capacity may be established if a capital improvement increases the level of performance or service provided by an existing facility or provides new facilities. And so, colleagues, I just want to say that if you're looking at a facility that is near failure and a roof is about to fail, or, you know, an hvac system is about to fail, or you've got a tennis courts that are so buckled that you cannot play tennis anymore, that is no longer routine maintenance. That is something qualitatively different. And so I think from the standpoint of, you know, recognizing that, yes, we do need to build some new assets for part of the city that that has not had them or kind of I think the council president had articulated a vision for regional parks assets, you know, things like the north Portland aquatic center. Those are meaningful and reasonable new investments. I, I want the resolution to sort of put in writing that we recognize that we have some internal work to do inside the city to clarify our policies, to revisit our internal assumptions about what's in and what's out of classifications for system development charges. Because if we can use a good share of the existing pot of money for sdcs to tackle some of these very important capital maintenance programs that are not routine, that are of a nature that is going to threaten the viability of the capacity of the existing system, then I think it's a strong signal to voters that that this council is, is, is willing to take very seriously the fiscal stewardship lens. It doesn't go as far as I think some you know, it's not perfect. And I would love to refer a levy that was much higher. But I but I'm more interested in a levy passing than, than, than what I think is, is necessary for the, for the maintenance backlog. So colleagues I would move that that we adopt my amendment. That's let's see. Let me stop rambling. Get to the point here. All right. So there's a whereas clause that speaks to the backlog. And it says whereas city council recognizes the parks and recreation system has an extensive backlog of major maintenance needs, and the 2025 parks levy will begin to address these needs, but will only be able to make only be able to address a small fraction of these needs. The council will continue to work with pr and community on a long range financial plan. We'll explore options for a major maintenance bond measure, and will direct the office of government relations to work in the legislature. And here's where my change is. I say strike authorize in the underlying resolution and replace it with clarify authority for because I believe we already have the authority to use sdcs to invest in capacity preservation of our assets. And then I add a new clause that says and will pursue as appropriate, policy changes in the city of Portland that clarify and prioritize the use of system development charges for extension of useful life or restoration of existing capital assets. So that's the whereas piece and then it's just mirrored later on in a second to last, be it further resolved where I add a clause on that that says and where appropriate, system development charge use will continue to include major maintenance projects, which the major maintenance piece may change and adjust pursuant to councilor Novick's previous comments that extend the useful life or restores the capacity value of existing parks, capital, assets, and colleagues. Before I yield, I just would like to mention that I previously contemplated putting language that said prioritize sdcs for existing kind of preservation, and I want to recognize that that might run afoul of some of our equity commitments and some of our you know, I don't want to put prioritize in there. I just want to say, let's just continue to use this practice and codify it a little bit. So that's what I'd like to add colleagues and would love to, to hear a second.
115 Second, second.
116 Colleagues, we have a motion and a second, I believe. Councilor Dunphy, was that you? First? I think four of us might have said it at the same time on the table. And clearly a fair amount of support here. Is there any discussion? Seeing none. Councilor Novick. Councilor Novick. Go right ahead.
117 I just want to raise I, I'm a little worried about confusion because I think that there's a general impression that you can't use sdcs for maintenance, even if in fact we have used them to some, some extent. And we're talking about going to the legislature, but we're also saying we're going to continue to use them. So I just. Want to know, councilor Green, how do you think that we should manage any confusion that arises from this? Adding this to the conversation.
118 I think it's a great question. I think part of why, I mean, I think we tackle that by updating our codes and our policies that specify how we how we use them. And we need to, as we consider councilor Clark's asset management lens going forward, we need to incorporate maybe some of the kpi discussion that councilor Ryan wants, wants to contemplate. We need to we need to provide a qualitative distinction on what we mean between capacity preserving and increasing, and how this fits into capital improvement plan lens. And so it may be the case that the legislature doesn't need to do anything. But I still think we got ourselves into this mess because the language in ors two, two, three would benefit from some. Just like maybe an example of how of how an investment might be capital improvement by just fixing up an existing thing.
119 And this is always a hard question to ask without also asking for privileged information. But have you run this by the city attorney's office?
120 Yeah, my staff has had conversations with the city attorney. I forget the gentleman's last name, but he does not support this interpretation. And you know, I'm not I'm not convinced I can read the law here. And I do have a background in, in cost accounting. And I think it's fairly straightforward to say, look, you can capitalize a project, you can capitalize a review if it threatens the viability of existing assets. So the resolution just asks us to do some internal work on our policy work. So there's still an opportunity for us to discuss what that policy change in relation with the city attorney and have a broader discussion. So I am comfortable with that. That tension with the city attorney's office, I recognize others may not be.
121 But I think that a little feel. Probably okay with pursue as appropriate policy changes in the city of Portland that clarify. And you said you're moving the word prioritize, which is what I had the use of sdcs for extensive use of life. So maybe as appropriate is like enough of a savings word that I'm not as worried about it. But then the where you say. In the subsequent amendment we're appropriate systems development charge use will continue to include major maintenance projects that extend the useful life for restores the capacity value. I know you're saying that or there are examples that we have done that, but I think that I just feel more comfortable saying include rather than continue to include.
122 May I offer a potential. Compromise here that I think gets to your concern. Maybe if we strike major maintenance project, which I already don't think belongs there, what if we just replace that with capacity improvement projects? Because those are the ones that can go into our capital improvement plan, and those are the ones that are already in our 2016 sdc plan that are otherwise non routine maintenance.
123 So we're let's see. Actually I'm not sure I'm looking at the same thing. What I've got looking at now is says where appropriate sdc use will continue to include major maintenance projects that extend the useful life or restore the capacity value of existing. So how would it read?
124 I would say instead of include major maintenance projects, it would say include capacity improving projects that extend the useful life that's very closely connected to the 223 language in ors. And it's also how it is described in our own sdc capital improvement plan. Okay. Is that okay?
125 Yes. Thank you.
126 Do we have that? Are we following that friendly amendment. Can I.
127 Say that one more time.
128 Yeah. So in a Green amendment number one, what I'm what I'm getting from councilor Novick is to replace in the penultimate, be it further resolved in the last clause, replace major maintenance projects with capacity improvement projects.
129 Councilor Dunphy is the seconder. Are you okay with that change? Okay, rebecca, do you have that or do you need us to send it in writing? Okay. You have it. Great. Okay, colleagues, we have a slightly tweaked amendment before us now. Councilor Ryan, go right ahead.
130 Yes to the amendment. And I want to say thank you to councilor Green. I had a two year experience where I was pursuing, and all I heard was no. So the legal said no. And then it was never a legislative priority. And so I think we need to do this action to get to the bottom of this. And I think the language changes that you and councilor Novick ironed out were were superb. Thank you.
131 Thank you. Councilor colleagues, is there any other discussion to the amendment? And I'll note this is our first council meeting since the break. And I did say that after the break, I was going to hold us to the policy in robert's rules of order to not speak at length with our votes. So if folks have comments on this vote, now is the time to make those. Okay. Seeing no one else in the queue. Rebecca, can you please call the roll. Koyama Lane I.
132 Morillo I.
133 Novick I Green.
134 Hi Zimmerman. I Avalos.
135 I.
136 Dunphy I.
137 Smith. Hi.
138 Canal.
139 I Ryan. Hi pirtle-guiney. I 11 eyes. The amendment is approved.
140 Thank you very much colleagues. Are there other is there other discussion to the now amended resolution or are there any other amendments to bring forward. Councilor Ryan.
141 Thank you. Council president. As mentioned earlier, here's the language for the amendment. My chief of staff did send that to everybody over the last half hour or hour. It reads as follows. Whereas on or before December 31st, 2025, pner leadership, in collaboration with state stakeholders, will submit ten key performance indicators kpi for city council's approval. These kpis will form the park's levee performance dashboard.
142 Colleagues, is there a second?
143 Any discussion?
144 Councilor Kanal I just had a question.
145 Can you speak to the choice of the date December 31st?
146 I didn't want to rush it and have it be pursued. Obviously today that would not work. I thought it was necessary that we include many of the stakeholders that we've been all talking to the last couple of weeks, and I do think that the arts and economy committee, which is the rec side, I think, would like to provide a space for that to take place. And I did December 31st because in a quick conversation with the current director, it seemed like it was fair. I'm sure it will come prior to that. That's why we use language that need to land before that. So what do you think?
147 Just to clarify. So then the intent is that that they would start working on it before the election. Right. Absolutely. Just making sure I wanted to understand that we're not asking for like a month and three weeks.
148 I just didn't want the experience that that we had with the last levee, where there was so much confusion. And what what was the intent, how did it make the world better? And I think that that wasn't fair at times, but we didn't have anything clear and visible that that was transparent to the public, that what success looked like. So with this one, since we want to improve operations and improve in addition to the ones I mentioned, that's why we have up to ten, and we want them to be digestible so that they're easier for people to understand. It's not going to be an insider's indicator. It's one that the public could definitely understand.
149 Thanks. And you answered my second question, which is sort of in passing, which is would this include indicators about recreation? So I am good and I'm comfortable supporting this.
150 Thank you.
151 Thank you. Councilor, councilor Ryan, I have a question. I'm wondering about the statement that there would be ten kpis. I'm wondering if you have specific kpis in mind or why you chose the number ten. I'm just concerned that if we get feedback back that we need an additional, or that we don't need that money, are we holding ourselves to something where we then are trying to split things and we don't actually have the performance measurements that we want? We have the ones that we need to make sure it's exactly ten.
152 How did I.
153 With ten? So I came up with ten because in my life experience in doing work like this continuous improvement work, the ten is a good number. Many times organizations will list hundreds and that doesn't really track as well. And people also get lost in it and you lose the accountability. So I thought we should lift the key ones that we keep hearing over and over again from partners. And all of you will be included in that dialog. And so is giving us some discipline to make it so it's manageable.
154 I hope we don't feel hemmed in by that number later. Councilor Green, are you in the queue?
155 Yeah, I just wanted to say that the reason why I seconded this, councilor Ryan and I, when we sat down to chart out what our committee would look like and what it would focus on, kpis was at the forefront. And kind of a data driven approach was at the forefront of how we manage our portfolio. And recreation is a big part of that portfolio. You want the kpis to be driven by a need, and we have this opportunity. We have a new levy, we have some new leadership in the parks bureau. We're hearing calls for increased accountability and transparency. And so I think this is just a great way to slot that in. So I just wanted to articulate why I think it's a good idea to add this in.
156 Thank you. Councilor. Councilor Novick.
157 Councilor Ryan, since you and I are of a certain age and share cultural references, are you sure you wouldn't want to go to 11?
158 I'm. I'm open to a number of change on that. And it was so I am open to the number.
159 Would you accept a friendly amendment to.
160 I'm really I'm trying to discipline us. I won't use the word hem. And so hem is in. But I do think it's important that we are disciplined. I'm fine with a friendly amendment of 11. And I also when we listen to testimony colleagues, it was really clear that people want that vision. In my experience, what you measure matters and what you put out visually does provide that transparency, and it further provides an opportunity to track that vision. Are you getting the results from what you're putting out there? So we we've been operating on a lot of vision at times or maybe ideas, and it's really important that we have an operations plan that has strategic clarity. And so when you can measure it and everyone can see it and they're all seeing the same thing, that dashboard is visible to the entire community. They know where we are and they know where we want to go.
161 Councilor Morillo. And I'm just want to pause. Actually, I'm not sure if there was an actual proposal for an amendment to 11 or if that was just a joke. So I'm moving on to councilor. Morillo.
162 I couldn't tell either.
163 I didn't understand the reference, so sorry. It's true. I feel like I had the same question as council president pirtle-guiney around the number of ten key performance indicators, and I know that you answered it, but I'm not quite sure I understood specifically what we're looking for. So could we specify that or maybe just remove the ten so we're not bound by it? If we if there aren't ten or.
164 The friendly amendment that you're offering is to just not have a number. And that I hear that or.
165 To hear specifics from you about what it would.
166 Where it's we have to work that out. I didn't want to tell you what the ten were today. I think that it's really clear what some of them are from based on dialog of late, but I'd rather take a pause. And all of us come together with parks leadership and the stakeholders to identify what they are. If we did that today, this meeting would last really long.
167 So what if it just says we will submit key performance indicators without the ten?
168 I can I can accept that friendly amendment because we're going to do them. So yeah.
169 Then I propose the friendly amendment.
170 All right I accept.
171 Do you accept that.
172 I accept as the second.
173 Okay. So this would say in collaboration with stakeholders will submit key performance indicators for city council approval. Okay. Councilor Novick, are you back in the queue?
174 Yes. Well, just for my own amendments not to discuss this one.
175 Okay.
176 Okay. Is there any other discussion on the amendment before us? Okay. And this is now a slightly amended form of the amendment to say will submit key performance indicators without a number there. And councilor Ryan, before we vote on this, could you let our clerk's team know where in the resolution you would like this whereas clause to be located.
177 We placed it on page two and now it's the third from the bottom. So it's after the one that talks about the annual reports.
178 Okay. So in between whereas ppr will produce annual reports on how levy funds are being spent. And whereas the community member oversight committee will review. Yeah okay. Rebecca do you see that.
179 It was in the email. It was mailed out about an hour ago.
180 Perfect okay. Thank you. Rebecca, can you please call the roll?
181 Koyama Lane. I Morillo. I Novick. I Green. I.
182 Zimmerman. I.
183 Avalos. I Dunphy. I.
184 Smith I.
185 Parnell I. Ryan hi.
186 Pirtle-guiney I.
187 11 eyes. The amendment is approved Ryan one.
188 Councilor Novick.
189 Thank you, madam president. There's a whole bunch of really tiny things here, and I'm going to mix in the slightly more substantive proposals from the parks alliance with the simple word changes. If anybody wants me to divide those up, then I'd be happy to do that. So the first word change is whereas the proposed 140 levy would include 137 for park and recreation options and zero three for now. It says capital projects add the words maintenance capital maintenance projects. Then two hours is below the oh three rate for capital projects. Again, make it capital maintenance projects. Then. Let's see. This is a more substantive addition to the. Whereas after the whereas that says p and r will produce annual reports about how levy funds are being spent, including performance metrics, etc. Addition would be whereas p and r shall, as part of the annual budget process, describe to council the approximate percentage of its operations and number of fte, which will be funded by levy resources and. And then below the current. Whereas that says whereas city council recognizes the parks and rec system has an extensive backlog of major maintenance needs. Oh, first of all, I'm proposing change major maintenance needs in that paragraph to capital maintenance needs. Extensive backlog of capital maintenance needs, but then follow that paragraph with the language suggested by the parks alliance, whereas city council will adopt this long range financial plan by the end of fiscal year 20 2728. And then let's see. There's a whereas which reads whereas if approved, the 2025 parks levy would raise an estimated 2,000,000in the first year to support capital projects. Again, add the word maintenance capital maintenance projects in the now. Therefore, be it resolved, also change the oh three of the rate will be for capital projects to capital maintenance projects and then a subsequent. Be it resolved that the .03 for capital projects is intended to be distributed between the four council districts, again at the word maintenance between capital and projects, and then in the same further resolved instead of capital, project decisions from levy funds will be included capital maintenance projects and then, along with other capital maintenance projects. So that would be the extent of these numerous but small amendments.
190 Councilor I believe what you're doing is adding capital to any time where we talk about maintenance projects.
191 Actually maintenance, where.
192 We talk.
193 Maintenance, where we talk about capital, I apologize, adding language about long range financial plan development and adding language about reporting on the percentage of the budget, the parks budget funded by the levy.
194 Right.
195 Are those the three categories?
196 Right and in one place, replacing the word major with the word capital perfect.
197 Is there a second.
198 Second second?
199 Okay. I believe councilor Canal beat you to it. Councilor Ryan, is there any discussion on this amendment? Okay, colleagues seeing none. Rebecca, could you please call the roll?
200 Koyama Lane.
201 Hi, Morillo. Hi, Novick. Hi, Green.
202 I Zimmerman.
203 Hi.
204 Avalos.
205 Hi, Dunphy. Hi, Smith.
206 Hi.
207 Canal.
208 Hi, Ryan. Hi, pirtle-guiney. Hi.
209 And the amendment is approved with 11 ayes.
210 Thank you, councilor Canal.
211 Thank you, madam president. I'm going to take the opportunity to formally propose the amendment that I handed out and have emailed in as canal one. This would create a new whereas clause that I have placed between the. Whereas on community and art centers and then free and discount options for recreational programing above and then below the sorry, those would be the ones above it, and then it would be directly above the strengthening partnerships ones about midway through page two. Whereas a new levy would allow for $139,169 per year, $0.00232 of the 1.37 for parks and recreation operations to be dedicated to the extension of hours at four community centers, one in each council district on fridays and saturdays from memorial day to September 30th each year to 11 p.m, to promote access to free third spaces for all portlanders, in particular young people, and promote student achievement, community safety and youth development. And just to speak briefly to it, we have talked about baltimore a lot. I think it's also worth noting two other examples of situations where the extension of community centers has hours on the evenings where. Young people, in particular don't necessarily have something else to do that they can afford, or something else to do that they can afford. That's in their home area. And so baltimore extended their hours in the summertime on fridays and saturdays to 11 p.m. Dallas has also done something quite similar. We're clearly willing to learn from their example. It's they call it the summer of safety program. And the other example I would cite is that this was a part of the conversation. I want to note the conversation, not the programing around some of the initiatives we've done in the past. Here in Portland, a couple of years ago, we recognized that gun violence goes up in the summertime, and we worked on a safer summer intervention program. Programs like that would be supported by having the ability to send young people to a place where they don't have to pay. And so that's fundamentally what this is about. We did have it scored. We're we're talking about an $84 million levy. And this is $139,000. And I just want to close with that piece of information. I actually I'll also note that the testimony we got from. Sorry, I have forgotten the name miss murray at Sellwood community house talking about asking portlanders to support an increased tax without getting anything new. This would be something new that would be visible in your community. And I think that's a really important thing to deliver to voters is that for a very small amount of money, you'd be able to see a space open that young people can go to. So that is why I would be proposing this amendment. And I would ask for a second.
212 Second.
213 Thank you. Councilors. Councilor Morillo, are you in the queue to discuss this amendment?
214 I am, thank you, council president. I am definitely in favor of this in terms of the substance of it and what it could do. I have some concerns about this amendment and councilor Zimmerman's amendment with regards to earmarking funds for specific things, because I think that given all of the federal funding issues that are coming down the pike and just everything else going on, that I would like to give parks maximum flexibility in how they're able to allocate those funds. So I guess I wanted to hear your response and analysis of that because I am I completely agree with your analysis on what that could do for public safety and for youth in our communities, but just have some concerns.
215 Yeah.
216 I.
217 I hear you. I think that there are massive concerns around, I think, roughly $100 million a year that we're talking about in the context of grants. I don't. So the two things I would say is one, I don't think $139,000 is going to make a huge difference either way on that particular concern, but it is one of the best bang for your buck type of programs we could possibly do. In terms I was, I was aware that it would be a low six digit number. I said that in the committee last Thursday when I floated this for the first time, I did not know it was going to be this low. So that's, you know, a pleasant surprise. And I also think that at a time when we're under significant threat, that from an authoritarian federal government, that one of its tactics is to divide us, combining this with the idea of volunteerism as a way to help bring communities together in an intergenerational way, often in terms of who's volunteering to provide programs for teenagers and young adults, is actually a way of pushing back against the broader concerns there. But that's not the original intent, but it is sort of a additional benefit.
218 Councilor Avalos.
219 Thank you. Councilor canal I and thank you, councilor Morillo, for asking that question because I was sitting with that tension. But I think where I'm landing is one the impact is very, you know, small. And I think that the impact in dollars and in percentage of the levy is translates to a huge impact to east Portland, where this will greatly affect our ability to create more third spaces. I think, you know, this is our opportunity in this levy, as we're doing in lots of other ways, to signal intent and program. And so I see this as just another one, even though, you know, it has a monetary amount. I mean, just like we're adding the $0.03 for capital maintenance. So I hear you councilor Morillo, because I agree in general, that I want us to be careful to not be overly prescriptive. This feels like enough of a like, I can I can get down with this. And I think the impact is good and it's also us totally agree with this assessment of us adding something visible that people will be able to feel. So I plan to support it, but I'm grateful for the discussion that happened just before me because I was sitting with that tension, but definitely landing on supporting it.
220 Thank you, councilor. Councilor Koyama Lane.
221 Thank you for this work, for your work on this. Councilor. I am absolutely interested in the extension of hours at community centers. I would love to see this. I am wondering also if the levy is the right place to do this type of earmarking. And I'm also thinking about how this is very specific and how I know voters appreciate having some specific examples of what they can expect. And so I actually can see this possibly being helpful as a campaign will hopefully be ran around this. And then I also have another follow up question. I'm wondering about this language. A new levy would allow. And then going on for that money to be dedicated. I was wondering if allow is the right word or it seems a little like squishier. I was wondering if there's another word like the word direct, or can I hear your thinking around that?
222 Thank you. So I'll first say yeah, the part about specificity I think is and this is a strange conversation because we're talking about how to build something that can be more politically viable. Right. That's just a strange concept to this entire thing. But I do think that having specificity will help with that. In terms of the levy, I think next year's budget will take effect on July 1st. There's a lot of time between the end of the school year and July 1st, where you start to see spikes in gun violence happen. And so we started when I was at the community safety division. We started the safer summer program significantly earlier than that when we could, and sometimes we couldn't because of funding and how it was funded. So I am thinking about that in terms of this opportunity. So and I think the two things together is the answer to your timing question? On the third question, I think that's a really good one about the use of the word allow. And I think this also relates to councilor Murillo's question of it's signaling council intent. But I don't think the resolution itself can direct it. And we were advised by, you know, not to amend the exhibits on the dais on the day of and through no fault of their own. I want to be clear. I'm not blaming them. It just took a little time to get the exact scoring figured out. And so it kind of it made sense to frame it this way as a direction. And I'll also just take the opportunity to note, you know, we are expecting that for three of the districts. We're going to have the conversation about which community center, you know, with the councilors. And I apologize to my colleagues in district one, you only have one community center. For now. That's a challenge for a later prog, a later problem to solve. But for the other three districts, I would hope that we're able to have input into that process. Thank you.
223 Thank you. All of that is helpful and I am excited to support this.
224 Councilor I had told you when you first brought this concept up that it was something that I was excited to support in the budget next year, because I do think that it is a really important thing for us to do, and we've had a lot of conversations about programed less time, but more programing or more time, even if it means less programing. And I'm really supportive of this concept. I'm struggling because we costed this levy in order to be able to assure portlanders that we would maintain all of the investments that we bought back during the budget process. And I worry that if we start to say and also this and also this, it becomes harder and harder to keep that promise. And I don't want to set ourselves up to not be able to keep the promises that we make during this levy. I know it's only a small amount of money. I am going to take the next minute or two as others talk to think about my vote. But I'm leaning voting no because I worry about being able to keep that promise that we will maintain what we have, that portlanders won't see cuts. But I did just want to state on the record that if I vote no on this, that does not mean that I wouldn't support it in the budget process. I do think it's a really important thing for us to do.
225 Thanks. And I'll just clarify the based in part on our conversations. It this does not include programing includes enough staff to keep the space open, but open gyms for gyms that have basketballs, gyms that at least one of which will have dodgeball soon. You know, those sorts of things will allow for that. And I think if there is a need for additional programing, there is the concept of volunteerism that we've talked about in a lot of places and obviously the friends of groups and things like that. To the other point about costing it out, that's that's where the costing is based. Just to just to clarify that.
226 Thank you.
227 Councilor Novick.
228 Yeah, I share the concern about this being really prescriptive. I also worry that I think that the overall message here is that we've got a levy that, in the words of bon jovi, holds on to what we've got. And I think that polling actually shows that the maintenance message is strong. And I'm a little worried if we say all this is about is holding on to what we've got, plus a little bit for capital maintenance plus this one other thing, it kind of implies that we've thought that we think that only this one other thing is important enough to be worth adding, and maybe there's a reasonable case for that. But I can sort of see people saying, well, wait a minute, if you're going to add things, why don't you add this thing or that thing or the other thing? So I'm just worried about having a bit of I don't feel strongly about this, but I think I'm a no, because I think it's sort of a muddled there's sort of a muddled message.
229 So I'll.
230 Just quickly state, because you brought up the bon jovi thing. The last reference was a reference to spinal tap. This is spinal tap. Just to clarify, for those who didn't know. Yeah, the I guess this is a kind of a response to both questions. I, I don't apologize for saying public safety is special and deserves prioritization. I do think it's appropriate to ask why this and not that. And I also think it's an incredibly fair response to say, because public safety and I for me, that is a priority that we often view very narrowly. But I think this council has come to the realization that maybe other councils did not, that that recreation and community centers are a part of our public safety system. And so it is special. I do think it's an exception, and I don't mind. I'm not apologizing for that.
231 Councilor Ryan.
232 Yeah.
233 To the amendment.
234 Yeah. Great conversation on this amendment. I have agreed with a couple of the comments here. First of all, I'm struggling on my vote on this one because I see the impact, but I also have experience where when there's carve outs, how rough that is to land it. And I know that we already put in a couple that were negotiated over the last few weeks. The point three for capital maintenance or in the other one is the one fte for partnerships. And I I'm concerned if we keep adding these and it's so hard to get to 140. And so this would would something would have to probably give. And so I'm probably just out of principle would would want to hear from parks leadership and have more time to see how they would be able to roll this out. I agree that I want this and I would support it in the budget process, putting it into another earmark. Carve out whatever you want to call it for this specific item. It gives me some. Hesitation.
235 Thanks. I just wanted to quickly state this is kind of to both councilor Novick and councilor Ryan councilor Novick. In the previous amendment, you noted that as appropriate, alleviated your concern. And I would I would say that the use of the phrase here of would allow should serve that same purpose. And I think this relates to the conversations that, that my staff had through with cbo and with parks about, you know, we did staff. The main concern we heard is we don't want necessarily one person to always be there alone. And so talking about the staffing level, we did adjust and get it rescored based on that, to have the ability to have a second staffer there so that the first person isn't staying alone the whole night, you know, so that we did adjust based off of those sorts of pieces of feedback. And I just wanted to make sure that was clear. I don't know if that alleviates the concern, but I think it's additional context.
236 Okay. I'm going to try to keep moving this along because we have a half an hour left today and at least one more amendment. Councilor Dunphy.
237 Thank you to.
238 The amendment. I just want to note, and I'll be a bit of a broken record, because I have said this multiple times on here, but I started my career working in a middle school in east Portland in the david douglas school district. I have watched three of my students die of violence. I have watched six of my students shot and live. I have seen one of my students doing a long term sentence because she was involved in the violent beating death of her classmate. Third places for students in east Portland especially, is unparalleled for our resources, for public safety. And the reality is, my 13 year old daughter will not benefit from this because we live in parkrose and the only available community center is the east Portland community center, which is adjacent to floyd light middle school. Those are my kids. Those are actually now the kids of my kids when I was there, because it's been 15, almost 20 years since I left. I think that this may be a special carve out. I hear my colleagues concerns about calling out one special thing versus another, but for my students in district one, for my young people, this is the difference between life and death. And it's not hyperbole. Kids who do not have a place to go find a place to go, and if they don't have something positive to do, they will find something to do and it will lead to increased. It is directly tied to increased gun violence, directly tied to car theft, directly tied to retail theft, and directly tied to interpersonal violence. I think that this is an enormously responsible use of our time, to modestly increase the amount of hours that some of our kids can benefit, even if it saves one child's life. So thank you.
239 Thank you, councilor, councilor Green.
240 Yeah, I just I just want to say that I think public safety begins with strong and safe and healthy communities and parks. Parks are a cornerstone of that for me. I think for all the other reasons that have been articulated, I, I think this is such a small amount of money that has the potential to save us a lot of public safety expenditure on the back end that this is, is, frankly, in a time where we do have budget challenges. I think just a really cost efficient move. I also, you know, I hear the I do hear the structural concerns about like, okay, what are we cobbling together here? And are we creating confusion. But I do think voters are looking at looking at us to, to be increasingly creative in how we stretch the value of every resolution, every measure, everything that we refer and ask them to pay for. And if we can say, all right, this has a very, very small impact on the rest of the program delivery, but has a huge impact on public safety and whole communities, I think is really something we should support. Colleagues. So I intend to vote yes.
241 Thank you. Councilor. Councilor Avalos.
242 Yeah, I agree with councilor Greene. And I just want to note there's been a lot of negotiating and carve outs that happened before it came to this table. So I think that this is another one that is actually people forward, which is why I'm going to support it. And I think you all should too. Thanks.
243 Thank you councilor. Any other discussion to the amendment? Okay. Seeing none. Rebecca, could you please call the roll.
244 Koyama Lane? I Morillo.
245 Sorry, I know we were supposed to have all our discussion. I'll be very brief, I think. In general.
246 A sentence brief.
247 Yes, a sentence brief. In general, I think that we should be able to indicate legislative intent when we are on the dais and have that be a part of the public record. But since this is such a small impact to the budget, with such a big impact for the community, I will be voting yes. But generally I'm quite tired of us being stuck in one position because we have specifically allocated funds when we need maximum flexibility, but I.
248 Novick nay.
249 Green a.
250 Zimmerman no. Avalos.
251 I. Dunphy I.
252 Smith no.
253 No I.
254 Ryan no. Pirtle-guiney.
255 No.
256 And the amendment fails with six I and five pardon. Passes with six I and five nay.
257 We need seven to pass. Can we get the final vote count? Rebecca?
258 Yes. Sorry. The amendment fails with six I and five nay votes.
259 Okay.
260 Councilor Zimmerman.
261 Thank you, madam president. As I indicated earlier, I would like to just add the sentence in the second to last resolved clause. The sentence reads the $0.03 for capital projects will be spent only on restroom facilities. So the reason I have shared before and being the representative for the downtown area in particular, but actually across our district, this is one of those areas where I actually think specificity in levies is important. And in particular on this topic. The reason I'm presenting this as an amendment is because I think we have seen over the last few years, we've seen where restroom facilities in our in our parks have been downgraded, if you will, in terms of their prioritization. Instead, we saw the parks put in porta potties and things like that. And I think it's important that we be specific that this is also part of it. And I appreciate the rest of the other capital maintenance and councilor Novick points about about the right sizes. I think those are all really important signals and, and pieces to send. And the additional 50% open to other items. But I do think it's important for us in this time to consider calling out the park restrooms, because for whatever reason, I don't think that park restrooms are held in high regard in the cultural decision making of the last levy, or in the last several years of parks. And so in this case, I, I think it's important I would never shy away from specificity. I think that the health of a levy would be that this would all be more specific. And I'm willing to be flexible on this entire levy. But in this in this case, I, I think for this one, I would like this 3% to be clear and that be resolved so that we meet our intent here. Thank you. I would appreciate any seconds.
262 Thank you counselor. Is there a second?
263 Second.
264 Okay. Seconded by councilor Ryan, councilor Dunphy to the amendment.
265 Yeah.
266 Councilor Zimmerman, you know, there are I think I'm ultimately going to be a no on this. I appreciate where you're going. And I have seen firsthand how, for example, when the bathroom at ventura park was chained shut for a year, it led to less use by families and more use by bad behavior. But I also see situations like lewitt view park in my neighborhood, where the rubber on the surface of the playground began crumbling. Within a year, the pipes that were used to irrigate the plants got run over by a lawnmower and never got replaced. And the splash pad has been out of commission for the last four years. So there are some, you know, especially in my district, there are reasons beyond simply restrooms, that people are no longer able to use a lot of these public spaces. And I. Would be hesitant to only specify that, especially because there are there are bathrooms in east Portland or parks in east Portland that simply don't even have bathrooms. So.
267 Thank you, councilor. Councilor Novick.
268 I wanted to second councilor Dunphy's reference to playgrounds. The current language of the levy says that a new levy would include 0.03 of the rate for capital projects to maintain our park system, such as repair of bathrooms and playgrounds. So it does call out bathrooms. And as a 62 year old man, I yield to no one my appreciation of the importance of bathrooms. But I would not want to exclude playgrounds.
269 Thank you councilor. Councilor. I also am concerned with just calling out restrooms playground stand out to me. There are also a number of facilities in my district that could support the type of partnerships that we are asking for parks to do more of. If only the facilities were more usable. Things like cottages. I know in Sellwood park we've heard about the shack that need roof repairs and other upgrades to be able to be usable for the type of partnerships that we're talking about that actually come in at about the same cost range as the bathroom projects that I'd like to be able to have on the list. If folks are interested in moving this forward and the votes are not there without changes, I would suggest that I would be happy to say prioritizing bathrooms, but not excluding other projects to give us some ability to look at what the needs are in our districts. However, if the votes are are there without that, or are not there at all, I, I don't need to move that forward. But I am concerned with the current language as proposed. Councilor Avalos.
270 Thank you, councilor Dunphy, agree with your points. I don't see how at a moment where we are scraping by, we're already sacrificing so much by choosing this 140 number, we're already carving out $0.03 for capital, and that's not even close to being enough. And our playgrounds are deteriorating. I don't see how we could put this kind of restriction on ourselves to make it only go to bathrooms, especially when east Portland barely has them. So I'm going to be voting no.
271 Thank you, councilor, councilor Koyama Lane.
272 Thank you, madam president. Glad you're with us. Councilor zimmermann, I have a question for you. I kind of wish I could just ask you this. Not on the dais. I'm. I'm genuinely wondering and a little confused. And I'm wondering if you can speak to your hope for specificity here and why that's appropriate and how that is similar or different from what councilor Kanal just brought up. I am genuinely curious. And it might be that those two are quite different, but can you speak to that a little bit? Help me understand?
273 Well, those are your words. I didn't speak to councilor Canales issue about specificity, and I agreed with his specificity, and I disagreed with those of you who thought that specificity was bad. I voted no for a different reason. It has. Unrelated.
274 Thank you for clarifying. That's helpful.
275 Councilor. Anything additional?
276 Nope. Thank you.
277 Councilor Green.
278 Yeah, I was I'm councilor Council president. I, I appreciate you brought in that potential amendment that you can make because that's something that I was going to suggest that could move me. But but I think yeah, I think that I think that councilor Novick has pointed to the language that in the ballot that, that that does identify the bathrooms. I bathrooms are a huge problem in our district. I know that I also think that we have an opportunity with the amendment that we passed from councilor Ryan with the kpis to say, look, we're we're in the five year levy period. How are we spending our money? Are we prioritizing the right things? And yes, bathrooms need to be opened up. We shouldn't be using porta potties, but I, I don't know if I'm there yet on this. So if there's further discussion, I might be able to be moved. Or if you want to have a response to me, please, please, please go for it.
279 Councilor zimmermann, go ahead.
280 I appreciate I appreciate that so much. You know, I think that this levy should have specificity. I think there's so much about this levy that is being taken on faith. And I have great concern, I think being able to signal a couple of areas where we have seen time and time again, the decision making within the bureau has not prioritized something. And so that's all I'm really trying to trying to solve for here is because I think that it can be very easy to get a bureau to talk about repairing a playground, but for whatever reason, that decision making has not ever prioritized restrooms in our community. And so I, I don't disagree with a lot. That's being said. I certainly wish this levy was more transparent in terms of what was being included in it. And I thought that this one little ounce of that might be palatable. And I just want to highlight a little bit of a difference when we talk about some of the parks that are in west Portland, we're usually when you stand in one position of that park, you know, you can see almost the rest of the entire park except for except for, of course, the, the forest park. And that's a little bit different than when you stand in some of the parks across our cities who who occupy larger blocks and larger areas. And the reason I bring that up is sometimes the behavior that happens in and around our parks is the kind of thing that you can't get away from when you're in a urban area park in the downtown area, that you will just choose to leave that park. And sometimes and a lot of times in our district, that is what I've noticed is it's toileting and it is, you know, it's the porta potty getting dumped over. Right? It's the it's the it's that kind of stuff that's you can't just go to the other side of the park when that park is only one square block and think that you're away from it. So I am, I am hearing folks I would still support and hope for some support on this. I know it's a tiny amount, but I am. I'm pretty worried about the future of this levy and where we're going with it, and I think some specificity could help with that. So thanks for the questions. And I and I recognize it's not everybody's cup of tea, but I appreciate consideration.
281 Councilor Morillo.
282 Thank you, madam president. Thank you, councilor Zimmerman, for bringing this forward. I, I think I share the same concerns that some of my colleagues have already brought up and just the fact that restrooms were already referenced, but I did just want to say put it on the record right now, that whenever you want to work on opening more restrooms and repairing our restrooms in the city together, I'd be happy to work on that with you. I do think it's a really critical issue, and I think that in the coming years, frankly, we're going to be experiencing more housing and homelessness issues because of everything happening economically at the federal level and locally. And this is going to be a really critical resource for people who are on our streets. And just for anyone who wants to use our parks. So I hope that this is signaling some legislative intent to move this forward, and that maybe in the next budget cycle, we add some specific budget notes as well to direct the parks bureau to have a specific focus on this.
283 Thank you. Councilor. Councilor Koyama Lane.
284 Thank you, madam president. This is a helpful discussion and thank you for clarifying. Councilor Zimmerman. That does refresh my memory. And I remember you saying you appreciate specificity. I would be interested if any colleagues are interested in sharing. If you voted no on that last amendment, specifically around concerns around specificity, but are considering voting yes on this one, I'd be interested. If you're comfortable hearing a bit of your thinking there. I, I said in my last vote, I'm interested in specificity and so I and I want to make I make my voting decisions based on what I think makes the most sense and what's going to be best for portlanders. And so I am also interested in this a bit. I am wondering, councilor Zimmerman, if you might be interested, if you might be open to a friendly amendment that council president and I were just whispering about over here about it saying bathrooms, playgrounds and other small structures. Or if the parks bureau has a more a better word besides small structures, insert that. Would you be open to that? Councilor Zimmerman adding in playgrounds and other small structures.
285 Thanks. So and I'll just remind folks, we have a maintenance budget in the parks bureau outside of this, $0.03 in this levy. And so nothing would stop them from doing those projects that you're referencing. Councilor. And so I appreciate the nod, I think, to get to get there. The reason I actually value including the term restroom in this one solely is because I don't think that those the prioritization for restrooms actually exists within the thought process within the bureau structure as it currently is. So that was actually part of the reason why I think calling it out individually was important, because the other aspects of park maintenance, excuse me, the other park maintenance funds seem to already be trying to keep up with some of the other areas. I'm noticing what I think is inequity in terms of how they apply those maintenance dollars. And this is a signal to one of those areas that I think has been on the lowest end of the decision making. So it's not that I, I, you know, I think some of the framing here has been like for some reason, this is against against playgrounds or something of that nature. And that's certainly not the case. I obviously was supportive of the regular budget and continue to be I'm just talking about this in this one. So I wouldn't I wouldn't quite be there for that friendly amendment. But I do appreciate the nod.
286 Okay. Thank you so much.
287 Councilor Smith.
288 Thank you, madam president. I just wanted to say that I agree with you, councilor Zimmerman. I think that bathrooms should be pointed out and I will be supporting this amendment.
289 Thank you. Councilor. Councilor Ryan.
290 Yes, thank you, madam president. I did second this because I wanted to have this conversation. I was equally challenged with the last one by councilor Kanal. All of us have heard from countless constituents, especially parents who tell me their frustrations with bathrooms being closed. And so clearly this is an operational issue that this council must stay on top of from for oversight reasons. But because I voted no on the last one, there's some similar themes on this, and that's where I'll land to stay consistent. Thanks.
291 Thank you. Councilor.
292 Is there any other discussion to the amendment? Okay. Seeing none. Rebecca, can you please call the roll.
293 Koyama Lane I.
294 Morillo I.
295 Novick no.
296 Green.
297 Hi.
298 Zimmerman. I Avalos.
299 No, no.
300 Dunphy.
301 No.
302 Smith.
303 I.
304 Canal.
305 No.
306 Ryan.
307 No.
308 Pirtle-guiney.
309 No.
310 The amendment fails with five I and six nay votes.
311 Colleagues.
312 Those were all of the amendments that I had noted. Folks said they were bringing. If there are any other amendments though, please feel free to put yourself in the queue. And in addition, because we are trying to not give our speeches with our votes now, if there is anybody who would like to speak to the now amended resolution and attachments as a whole, this would be the time to get in the queue to make those comments. Councilor Dunphy.
313 Thank you. Yeah. First, colleagues, thank you for this conversation. I think that the debate back and forth has been great to add some some value and to continue to work with you all. Thank you to everybody who's been involved in this so far. I'm eager to support the renewal of the Portland parks levy, and I'm really thankful to everybody who has and all the work that's gone into the compromise proposal before us. You know, as I said, just a little bit ago, and I've mentioned repeatedly in my in my brief time on city council, I've insisted that we treat parks as a vital public safety infrastructure, especially in east Portland, where far too many residents lack access to safe, accessible places to play, gather and connect. I believe strongly in investing in these spaces, not just to maintain what we have, but to grow and transform what our parks can be. But let's be clear what we have heard from every part of our community. This cannot just be business as usual. We're asking portlanders to dig deeper into their pockets. If we are asking portlanders to dig deeper into their pockets, especially in my community in district one, we must demand more in return, holding ourselves and parks and recreation to the highest standard of fiscal stewardship, accountability, equity, and imagination. Our parks should be more than vibrant or more than beautiful natural spaces. They should be alive and vibrant with youth programing and cultural celebrations and music and food and community events that bring neighbors together and activates these public spaces year round. And where the bureau can't do that on their own, then we must be bold enough to pursue partnerships with community organizations that can, like the Sellwood community house and others that have shown us what is possible if when our public assets are community powered. So I support this levy and I'm let's also use this moment as a call to action, a challenge to ourselves and to the bureau to raise the bar, to build a Portland where our parks reflect the vibrant, diverse, thriving communities that they are meant to serve. Thank you.
314 Thank you, councilor, councilor Canal.
315 Thank you.
316 I actually have a couple questions for the parks leadership. I separated this out so I could propose my amendment. And it's related to some specific testimony that we had here, both mr. Oldendorf and mr. Weinstein referenced an audit that they said had not been released publicly. Could you speak to that?
317 Yeah. I don't I don't quite know what that is. I know there are a couple of audits underway with the city's audit services division. None ready for release. I think one is maybe scheduled for fall and one's a little earlier in the sequence, but those are released publicly and contemporaneously by the auditor.
318 Right. And then there's when you say in the fall before the election.
319 Up to the auditor, I, I kind of think so, but I don't know.
320 Okay. And then last year, there was a conversation when I was on the parks board about that not by the auditor, but an independent look into the levy, specifically the current levy, and that that had, as far as I'm aware, been publicly released. I've seen it.
321 Yes.
322 And I was on it as a volunteer. So I assume if I could see it, anyone can see it.
323 Correct.
324 But yeah, I'm seeing nods over there for the record so that that's helpful to know. And I my just for the record, it was a clean audit like it was it was a very positive audit. Thanks. Second, is there any current strategic planning process underway at parks or for that matter, in the public works service area.
325 Or in the city? Yes, in the parks bureau. I might ask sarah to come up briefly. I think the healthy parks healthy Portland framework is really the strategic conversation about directional priorities for the bureau. And within that, how to get there. Could you give us 30s on that?
326 Thank you. Certainly. Thank you so much, sarah huggins with Portland parks and recreation, for the record. So the bureau has a strategic planning framework. It's called healthy parks, healthy Portland. It includes both a mission vision values equity and anti-racism commitment. It also includes a performance framework. We call it actions and results that looks at performance over time and how those link up to six identified outcomes that are also in that strategic planning framework. It has other elements as well, but that is sort of the guiding principle for the bureau.
327 Thanks.
328 So, colleagues, I just wanted to note, I think my I'm a supporter of that. It's a 2020 document and I think we need to also evolve over time. I think that there's been some valid criticism of parks that that's insufficiently focused on recreation, to the point that we often just say Portland parks and it's Portland parks and recreation. Right. But I think that's worth noting here, and I hope that there will be a strategic planning process that can inform the next levy through this process. I think that's a fair thing for voters to ask because, as miss murray mentioned, and I think mister schulan as well, that there is a lack of cohesive understood by the public vision in that shorter, more concise way. When I met with mr. Schultz's group, I referenced my vision statement for parks, which is that parks are the thing that move your life in Portland from merely surviving to thriving, regardless of your income level. That's helpful context for our purpose. It's not specific enough. And so I want to note that and say that we do need to get there at some point. And then I'll just mention mr. Weinstein. Also, weinstein also mentioned the risk of conveying something to voters. That's not what they'd be voting for on major maintenance. And I think councilor Novak's amendments resolved that for me. I also mentioned this exact concern in the work session and the committee last Thursday. I checked all the exhibits. I think we have resolved that issue. And so I wanted to just note that finally, I agree with councilor Dunphy that we should treat parks as part of the public safety infrastructure of the city. Unfortunately, that didn't happen today and we had an opportunity to do that. I've been told in the in the Portland building and told for years next, next budget cycle, next fall bump, next spring bump. We'll get you the money. That never happened under the previous mayor. So we'll see if the next if the current mayor puts up a budget proposal that includes extended community center hours, I hope he does. I believe that he is interested in this work. And having said that, even if he does, we won't have it in June, which is when schools are out but before the budget takes over. Having said all of that, this is at the upper end of what I said was a good amount. I said $1.30 to $1.40 was my range when we had the work session. I think they've threaded the needle on where. The people and when I say they, I mean the people who did the negotiations over the last few weeks threaded the needle in terms of resolving both the needs of the operational side and contributing a small amount to the capital side. I committed then not only to donating dodgeballs, but to knocking doors for this levy, and I intend to keep that and I will support this.
329 Thank you.
330 Thank you, councilor, councilor Avalos.
331 Thank you. I just wanted to put my thoughts on the record about this. Ultimately, I do plan on voting I because I believe that this resolution is better than failing to address our budget shortfalls. But I'm definitely disappointed that we didn't have a bigger investment in parks that that wasn't really on the table. It seemed like there was a lot of discussion about, you know, what would be palatable with different groups. And I just feel that we miss the mark and that within the 140 range, we could have gone higher. I think there was a number at like 147 that would have gotten us a lot more. And I felt, you know, politically we could handle those $0.07 as well as it's just what we need. East portland's parks and recreation facilities, they're crumbling, as we have said over and over again. And we have so few of them as to begin with. So I'm just hoping that we really talk about how we stop this cycle of under investment and deferred maintenance. That just continues to lead to all of these even worse problems down the road. I hope we're prepared to have a discussion about how we make some progressive taxes instead of regressive taxes. Of course, it's not easy to add more taxes and fees to people who are struggling, and yet the folks that often fight us on some of those fees are the folks that don't let us do the progressive taxation that we need from the people who are leaving, not giving us the infrastructure dollars that we need as a city to build and thrive. So I'm ready to have that conversation to start figuring out how we do some other taxation measures that ask those that have the most to pay their share. So that's where I'm landing. I will be voting yes, but I wanted to continue to raise our concerns about how we really invest in our infrastructure that we need. Thanks.
332 Thank you, councilor, councilor Green.
333 Yeah, when we had our work session, I had indicated my directional preference for the my upper and lower bounds for the levy and a buck 40 was my lower bound. And here we are would prefer a higher number for all the reasons that councilor Avalos has already articulated. But I didn't want to let the perfect be the enemy of the good. I do believe that we have a council that is invested in hearing constituents and advancing that forward into accountability and transparency, and you have my commitment on that part of what got me here. And part of why I think we have a real opportunity is the willingness for this body to consider an amendment to more clearly specify how we might use system development charges to really leverage our, our backlog. And I think that's I think that's a win today. I do think as we contemplate the future, you know, future levy's future, future funding packages that we do, we always got to remember that you got to noticeably improve people's lives to keep them in the game. And this is a game of political economy. At the end of the day, we are losing people out of our county that we are primarily losing people in the middle of the income distribution, who who really want prized assets to raise a family. And the, you know, parks are a big part of that. So this got us partway there. We've recommitted, but we have more work to do. Yeah. Thanks.
334 Thank you, councilor, councilor Smith.
335 Thank you, madam president. I think that my district one councilors have have identified that taxation without representation is real key here. And I think the fact that we have probably one of the most vulnerable districts, the average income in district one is $60,000. And I know we know that from groceries to gas, every dollar counts. And this council has attached to itself many, many additional taxes this year all the way down to the parking. I felt that this past weekend, being downtown, $3.50. And that's a huge, huge amount of money. If you're asking folks who who have very little to do more with less, but the importance of this particular levy is being thoughtful and transparent about, you know, what is important, what is critical. It's not about expanding or, you know, increasing and improving shiny objects, but preserving what portlanders love and portlander. They love our parks, our trails, safe and clean community spaces. Without this funding, Portland risks the decline of some of our greatest assets. Parks are not luxuries, but they are on the front line infrastructure for public health, climate resiliency and social connection. And I believe delaying investment today could cost them far more investment tomorrow. This levy protects access for children, seniors and all portlanders while preserving skilled jobs and critical sanitation of our public spaces. Our parks are economic engines that help protect the value of the properties in the communities that they sit within. And so I've listened to all of you, and I've listened to portlanders, and I believe we would not ask for this increase if it was not necessary, critical, important parks are the lifeblood to our communities, and this levy was designed to be targeted and subject to accountable stewardship by our partners at Portland parks and rec. And I just believe that this is something that the community wants, and we have to deliver. So I will be supporting the levy. And thank you, madam president.
336 Thank you, councilor, colleagues, as a parent, a coach, a summer free for all fan. I have used parks a lot and I see the uses a lot, and I see the need in our parks a lot, especially around bathrooms. Parks are part of what hold our community together. They keep people safe, they keep people healthy. They're places that we can connect. Our communities provide our kids with natural areas close to home, regardless of income level or the amount of free time parents have, and that offer hundreds of hours of classes and programs each week. This continued funding will ensure that our parks summer programs can continue, and it will begin to address some of the long term maintenance needs that are piling up right now. This measure gives us new accountability tools, things that we have asked for and that we have heard community members ask for because our parks must be everything they are and more. And for too many neighborhoods, our parks start to feel like they are less and less. This measure will start to make a difference in that accountability. Tonight, I am excited to refer a ballot measure that I hope we can all get behind, and that I think portlanders can get excited about. One that balances the needs of our parks with our community's financial capacity. I will do everything I can to make sure that this is a win for our city. I hope that you all join me in that and portlanders, I hope that you will join us in continuing to invest in our city and our kids, and in our future colleagues, thank you for being a part of this robust debate today. Councilor Koyama Lane.
337 Thank you. I really see this moment right now as an invitation to our entire community to join together in making sure our parks are able to exist and operate, both now and in the future. I support this levy at $1.40 rate as a smart investment, even at the same time as I acknowledge that it will not address every need for our beloved park system, how exactly these funds will be used equitably to benefit all of our communities is a really important issue that we will need to address and explain really clearly to the public. For example, I'll be looking to see how these funds might impact the years long backlog of removing the more than 20,000 barriers to our parks facilities that were identified in the 20. In 2014, as part of the city's ADA transition plan. And I want the community to know that I commit, along with my colleagues, to holding all of us accountable to the stated intent of the use of the levy funds, and I look forward to a successful result. And finally, I want to share that with the newest park reopening in district three, berrydale park. I look forward to enjoying a newly renovated and updated park that ensures a park that's safe and accessible for all, and I want to invite everyone to join in the celebration on Friday, August 8th from 3 to 5 p.m.
338 Thank you, councilor. Councilor Ryan, you may be closing us up today.
339 Oh, thank.
340 You, thank you, council president. First, I want to thank the many stakeholders who have been very active in this, putting this on the ballot. We've had a lot of tension to get to this point. I wasn't sure how we were going to land this on this date and no one got everything they wanted. Special nod to the many conversations I've had with you, council president and you, councilor Novick. In between some of those creative meetings that we that we were all participating in. I'm supportive of this parks levy. And although I initially had a hard time going above the 120 rate, knowing that we intend to address maintenance needs at a higher rate, move my thinking, as did the willingness to join other big cities in the top ten of parks around the nation to attract more revenue from philanthropic sector and more earned revenue connected to our rec programs. And I'm thrilled with the crisp performance measures that we will bring forward. I hope that all funding measures, in fact, become more crystal clear when we go to voters so they can track what success looks like and become, and that voters and taxpayers deserve this accountability. I support obligating some of the levy funds to tackling a backlog of parts parks deferred maintenance. However, we know that the need is far greater than what is the reasonable levy is able to fund, and we need a plan for funding maintenance for the long term. This entire council is committed to that. I've been a vocal advocate for long term planning to push legislation changes in the state to utilize sdc funding for maintenance of capital assets. Thank you, councilor Green, for your amendment. It's clear that parks needs to undergo a cultural change and a transformation, including some structural changes, funding, stabilization, plan for the long term and prioritizing core services the public expects. I'm looking forward to starting this work immediately and so that we can regroup after the levy focus. I will always be a champion for parks outreach and partnership development work, which really fell off the last few years. They had a robust donor development partnership team prior to the last levy, and I want to revive that, which is why it's important to me that this position was included in this levy and that we will have dedicated more to this work. I hope to bring forward a proposal in the fall bump to find a second position to do that type of work so they can achieve more funding stability for parks operations. I'm so thankful that the north Portland aquatic center will stay in this levy to keep the promises the city has made previously to north portlanders, and I'm also thrilled to see the old town skate park is also included. These are promises that were made dating back well prior to I joined the council in 2020, and we are now equipped to deliver all that would have been ideal to resist, reset the culture change in parks and do some organizational shifting before we consider this levy. Timing didn't allow for that. I fully expect that after today, we will start working on what our parks can look like in the future.
341 Thank you councilor Colleagues. Seeing no other discussion or debate, rebecca, can you please call the roll? And I'll note this is on passage of the final package of resolution, as amended, and attachments as submitted.
342 Koyama Lane I. Morillo I. Novick I. Green. I.
343 Zimmerman I.
344 Avalos I.
345 Dunphy I Smith.
346 I connell. I Ryan. I pirtle-guiney. I and the resolution is adopted with 11 I votes and adopted as amended.
347 Thank you colleagues. This was the only order of business on our agenda. Today I am going to adjourn our special meeting, and we will be back here at 6:00 for our regular council meeting.