The record · Transcript
Council Session — 2025-03-31
Transcript from the session's official auto-captions (19,100 words), shown in readable case and split into speaker turns. Speakers are not yet identified (colors just separate consecutive turns). Auto-captions can contain errors — check the recording for anything that matters.
Session summaryEditor-reviewed
The Portland City Council Governance Committee convened on 2025-03-31, with roll call confirming member presence and the clerk reading the standard statement of conduct. The session addressed three agenda items: a resolution establishing procedures for appointing and confirming Portlanders to city boards, commissions, and committees, which included discussion, public testimony, a proposed amendment, and votes whose outcomes are recorded in the vote ledger; an ordinance to add the Sustainability and Climate Commission to city code, presented with background on its history, purpose, structure, membership, recruitment process, and relationship to other bodies such as the Planning Commission and PCEF, followed by extensive questions on outcomes, staffing, budget, and district representation, with deliberation carried over to a future meeting rather than concluded; and a presentation on a proposed Advisory Bodies Alignment Project intended to clarify roles, purposes, and processes for the city's advisory bodies under the new government structure, with discussion of committee reduction, equity, compensation for volunteers, and communication practices. The meeting closed with discussion of committee procedures, public testimony practices, and scheduling, with the next meeting set for April 7 at 2:30 p.m.
AI-drafted from the session's auto-captions, reviewed by an editor — describes the discussion only; recorded votes live in the vote ledger. Captions contain errors.
Procedural markers in this session
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0 T is the transgender day of visibility. And it is 2:30 p.m. Rebecca, will you please call the roll?
1 Dunphy here.
2 Pirtle-guiney. Ryan. Here. Clark.
3 Here.
4 Koyama Lane.
5 Here. Ashley. Will you. Will you please read the statement of conduct?
6 The meeting of the governance committee to testify before the committee within, in person or virtually. You must sign up in advance on the committee agenda at w-w-w. That Portland gov slash council slash agenda. Slash governance committee. Or by calling 311. Information on engaging with the committee can be found in this link. Registration for virtual testimony closes one hour prior to the meeting. In person. Testifiers must sign up before the agenda item is heard. If public testimony will be taken on an item. Individuals must testify for three minutes unless the chair states. Otherwise. Your microphone will be muted when your time is over. The chair preserves order. Disruptive conduct such as shouting, refusing to conclude your testimony when your time is up or interrupting others testimony or committee deliberations will not be allowed. If you cause disruption, a warning will be given. Further disruption will result in ejection from the meeting. Anyone who fails to leave once ejected is subject to arrest for trespass. Additionally, the committee might take a short recess and reconvene and reconvene virtually. Your testimony should be at addressed, the matter being considered when the. When testifying, as they say your name for the record. If you are a lobbyist in identify the organization you represent. Virtual testifiers should unmute themselves when the clerk calls. Thank you.
7 Thank you so much, ashley and rebecca. So for a little bit of a meeting overview today we have three items kind of three big things we're going to be talking about and doing today. First, we'll start with discussing the resolution to establish procedures for appointments to commissions and committees. Following that we'll receive a presentation and discuss an ordinance to incorporate the sustainability and climate code commission. And then we will conclude with a presentation on the office of community and civic life's work related to advisory bodies. All right, rebecca, will you please read the first item?
8 Item one adopt a procedure for the appointment and confirmation of portlanders to city boards, commissions, and committees.
9 Thank you. So we're here to continue the discussions that we've already began. We've had them on February 10th and February 24th, which led to the resolution that we have before us today. This resolution outlines our recommendations regarding the procedures for appointing and confirming Portland residents to different volunteer boards, commissions and committees. We will be submitting this resolution for adoption by the full council. So, colleagues, I'd like to give some time for us to first discuss the proposed resolution. Hopefully not too much time because we do have a lot going on today. And after we have a little bit of time, we will listen to public testimony. Oh I would. Okay. Just kidding. I'm going to discuss it then. We'll listen to public testimony and then we will have questions and comments. How does that sound? Colleagues. Okay, so I know something that really came out of this conversation. And this work is we want to make sure that we are being mindful and respectful of the many portlanders who volunteer their time for these boards and commissions, wanting to make sure that in this new form of government, we also have a clear process for after there has been vetting done by the executive branch, what happens when that now comes over to council? There was also some conversation about how some of these boards and commissions are a bit different. And so sometimes the council is more invited to be part of the vetting process. Sometimes they're not. This the third item that we're going to be discussing today on our agenda, will go more in depth on this bigger, longer project of how are we rethinking these advisory bodies. But in the meantime, we are getting names coming to us as council. Council president is getting names. And so we had talked about a few different ideas, a few different routes for these appointments. After they have been they've gone through the executive side. And so in general, we got to a place that I mean, we kind of went a few different directions. First there was conversation of should all of these go through governance and then should they go to the full council. And we actually ended up moving things. So instead, if there is a policy committee, a policy centered committee that's more related to this, this advisory body, then that's where the names would go. So that is the resolution that we have before us. And should we take public comment. Is this a that a good time now.
10 We have one person signed up for testimony terry harris.
11 Well, on my very last day of gtac, terry harris. For the record, it's my very last day of gtac. They've taken away my email. But nevertheless, here I am. And as part of our gtac discussions at the very end, some of us will be cursed to come to governance committee meetings until we're done. Right. So anyway, on this topic, I just want to say, I think what you've got here is fine. It's great. The one thing that you might want to consider is and let me there's some written testimony to make it clearer is to make it clear to appointees what their responsibilities are and whether they're invited or not, and who invites them. And how does that occur? Seems a little vague in your draft. One way, I think to simplify it just really quickly is to is to make it is to generalize it that in a committee hearing, if you're an appointee, you may show up, and if you do, you'll be afforded an opportunity to speak, period. And if you would like to show up at the full council meeting, the council may want you to speak. And in neither spot is it necessary for you to show up to, to be appointed and leave it at that? And then if there's a problem with an appointment, then it should be on the sponsor of the appointment or the appointee to show up and make themselves heard and make their case. If there's not a problem, then most of these are just going to coast right by and you don't get you don't need to wrap yourself up in process as to who does the invitations when those invitations go out, how that how that lands on the chair's desk, you don't have to worry about it. So just something to think about. And but other you know, this is otherwise it's great. I'm glad to see progress.
12 Thank you terry, I appreciate your comments. And could you actually are you open to staying up while we are having a bit of a discussion to answer some questions?
13 Sure.
14 All right, councilor Clark.
15 Thank you, madam chair. So, terry, I just want to ask you, in looking at exhibit a, it would seem to me that there's plenty of flexibility in number three that appointees will be invited to come before the designated policy committee to share their interest in serving, either in person or virtually. The chair will determine whether an appointee needs to appear before the committee. That seems pretty straightforward.
16 Well, but I guess my point is that it puts the responsibility on the chair to make some sort of determination as to whether they need to show up or not. And I don't know what the standards for that are. And you don't you don't know when or how that gets communicated to you as an appointee.
17 Well, I think, madam chair, if I may, that that's going to be I mean, every chair may be slightly different, and I don't know that we can really determine all of that here. I would prefer that we just go with the language that our chair and vice chair have presented to us today. But I appreciate your comment that we may need to add to it later. If it if it's not clear to people, but we're going to have a variety of, you know, bureaus, appointments, commissions. I don't know that we can dictate that here, but I think leaving up to the chair is a pretty good idea. Madam president or chair?
18 Thank you. Councilor pirtle-guiney do you would you like terry up here for your comment or question?
19 I wanted to weigh in on this topic, but I think if terry wants to sit down, that's probably okay. Terry, thank you. And terry, thank you so much for being here. I actually love that on the last day of gtac being a formal entity, we have you here and I hope that we can continue to draw on your expertise as we move through these conversations. I actually think and I just I want to say this so that there's some record of it that we should default to, assuming that appointees will come to committees. I think it's good for council to hear, but more importantly, for the public to hear why somebody who we are appointing to serve on behalf of the public is interested in serving in that role. And I think coming before committee provides the space for them to do that. I think it's important to have the determination with the chair so that if somebody is scheduled, just doesn't allow them to be before a committee. There's a release valve. It's not mandatory. But I do hope that the default as we move forward is that folks will come to committee, that they will speak, even if just for two minutes on zoom, as to why they are interested in serving on behalf of the public. And I think you're right, mister harris, that we do need to have some specificity that's not in here, but I think we can create that through practice. And I hope that that specificity is that the sponsor, the bureau or dca, who has brought a name forward to us, coordinates with the nominated individual and the chair of the committee to figure out what date works best for them to be there, and that the chair sets a date that works with that individual to bring their name forward through coordination, not with the individual directly, but with the sponsor who has brought that person forward. So I hope that that's how it works. I do think it's important to have that opportunity. And also a thank you to our chair and vice chair here, because I think that where this landed gives us a lot of direction, but also a little bit of space to see how things continue to work.
20 I just want to.
21 Questions I have a comment.
22 Go ahead. Yeah. Counselor.
23 Clerk.
24 Well, I had just a question of clarification and also appreciate the work that you both did in council. Consideration of appointments. Number one, this is appointments that have been removed from the initial report and placed on separate reports may be included on the regular agenda for council discussion. That's just a permissive. It's not just in case. Could you can you say something about that. Just flesh that out a little bit. So appointments recommended to the full council will be placed on the consent agenda. Great appointments that have been removed from the initial report. And we talked earlier about splitting them up potentially if there's more than one and placed on separate reports may be included on the regular agenda for council discussion. I just want to make sure I understand what you're getting at there.
25 I think councilor Pirtle-guiney helped with that part.
26 I some work has been done on this since I last saw it, so I don't want to speak for whoever drafted this specifically, but the way that I personally read that was that. That was in contrast to the consent agenda, meaning that those appointments who are removed from the initial report could still be placed on the consent agenda, but they also may be placed on the regular agenda, presumably, if you took them out of the full report, it would be to consider them separately. So you might want to place them on the regular agenda. But this would allow the contrast and the choice between consent and regular. Again, if others who worked on drafting this had a different intent, please say that. But that was my reading of it.
27 Well, can I make a suggestion then, that we say appointments that have been removed from the initial report may remain on the consent agenda or placed. That might make it clear for me. Okay.
28 Do we need a motion for an amendment?
29 Yeah.
30 Is that an amendment you want to okay.
31 It would be to amend the second sentence in number one. Appointments that have been removed from the initial report may remain on the consent agenda or be placed on separate reports. On separate reports on the regular agenda for council discussion.
32 Do you want to read that?
33 Okay, one more time.
34 Is there a motion suggestion?
35 Oh, sure. Sure.
36 Oh I'm sorry.
37 I'm sorry. Was was there a motion. I was moving moving.
38 And was there a second I'm sorry a second. Thank you.
39 May I make a suggestion on placement of the language that you've just motioned councilor?
40 Please do.
41 If you were to say, and this is in council consideration of appointments. Number one, second sentence, appointments that have been removed from the initial report and placed on separate reports may be included on the consent agenda or on the regular agenda for council discussion.
42 Perfect.
43 That might be a cleaner place.
44 That's a friendly amendment.
45 Okay.
46 I'll second that one too. I think we just approved it. Right. But you liked it?
47 Yes. Rebecca.
48 Did you catch that or do you need it in writing?
49 I we're going to need it in writing.
50 Did you need anything? Oh, should I read it real quick? Would you.
51 Like me to send it to you in teams? Does that work? Okay, I can do that right now.
52 Are you able to call the roll on this amendment as we're doing.
53 This? Okay.
54 Dunphy. I pirtle-guiney. I Ryan. I Clark. I Koyama Lane.
55 I.
56 The amendment is accepted.
57 Councilor. Clark. Did you want to say anything else?
58 Okay.
59 Okay, so we have a motion.
60 Without any other discussion. May I have a motion for this? Nonemergency for this? Yeah. Resolution.
61 So moved second. Okay. Well, madam chair, I, I move resolution document number two 2025 117 to be sent to the full council with the recommendation it be adopted.
62 Our second.
63 All right. The motion has been moved by councilor Ryan and seconded seconded by councilor Clark. Is there any discussion? Clark. Will the clerk please call the roll?
64 Dunphy I.
65 Pirtle-guiney. I Ryan.
66 I.
67 Clark I Koyama Lane.
68 Hi.
69 It's referred. The resolution is referred.
70 All right. We're moving right along. Clark, will you please read the second item?
71 Item two add sustainability and climate commission code.
72 So this is an ordinance. So I would like to call agenda item 2025-118 ordinance. And this ordinance to add sustainability and climate commission in city code. I want to say thank you so much to our chief sustainability officer, vivian satterfield, and sustainability and climate commission coordinator, elaine visca. Did I say your name right? Visca. Thank you, livingstone, for joining us today to brief us on this much anticipated advisory body. So I have gotten to meet with vivian and elaine and hear about their massively important work that they've been working on over the past two years to design a new climate oversight body that is aligned with community needs and demands, our new city structure and form of government, and with a focus on climate action and justice. I want to say, as I was meeting with them and getting briefed on this last week and just hearing about how. With so much they've been so intentional about this process, and it really made me think about how it connects to this last, when we're going to have amanda come on up and share with us, just really thinking, wow, this is a great example of putting together advisory bodies. And I think is really something we can look at as we're thinking about how we can streamline our processes. So with that, I will hand it to vivian satterfield to introduce her team and their work.
73 Thank you. Chair Koyama Lane, council president. Members of the committee. I'm vivian satterfield. I use she her pronouns or my name. And I'm your chief sustainability officer. I'm here today with elaine livingstone, who is the climate commission coordinator. We're so pleased to be able to present this work on the two years that we spent in creating the sustainability and climate commission. The work before you today actually is a code amendment, and we have time to explain what that is. But I am going to give you the benefit of a brief background on the purpose, the work, and then what the appropriate committee council committee will be hearing for the full appointments later this month. I know, at least for councilor Ryan, you will have the benefit of sitting on both of these committees and hearing this work in in greater depth. So that burden is for you to share with me here. And I also want to appreciate today's agenda, just on the topic of conversation here today on advisory bodies, the great work of members such as terry harris and the rest of the members of gtac in helping to set really a new stage for us in how the city of Portland is approaching, approaching these advisory bodies. And of course, my colleague, the chief engagement officer, who's here today as well. We continue to be in coordination alongside you all and partnership for this work. So thank you. So again, the work before you today is an ordinance to add the sustainability and climate commission into code. Specifically it's to add new code. Chapter 3.1 36i know you all have this memorized and amend chapter code 3.33 with the commission currently exists in the bureau of planning sustainability. All this work has transpired during a transformational time for the city of Portland. So this is what we did before in the older form of government, and what we're putting now into the newer form of government when it didn't exist yet when we conducted this work. Next slide please. So today again, the agenda briefly is through background and context for this code change. What the sustainability and climate commission code actually is, and then the current status and upcoming council action as well. Next slide please. So a brief journey in city history here today we used to have at the city the planning and sustainability commission. It was established in 2010. And the role of that commission truly had two charges. Because of the size of our jurisdiction, we have to have a planning commission. That commission gets its power vested to it by state land use law. Because this is Portland, we know that portlanders care deeply about sustainability and climate change. The importance of sustainability was lifted up and given to the planning commission to sort of have this dual charge of dealing with both the planning land use side of the work, but also to address sustainability and climate issues. That work became quite onerous and too large for just that single committee to handle. And so, thanks to the leadership of then commissioner Rubio, she actually chartered a report that gave her some recommendations on how to handle both that dual charge of planning and sustainability. So the psc was disbanded in February of 2023 through an ordinance. And then that created also a new planning commission. Now that has been up and running, it's stewarded by the bureau of planning and sustainability. And of course, because it gets power vested to it by state. State land use law continues their good work there. That ordinance 191150 directed at the time, the bureau of planning sustainability to bring a new climate proposal to council. So that's the background and backdrop for where we are. Alongside that, we also had charter reform phase one passed in November of 2022 by voters, and in that in there it stated that the role of the mayor and city administrator would have these responsibilities and, I quote, advance the city's efforts to mitigate the human made climate crisis and prioritize environmental justice initiatives. Also in that we have phase two environmental and climate justice listening sessions, which really brought to the forefront the importance that portlanders do place on the city's role in addressing this. And that's why there's the charge, then, in the mayor and the city administrator's job descriptions to deal with these issues. Excuse me, during that time, you know, alongside it, city climate, climate action planning has been going forward. So city council declared a climate emergency in 2020. The climate emergency work plan was approved in July of 2022, which brought us through 2025, and there would be yearly progress reports and a final progress reports anticipated for later this year in July 2025. That's all to get us to the point that I got here. That is going to be in early 2023, which I was hired as a chief sustainability officer, and I was tasked with creating this climate commission at that time. I also got to work quickly and was able to find elaine and hire them on as the climate commission coordinator. And I want to acknowledge the leadership of danny oliveira, who is the bureau of planning sustainability director at that time, who oversaw this process and handed me my first work plan, which included standing up the new sustainability and climate commission. We worked in partnership with community and city leadership and staff to design the sustainability and climate commission to offer a framework that was approved by the previous council in may of 2024. Okay, so I hope that you all have that backdrop absorbed as we move on to the next slide, please. Just wanted to give you all a bit of an appreciation of the breadth of work that elaine and I conducted in partnership with, especially the engagement equity team at the bureau of planning sustainability. Our colleagues, harmony dashiell and communications manager there, megan read as well, were instrumental in helping us conduct this work.
74 This is okay.
75 So I'll go ahead and let elaine speak a bit about the research and public engagement components of that.
76 Thank you, vivian, and thank you, governance committee chair and vice chair, for having us today. For the record, my name is elaine livingstone and I use she they pronouns and I'm the sustainability and climate commission coordinator. So after vivian hired me, I went straight to work on researching the background of our climate commission. So going back through the city of Portland history that we just reviewed on the last slide and reviewing the previous community engagement on climate issues, community has shown up time and time again through the years, most namely from the charter reform commission, where in phase one, 8% of their survey results alluded to climate and environmental justice, and in phase two they had multiple climate and environmental justice listening sessions. So I reviewed all of those materials, and then I also researched other climate commissions across the u.s. Previous to the city, I worked for the university of hawaii at manoa as a researcher and instructor in climate science and justice. And in my work there, my research was used to inform the two climate commissions in hawaii, one at the state level and one at the city and county level. So I also brought that background to this research that we did here. Then we did our own public engagement. So we brought together an external working group who we then worked through the different processes that a climate commission may need for the city of Portland. We had a community kickoff event. We had several community conversations in person and hybrid. We had surveys. Then when we released our proposal for the council framework that was approved last year, we had public comment periods where then we updated that proposal and then had proposal open houses.
77 Alongside that, we also ran the internal process as well. We engaged in specific city staff workshops. I my role, which by the way, is also the coolest role in the entire city. It really gets to convene climate practitioners through all different service areas. I was able to convene them and run them through the same workshop series that the external work group helped design for us. So both the public facing side and then also the city engagement side, we had them inform the same workshop series also ran it through the climate practitioners group. We consulted with the transition team, with asset management team, a variety of city leadership teams and bureau directors to help inform this as well offered briefings. And then of course, we tracked council discussions and decisions as this process was moving, recognizing these were parallel tracks, we wanted to ensure that what we were designing was going to fit and be built alongside this new form of government. Next slide please. And this is just some further context which helps inform the formation of the sustainability and climate commission. So in November of 2023, a resolution transitioned my position out of the bureau of planning and sustainability and is associated resources into the city administrator's office, which was effective on January 1st of this year. With that, the sustainability and climate commission is moving alongside my office into the city administrator's office. This does make this advisory body, this commission, the highest level advisory body that we will have in the city currently. Additionally, in may of 2024, the ordinance, a number that you see referenced here created the sustainability and climate commission, approved its framework as a council exhibit, and the commission currently exists in bts code. That's the work before us today is because we had the code for the new city administrator's office had not been created by the time that we were approving the framework. And so that was why it was, for all intents and purposes, parked in bts code.
78 So before you today with your ordinance, you'll see two exhibits. Exhibit a is what codifies the sustainability and climate commission as chapter 3.136. This is a high level out line of requirements that goes through this body's purpose, their members and terms, powers and duties, procedures and meetings and staffing. And then exhibit two is where you will see the removal of the sustainability and climate commission from code chapter 3.33. So to walk us through some of these code components that you see in exhibit a, the sustainability and climate commission purpose is to advance climate action across our city, focus on environmental justice and accountability, and it creates and evaluates the city's climate action plan. Then you will see this list of our eight initial focus areas. This is not codified. This was part of our framework that was approved by the previous council. So these are eight focus areas that really draw through line from our previous climate action plans, to what we can expect that this commission will need to focus on. At maximum, this commission will be 20 total members, which includes at least four designated seats for youth, which we've defined as ages 16 to 24, and that members should reflect the broad representation of portland's diverse communities and socioeconomics. And the members must have expertise or lived experience in sustainability and climate issues. Acceptance of human made climate science and motivation towards collaborative climate action. This commission is mayor appointed for terms no longer than four years.
79 Okay.
80 So to talk a little bit about its powers and duties, we have proposed that the sustainability and climate commission advises city council, the mayor and the city administrator. Again, think back to that charge from charter that defines that. The mayor and city administrator must address actions of human caused climate change. And I believe that the sustainability and climate commission helps fulfill that charge for them. It also recommends actions for the city to take to fulfill those those that charge the sustainability and climate commission may hold hearings, work sessions and committees to help develop the city's next climate action plan. They can also hold joint committees and joint meetings with other advisory bodies. Excuse me. For example, Multnomah county also has a sustainability advisory body. And so I imagine that because we have a lot of shared purpose in this realm, that this body could be the formal body for the city of Portland to convene and have those discussions with other jurisdictional bodies as well. The sustainability and climate commission would provide that public forum for community to have open debate about how we should be prioritizing our climate action plan and the actions that we should be taking. They would help us, advise us on the evaluation and also help create accountability and transparency for portlanders and how we're conducting our actions that link back to our climate action plan. And because this would be coming alongside myself and elaine to the city administrator's office, it would be directly reporting to me. And just to give you a little bit of a backdrop for I keep referencing that one of the biggest charges of this body will have is that they will help us create our next climate action plan. Portland has a long legacy and history of being a leader in climate action planning. We were the first city in 1993 to release a carbon reduction plan that was actually on a floppy disk. Maybe it was on paper. And since then, we've had many different iterations of climate action planning, both with other jurisdictions, such as Multnomah county, all the way up to our most recent climate emergency work plan, which is our current guiding document on actions to get us to a net zero carbon by 2050, which is a city council adopted goal. We also obviously have a clear focus on community to capture lived experiences and serve frontline communities as well, and our current plan and future plan will have resiliency, adaptation and climate justice actions as well. The city commission will create further processes to convene and work on the next climate action action plan. I think one of the through lines that the governance committee will be hearing is that there's some components of these advisory bodies will be codified in code and other aspects the body itself will have to work through to create through their bylaws. And then the commission guiding documents. The commission will serve as a connection between the communities they represent the council, the mayor, the city administrator and staff. The work and briefings will be brought forward to the commission by city staff from their service areas, thus engaging and encouraging de siloing and collaboration. So city staff will be staffing and supporting the sustainability and climate commission. And when we develop our next climate action plan, that work will be happening holistically and together. We also won't be doing this without any sort of, you know, just on our own. We'll also have technical assistance from the other sort of climate advisory bodies that that we are members of, such as c40 and the us. Us director network, usda. Sustainability directors network. Sorry, it's a mouthful. So we won't be doing this alone. We'll be doing this in partnership alongside this as well. But the sustainability and climate commission, because they will have city staff sitting alongside them, will have a strong connection to the development of all of our climate goals in the future. So again, the requested council action today is to recommend this ordinance to full council to add chapter 3.136, as demonstrated in exhibit a, and to amend city code chapter 3.33 as shown in exhibit b, to remove those responsibilities from planning and sustainability, and to put that into the city administrator's office.
81 We also are currently undergoing recruitment for the sustainability and climate commission. We had applications open from November 2024 through January 2025, and we received 245 applications. We then convened approximately 30 city staff to review all these applications. This was staff teams from across service areas, and then February and March of this year we conducted interviews. We did 12 panel style interviews where we tried to mimic how real commission meetings will go, including having similar ratio of adult commissioners to youth commissioners to city staff. So in each panel interview, our goal was to have eight adult commissioners, two youth commissioners and four city staff. And we interviewed 113 individuals. Then this March, chief sustainability officer vivian satterfield gave her recommendations to the mayor. And then we're hoping to go through the appointment process this April and may. With the mayor's appointments being seen at the climate, land use and resilience committee.
82 So that concludes our presentation. We welcome any of your questions. Thank you.
83 First, I want to say thank you to both of you. I have to admit, I was a little shocked to find out that your team is just a team of two. I'm also very impressed, just as I can see that this has been a really big lift. And I also see how hard you're working and the results that you're delivering. So first, thank you. And also just wanted to clarify that what we have before us is, is approving the code change so that this new commission can move forward, but that the actual appointments are going through the climate resilience land use committee. So we're really just just talking about this commission moving forward. Something else that stood out to me is I appreciated that you shouted out your dca donnie oliveira, and acknowledging that you felt supported to me, as someone that cares so much about workers, I. I like to hear what what folks are saying about the people that they report to. And so that carries a lot of weight. And I do think it's important that we acknowledge when things are going well. And so that carries a lot for me to hear you feeling supported by the person that that you report to. That slide about the current recruitment slide was really helpful for me to see the different. Thank you. So that going back up the recruitment and reviewing and interviewing and recommendations that happen before getting to us, I think for me being new to council to see the vetting that happens on that on your side is important for me. So let's some of my councilors have some questions and comments before we get to those. I am hoping we can take our. I'd like to first take public testimony from someone who I hope is always on our public testimony list. Yeah. Can we do that first, please?
84 Yep. Terry harris.
85 Yeah. You you hope that now. Thank you terry harris, for the record. And I appreciate the long engagement and hard work that's gone into this. It's an impressive process. I, I support what they're doing here. And as full disclosure, I've applied for the commission. We'll see what happens after I'm done talking here. But I have some concerns about the draft language, and that's just a curse of mine. And I just wanted to curse you all with it to just to be share in the love. The main thing, I think, is you've got later on your agenda today is the alignment with advisory bodies. I think that's a really important process. And this body probably needs to be in alignment with the alignment, and that's just something to consider. And what I think that looks like now is maybe a whereas clause in the, in the ordinance that you're, that you're drafting. I have some written testimony that I encourage you to read. I will say that the members and terms provisions are not what I would have drafted the membership, I think, in the language of the ordinance is a range between 10 and 20 members. I think you have to set a number. And so that it's really 20 members with some number of vacancies to be filled. Similarly with the terms you have the mayor appointing terms up to four years. But I kind of think there are four year terms that you may stagger initially if you want, but if you're going to do that, go ahead and put that in the code. If the youth positions are not four years, go ahead and put that in the code just for clarity's sake on the powers and duties. If you look at the way it's drafted, it says the I think the commission may do the following. If you read that narrowly, it's like that's all they can do those things there. I think you want to leave it open to be more than that. And so other duties consistent with the purpose or other duties as directed from the sustainability office, something else to go there. So it's not just restricted to the to the enumerated powers and duties in the, in the legislation. I think the procedures and meetings provisions are probably specifically subject to the alignment. And so again, you'd want to keep that open to the alignment where you end up. And then finally, on the staffing provision, I'm not sure that needs to be in code. I think that's, you know, the city administrator, the executive branch can staff this commission as he or she. Desires. I'm hoping that a big active commission might need more staff and do lots of things. And I don't think you want to restrict it in code. So those are those are the drafting suggestions that I have. And I'm happy to work with you all to do that. I don't want to hold up progress as an applicant, but I you're setting a precedent here, and I'm hoping it's a good precedent. And thanks for letting me go on for more than three minutes. I'm sure that was more than three minutes.
86 Thank you so much, terry. All right, now we can move to discussion among us councilors. Councilor Clark.
87 Thank you, madam chair. And thank you to terry. I. I appreciate all those comments, actually, including the staggering. We were staggered. I think that's a very appropriate actually all of his recommendations I would be in support of, including the last one on staffing. For my own comments. I want to thank you both, vivian and elaine. It's a lot of work. It was amazingly thorough, I must say, quite a process. I appreciate all the outreach and the research that you did as well. I'm going to, but my caveat is that I know we've been a leader in Portland and planning. We have lots of planning documents. We're very good at planning. We're not always great at outcomes. And what I don't see in here so much is addressing outcomes. And I would like to offer some language. I'm not sure where it goes, if it's in the purpose or if it's in the powers and duties, but something along the line, and I'm really open to our discussion of this is something along the lines of including the development of outcomes to advance the city's environmental goals. I want something that addresses outcomes, not just plans or forums or discussions. Evaluations and accountability are important, but what are we really going to achieve by having this commission? What are the outcomes? So I'm not sure if that goes in the purpose, you know, advance climate action across our city with a focus on environmental justice, including the development of outcomes to advance the city's environmental goals, something to that effect. So that's my first comment. Secondly, and I'm hopeful we can engage in a conversation about this. My second comment is in the membership. And I like what terry offered. There's no mention of districts. And I think in the next item, we're going to the last item today, we do talk about an even some sort of distribution across the city and district. So I would like to say to see some language that addresses distribution of membership by district so that we're not everybody's from district one or district four, but there's an even distribution. I don't know that we have to dictate the exact number, but there needs to be an even distribution across the city. Next. Let's see. I have a question. You mentioned the d siloing and I don't know if I heard you say this, vivian, but are there clam climate staff in each bureau? Did I hear you say that?
88 Thank you for the question, councilor Clark. So there are actually only a number of dedicated climate staff. They are the climate team at the house of the bureau of planning sustainability. That being said, there are climate practitioners who have working on climate as a percentage of their work plan and their work time embedded in various bureaus, mostly in, for example, environmental services, transportation, water. But the dedicated climate staff of the city are housed at the bureau of planning. Sustainability. Currently.
89 I know that we're discussing both at the administration and management level and here on the council. That whole concept of collaboration and consolidation eventually. And I think that's something that maybe in the future we look at that kind of consolidation. Next question. I just wonder what the budget implications are for this commission. It's a it's a big job. We have staff. Do you do you have any sense for the budget that comes with or is needed by the commission and your office?
90 Thank you, councilor Clark. This is the perennial question that we're still working through. So for this first year, elaine and I work to actually secure some additional grant funding to help staff the first year of the sustainability and climate commission. So for this first year up and running, we do have some support coming from meyer memorial trust. So thank you to the program officer and the trustees there who helped invest in this work for one year in recognizing that this year is a profoundly difficult for the city. So as we are going through and standing up this commission have a better sense of its operational needs, including its staffing, we'll be able to make better budgetary asks and implications for the future budget cycles.
91 So does that mean that we're covered by memorial trust for this coming year?
92 For this year, we have increased support because we haven't started commission meetings yet. I would anticipate that we hopefully are covered, but we're still making adjustments in real time.
93 Okay.
94 Thank you. Maybe my last question. I'll give up the floor here under procedures and meeting. I wonder why we can't say the commission may meet ten times a year or more. Why do we have to meet ten times? I would rather see some flexibility there. So commission may meet ten times a year or or more would be a recommendation from me. I'll. I'll end it there. That's enough for now.
95 Thank you sir.
96 Councilor Dunphy.
97 Thank you, madam chair. I have a number of questions for you all. And I apologize. I do it as quick as I can. You started the work on standing this up before our committee structure was in place. Is our committee structure complimentary or conflicting with your vision of where you were trying to take this this commission?
98 Thank you for the question, councilor Dunphy. I think this is still a work in progress. We're only I mean, barely four months into the new committee structure, I really do see the climate resilience and land use committee as being the primary body that I've been tracking, and that I'll be looking towards for how this interacts. I think that still two be told how this will all truly come together. My vision for the sustainability and climate commission is that this truly is the forum for public debate on issues that specifically pertain to climate and sustainability issues. The council committee's breadth is larger and it does include land use, which this specifically does not touch. Didn't want to recreate some of the same issues of the planning and sustainability commission. And so therefore, I want to leave a little bit up to us playing jazz here to see how it how it'll go forward.
99 Okay, good answer. That also cues up my next question though, because on slide nine we're talking about recommended act. It says that there are some some recommended actions that the body could take or refer, specifically saying what? Advising on what city council could do. But my sort of take on on the most effective climate and sustainability policies is more about how rather than the what do you envision this body having a scope to include things like talking about how PBOT paves our streets, or how parks maintains trees? Do you envision it getting into conversations around land use, or how we could use the land use code for things like zenith energy in the future, or the city's investment structures?
100 Councilor Dunphy, this, this, this commission will not touch on land use at all in any of it. So some of the specific questions you asked that will not be a charge. I think that it will be. That's a limitation we currently have. Anything with land use must go to the planning commission.
Procedural episode · turns 101–109
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101 Okay.
102 One more quick question. Actually, I'm sorry, two more. The first one was with the membership composition. We specifically say to exclude city staff. I'm wondering if there isn't a role for labor. We have other advisory bodies like the pub, the public utility board that has a designated labor seat. And I also recognize that sometimes labor and environmentalism are friends and sometimes they're not. And I'm wondering if that was something that you all considered.
103 Thank you, councilor Dunphy. Some of my past work in advocacy, fairly familiar with some of those artificial wedges that can be driven between communities and their own self-interests. So the city staff will be having ex officio seats on this commission, non-voting, but clearly have to sit alongside the commission and helping to guide them to have a strong connection in this work. And that's how I envision to have, depending on where the commission was going in their deliberations, if we're talking specifically around a particular topic, that we have city staff coming from that topic to help support those conversations and give them a grounding in in what happens here. That's the linkage of those dedicated seats.
104 I would I mean, I think that there is a really good argument to, in addition to having an ex officio seat, because I do think that, you know, city officials often are experts about the work and the also some of the most passionate people about this work. But I do think that there really should be I think we should have a conversation about whether there's a role for a dedicated labor seat. As one of the members, my last very quick question is with regard to the testimony we just received from mr. Harris. Were there anything was there anything in there that you objected to not to put you on the spot in front of terry?
105 But no, actually. Right. Thank you. But right in the beginning, before we started the proceedings, actually shook hands with with mr. Harris and appreciated his comments. I did not object to anything that was in there. I thought that a lot of it is very pertinent, and I, you know, elaine and I debated alongside city attorney a bit about how much we wanted to codify in city code and then how much we wanted to go ahead and put in the bylaws and how much we needed to leave up to the future. And what happens from here. So but I had no specific objections to anything that was raised.
106 No thank you. Thank you.
107 Vice chair Ryan.
108 Yes, thank you, madam chair. First of all, it's good to see both of you. Thank you for being here. I want to start off by saying it's always appreciative when you're wanting to add a code, but you're actually saying what code we're removing. I have an experience people coming forward with what we're removing. So that's part of that clutter that we have to keep cleaning up. So thanks for being on top of that. Now I'd like you to go to the slide that looks at your the composition of the commission. Or your recruitment of that. It was probably towards the beginning.
109 Give us one moment, please.
110 Councilor member, I apologize.
111 Yeah, I just had to. It's the way I can share. Sorry. One moment now. It's not. There it is. You're doing great.
112 Is this the slide that you're referencing?
113 No, I don't think so.
114 No. Keep going. It's the one where you show how many members there are and they're experts.
115 Are.
116 It's not.
117 So we have we've proposed that this would be 20.
118 So I agree with one two lived experience. Here's where I'm getting at with this one. You've heard me say this before. I'm a fan of having the tension be in the room. I like collective impact. I don't like it when we only hear from one side, if you will. And I think too often we build these commissions where they're biased in a way that doesn't allow us to get to the heart of the matter of some of the pressing issues that eventually come to the council. So it's great when those are worked out as well in the committee level. So how does what do I mean by that? I mean that if some of our big energy providers aren't at the table, then eventually they're going to be at the table because they're doing the work and in real time. So how do we ensure that we'll have that kind of flexibility, that kind of diverse composite that includes private sector as well.
119 Thank you for your observations and question, councilor. Our recruitment process, I do stand by for this initial this initial vetting. It was an open recruitment process. We had it open for over eight weeks. We spread the word far and wide. I think we even had a few clips go semi-viral on our social media for the city of Portland as well. And so this garnering the second highest recruitment for any city advisory body. And we went through a process to review all applicants that came in, including district representation, to councilor Clark's initial observations as well to try to find parity in both district representation and various experience levels as well. And so I'm looking forward to my initial recommendations to the mayor, reflecting a balance of all the applicants that came in, at least for this initial round.
120 Okay, so what I'm hearing from that is that you feel like the net was cast widely, and we will see some of that diversity of opinion, if you will.
121 I believe so, at least in this first round. That's what reflects in my initial recommendations to the mayor.
122 Okay.
123 I look forward to that. It saves a lot of time. If you actually have that be a part of the commission. So when it comes here, we know that it's been vetted in that thorough way and people don't feel left out. I was listening because I love the word de siloing. I think it's used quite often now, but I don't know if anyone really means it. And I'm not saying you don't, but I'd like to hear a scenario of what that means. Like give me a scenario. I, I'm kind of going off of. You ended up touching on this as well, councilor Clark, but I didn't I didn't hear what I needed to hear to think that I understood that you're actually implementing some de siloing here.
124 Oh.
125 Gosh, I.
126 Love de siloing. So I just wanted to be excited about a scenario that you could give me.
127 Well, thank you. Thank you for the question, councilor. I believe that I'm trying to think through, you know, my last two years here at the city of Portland and going through this process and how much work already happens to de silo, especially for topics as important as climate and sustainability. This cuts through every single piece of work that we have. So, for example, I already get to convene about a bit over 30 different climate practitioners who are embedded in various bureaus and service areas, folks from, you know, parks and urban forestry folks from water. So we've got engineers sitting directly next to, you know, climate policy, you know, policy creators, that's what they do all day long, utility experts. And really thinking through how we can achieve. The council adopted goals of reaching net zero emissions by 2050. And that's what we hold ourselves accountable to in terms of those outcomes and, and how to and how to approach those. These are all the low hanging fruit has already been picked when it comes to climate policy. All we've got left is the really gnarly sticky stuff. Unfortunately, in doing this work. So the what we're the charge of this work is inherently de siloed. It's not this is the right path to go. And here's how. This is what we're going to do in order to achieve it. Everything we have in front of us to, you know, to reach our climate goals has to do with de siloing and working across various issue areas and various service areas to achieve those goals. Is there something more specific that I can help offer?
128 I think.
129 It's this conversation.
130 As you're building, because let's go back to when we started the office of equity, and I use that because I had about a year where I was a commissioner Overseeing that office. And the theme of my experience in one year being at a very high elevation was that it was what was their authority. So every bureau, big bureau especially started building their own dei office. And then this office that was central. It didn't feel empowered to actually have any influence over those big bureaus that actually had almost as much staffing as the central office. So I think, colleagues, I'm kind of giving an example of what we don't want to do. And so I think as we're building this, we should know, just like dei, it's a value throughout the city, and it needs to be what are those values? What are those guidelines? What are what what do we expect? What do we expect from outcomes from the different bureaus? So I really am working with you to try to say when you set this up, make sure it has that type of authority and influence. And I don't think it worked when we started building those silos in all the bureaus. When it came to another very important value for the city, especially now more than ever. So I want to make sure that why we say those words, we're really comfortable with how messy it is to do it right.
131 Yes.
132 Councilor Ryan.
133 You're nonverbal, seem to appreciate this conversation as we went on.
134 Yeah. Okay. Tell me what you're thinking.
135 No, absolutely. I know I appreciate this because I think that's that's the beauty and the promise of this new form of government. That's the that's the tactical consideration. When my position was moved out of the bureau of planning sustainability into the city administrator's office, reporting directly to city administrator michael jordan. And this is elevating the importance of climate and sustainability, gives me the platform to be able to reach across all those various service areas and has the backing of city leadership, that that is the promise again, how it how it plays out. We're still on the precipice of all of this, but there's a great deal of intention behind that. And in in the sustainability and climate commission as well. And I do hope that we'll be able to achieve it.
136 I think. So the reason I'm having this conversation is I felt like there were I experienced a lack of relevance sometimes for an office influence citywide. And I don't want this to build another system like that. So I, I'm here on record to say I don't want to see specialists like the two of you in each area as much as we should have. Everybody that works for the city understand these values and be in alignment with what that means.
137 Your comments are.
138 We should be generalist on this one because it's such an important value. Just like dei is where it felt like we turned it into this expertise thing, where then people couldn't tap into what it was, and I felt like it created more walls and more silos. So I just don't want to see that happen with another important value. So I just want to make sure I understood the intent of that.
139 Right. Okay.
140 Your comments are noted.
141 Thank you.
142 I think I do have one more. This one's big because we all know that there's another body that people think is the active body when it comes to climate work. And of course there's money connected to it. And we all know that money allows people, allows an organization to have more attention because people love to chase money because that's just what happens. And so what is the relationship between currently and how do you envision it between the climate commission and PCEF?
143 Yeah, thank you for that question. And folks who are tracking this issue closely, you know, are well aware. Of the Portland clean energy community benefits fund and their grant making committee, which will continue to exist again, that is housed in the bureau of planning and sustainability. And so the sustainability and climate commission is a different body. I do think there is a future in which there will be will necessitate more needed conversations between the two bodies. That's why this commission does have the power to have joint meetings already codified in code. And I do envision that there will be future conversations, especially as the climate investment plan winds down after year five and a new plan will be coming forward to consideration for that body.
144 Okay.
145 I'm glad you're mindful of this.
146 Thank you. Of course. Thank you.
147 Thank you, everyone for all these great questions. We have more questions that I can see up here, hands raised. And I would like to take a moment to do a bit of a time check. We have about four minutes left scheduled for this agenda item. And I'd like us to think through some of some process questions right now, since clearly I think there are some amendments that members may want to propose. So I'm wondering if council operations, if your team can help a little bit. I'm wondering if I should turn to ashley or to lori to talk a little bit about what our options are right now. That makes. Yeah.
148 Thank you.
149 Alrighty. So you guys have two options. You can vote or move it to a future committee. So it is up to you to make the decision.
150 Can we go.
151 As a chair? It makes sense to me that we take take another question and then we can close the discussion, close the debate and carry over deliberations to the next meeting. While members then can file amendments in council. Okay. All right. Councilor pirtle-guiney. I'm going to try to be quick. You said I have like three minutes. So the first is just a clarifying question we have. We have an exhibit. Exhibit b that changes current code. It's not annotated to show us what it changes. Is that just removing section I for subsection section I, subsection four.
152 Thank you. Councilor. Yes. The clarification is we are deleting, I believe it's seven words from the planning and sustainability code.
153 Okay. I just wanted to make sure there wasn't anything else since it wasn't annotated that I wasn't noting.
154 It's weird.
155 My apologies that somehow did not make it onto the exhibit, but it is seven words, which is the activities of the sustainability and climate commission.
156 Okay.
157 So 333030i subsection four.
158 Yeah. Okay.
159 Great. Thank you. I want to note that I agree with almost all of councilor Clark, what you put on the record as potential changes, if those are things that you plan to bring forward, I would be interested in support. I would suggest that if we're going to add language around advancing outcomes and goals, which I very much am in agreement of, but I also think we should ask the commission to identify actions to reach those outcomes. The commission may not be able to direct those actions, but I think that asking them to identify actions for meeting those goals, which then council could take on, or the city administrator or the mayor could take on and determine whether or not they wanted to implement those actions, is an important piece of reaching outcomes. To that end, I'm a little bit disappointed to hear that the commission can't even discuss land use, because if we're going to talk about actions that could be taken to reach outcomes, not the direction of land use policy, but the discussion of land use changes that could be undertaken by the land use policy bodies would be an important piece of that work. I had a question about this. Moving to the to under the city administrator on the same day that we received information about some shuffling of the administration, which actually includes moving some specific programs like this out from under the city administrator and putting them into one of our bureaus that oversees core services to ensure that they can touch all of our service areas a little more. So I just want to note that because we are considering code changes today that seem to move in the opposite direction of where the current mayor and city administrator are moving, that may be intentional, but I just I think it's worth putting on the record. I also had some concerns about the language around staffing and the fact that we're saying in code, not only in the staffing section, but in the procedures and meetings section above that, that the sustainability and climate commission coordinator will be part of the team that staffs those meetings and that that's called out by name, creates some limitations in the future. If, for example, you wanted to change that classification up class, it have a different title split that work because it had grown too large, we're a little bit stuck because we will have put in code a specific position. If we are going to be amending this. I would love to have a conversation about whether that's something that is in there by intention and is helpful to have in there, or whether that's something that could become a limitation in the future. I'm moving quickly because of the time, but if you have comments on that, I'd love to hear them.
160 Yeah. Thank you. Councilor. On staffing, I thought that we had kept it open enough by saying or other staff, but noted that your opinions on limitation of naming at least one position in there, and I did want to address the clarification on the new organizational chart. Sustainability is not one of those that are that is being embedded back in a bureau. The new organizational chart still has sustainability reporting directly to the city administrator, knowing that this body would be also at the same level. And so this is not going back to the bureau of planning sustainability.
161 Yeah, I understand that this wasn't. But because some of those were it, it seems interesting that we are specifically saying in code that this will lie there. Again, just something that limits flexibility in the future.
162 Thank you. And one more, which is to I hear disappointment. And I saw councilor Dunphy's, you know, agreeing regarding land use. This body does have the ability to convene joint meetings with bodies. And so again, the planning commission that will be stewarding, you know, the land use components and the future sustainability and climate commission can have joint meetings with the planning commission if they see it fit.
163 And that's helpful. And your answer around PCEF was helpful for one of my questions as well, which was the ability to create committees and joint committees. It seems like we're building in a lot of infrastructure here, and I wasn't sure why. I appreciate the explanation on why that might be needed. To that end, I do want to note that we do have there's a question about cost, and we do have a budget, both budget impact and budget analysis. The impact that the folks who bring an ordinance forward list and then the analysis that our budget office does and both say that there's no fiscal impact. I'm a little bit concerned that we're being told there's no fiscal impact, but I'm also being told that there's no cost this year because of grant funding. But I'm left with the impression that that's a cost we may need to backfill in future years. I don't know if that's a conversation we need to have about how far into the future the impact statements and analysis look, or if that's a. A, a signal to us that we will not be asked to fund this in the future. But if I'm looking at something that says no fiscal impact, I hope that means clearly five years from now things change. But that next year we also would not be asked for funding for this. I also just want to note, chair, that we don't yet have the prosper analysis. The economic analysis we're working through with prosper in other spaces, making sure that they get those turned in on time. And if it's not in by the time you want to move this, I'm happy to be the backstop and make sure it's in by the time we schedule it at council. But while I was talking about the analysis, I just wanted to note that for the record as well. I think that's everything I have. I'm sorry.
164 I'd like to ask you both, if we move this item to take back up at a future committee meeting, is it going to impede this commission moving forward with your current timeline?
165 Chair Koyama Lane, give me just one moment to look at a calendar. I believe that we did have. May I ask when your next meeting is?
166 Yeah, it's.
167 It's a good question. Actually. It's next week.
168 Oh seven.
169 Yeah.
170 We can meet a week from today.
171 I believe we would impede.
172 No it wouldn't.
173 No, it would not impede progress. We can absolutely come back next week okay.
174 So I see I see all of your hands up colleagues. I'm wondering if we if your questions need to be answered now or if, you know, in the next week we could have time to submit amendments and then we will take this item back up in a week. Is that okay? Or leave your hand up if there's something that needs to be asked. Right now.
175 We all think we can.
176 Say, okay, real quick. Councilor Clark.
177 Just a question on the bureau of planning and sustainability chapter. Are we being requested to potentially offer amendments to this as well? Because I'll have one. Or no. Yes. No.
178 I think the answer is no.
179 Oh, no. Councilor. No. The only the exhibit is simply to remove. So when we created the framework for the sustainability and climate commission, it had to go somewhere. The city administrator's office code was not yet completed. So we parked about seven words in the bureau of planning sustainability code. So the exhibit that I'm regret that for some reason it wasn't in front of you that clarifies is just the deletion of those seven words so that we can not give them that responsibility anymore, but release it to the city administrator's office with additional code.
180 Disappointed?
181 Okay, good. Real quick. Yeah, I.
182 Oh.
183 Councilor, I do think that you have the ability to bring forward an ordinance amending the bureau of planning and sustainability code anytime you'd like to, and there are likely committees that would be happy to hear that.
184 Vice chair Ryan.
185 Yeah, I just want to echo what council president said about the financial impact. I was going to bring up the same thing. I don't feel comfortable voting on this until that has more thought. Councilor doesn't feel genuine right now based on what we heard earlier.
186 Yeah.
187 Director satterfield, last thing that just came to my mind, specifically under staffing, are there other commissions that report to an individual city employee in this way, or do they typically go to the council more broadly or an elected official? How does I mean? It stands out a little bit to me.
188 Oh, councilor Dunphy, thanks for the question. I don't believe I have enough knowledge to be able to answer that question.
189 Yeah.
190 Councilor Dunphy, I'll jump in. I do know of one. The urban forestry commission reports directly to the city forester is one example.
191 Thank you.
192 Yeah.
193 Thank you.
194 Thank you so much for presenting and for fielding all the questions. And we all are able to communicate with you if we have more questions over the next week.
195 Oh yes.
196 Please. We can't all talk to each other, but we can talk to you.
197 And I'll be around all week.
198 So we will take this item back up in a week. And so I'm closing debate and carrying over deliberations to a future agenda. And I want to share that my priority is that we can get this discussed and voted on as soon as possible, because it's important that this commission gets to be up and running soon.
199 Thank you chair. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
200 All right. Rebecca, will you please read our last item?
201 Item three advisory bodies alignment.
202 I am so excited to have amanda garcia snell up here with us. I've gotten the chance to hear about her passion for community engagement and for the city. She is here to provide an overview and outline for a proposed advisory bodies alignment project, intended to better understand what is needed to bring the city's various advisory bodies. We've spoken about these into alignment with the new government structure, so I'm happy to hand things over to you, amanda.
203 Thanks.
204 Vice president. Good afternoon. Councilors.
205 As vice president Koyama Lane mentioned, I am amanda garcia snell, for the record, and I am the city's new chief engagement officer entering week nine. So I haven't had a chance to connect with all of you yet, but I hope to do so soon. I am here to talk with you about aligning advisory bodies and with the city's new government structure, and a proposed project to get us there. And you have the. Sorry.
206 I think.
207 I think the slides are being shared one second. As that's coming up. I can just go over that. The hope. For this presentation, this will be a very short presentation so that there from me anyway, so that there's plenty of time for your questions and comments and so that I can better understand your information needs. Oh, that was it. That was just the last slide of it.
208 This reminds me of when I had to do online teaching. And when you need things to.
209 Work.
210 It all gets wonky.
211 And then also so for today, I'm also hoping to get some direction from you all about next steps. Really, how you would like us to proceed? If this is in line with with the direction that you would like and what else we should consider? Next slide please. And that's the agenda I just went over and next slide and next slide. Thanks. So hopefully you've had a chance to take a look at a document that I had shared last Wednesday that with the current state and proposed plan elements, I have hard copies of that. If you didn't and I can send it to you again as well if that's helpful. It's a high level overview. So for this project, we'd like to focus on 53 advisory bodies that are appointed by elected officials and address the remainder of the advisory bodies. Later, when we have more clarity, you'll notice a little bit of a math error there. There are 77 advisory bodies, and it's the 2423 that I'd like to focus on later. And right now for this project, really looking at those 53 that are appointed by elected bodies or elected officials. Last year, an inventory was completed in December, which has provided a lot of really good information. It gave daylight to some inconsistencies and the need for more clarity. In addition to authority appointment designation, there are some outstanding questions about the roles in general that advisory bodies play in this new form of government. And what is the purpose of advisory bodies? So really wanting to think about that shared across the organization, I would like to do some additional analysis to really get my arms around exactly what is needed to have a clear purpose across the organization. I, I appreciate the conversation earlier for the resolution that you approved related to advisory body appointments by council, which is great. It addresses some of that confusion, and this project will address some of the remaining questions, especially for those that are not appointed by council. And then for your awareness. This proposed project is informed by recommendations. So thank you, terry, for being in the room and also councilor Remarks. So I have captured some various remarks as you all have been having conversations related to different advisory bodies in this committee and other committees, as well as full council, and then of course, in other public spaces. Next slide. And next slide. So I'll just jump right into this proposed alignment project. So as I here are the proposed goals and outcomes. So as I mentioned the goals are really looking at alignment shared understanding and consistency. And so this is really in relation to this new form of government. And how how do we how do we look at advisory bodies within this new structure. And then having shared consistency and to say this great word silo some of this work as we go forward, I really believe that clarity is kindness. And so as you can see in these outcomes that are in the second set of dot points here, they're really about improving the human experience. So that's volunteers, the community, you all staff to really make sure that advisory bodies are serving community well, that we're being good stewards of their time and labor, etc. So having transparency in the processes from recruitment to onboarding and for serving on an advisory body would be one of the one of the outcomes. Also, accountability to community in what we ask of their time and labor. A path forward on how we will increase internal capacity and knowledge and skills and whatever else may be needed to improve equity centered practices related to advisory bodies and then streamlining. So just as as important as it is to being good stewards of the public's time and labor, we also want to be good stewards of public dollars so that we can reduce duplication and create some efficiencies. Next slide. So I'll just touch on the timeline here. This is a high level timeline. It shows some proposed committee and council touch points as well as some staff deliverables. Of course there are more details and I'll get into that a little bit more in this proposed project plan the next couple of slides. But you can see here three phases. This first guidance from the governance committee. That's where we are today. So hoping to get some guidance from you all today. And then depending on that guidance then I'll do a bit of additional analysis and finalize the project plan and then hope to launch into really clarifying that overall purpose and intent of advisory bodies. We'll be looking to convene a work group and then confirm some processes for updating language. And that's the first phase. You can see the phase two. And then at the end of summer phase three. And I'll just get into a little bit of that in the next slide. Next one. So here's this first phase. So guidance from the government and governance committee. So presenting to you all getting that high level clarification. You'll see the proposed project goals and timeline. And then depending on the conversation today and the guidance and direction that you give, we would really want to launch into the advisory body alignment project plan assuming that can finalize that. So building on the previous work and recommendations, this work started before I got here. And it's definitely been an interest and a need for quite some time. And so this is a really great opportunity that we have to launch this work now, complete some additional analysis, clarify the intent, convene an internal stakeholder work group. So there had been an internal stakeholder work group. We would look to some of those folks and also really think about intentionality around the who else should be at the table for that internal work. And then also wanting to involve external community partners and community leaders, people who have had experience in advisory bodies here at the city to inform and help co-create an external input process. So I think that's really important to do in the early stages so that they can be involved in planning of whatever that might look like, and then come from the process to modernize the language. By that, that's meant that some advisory bodies have appointments by commissioner at large, which is old language. And so we would want to update that and really clarify some of the other language within those guidance documents, better understand what those changes are and what the process would be for those changes. So then phase two would be late spring, early summer. So really like June July because we don't know what we don't know. Is there estimates of time of course. But continue implementing this project. So continue to clarify roles and process for recruitment vetting appointments beyond the work that you all did earlier today. And then really identify a path forward for shared equity centered practices across the organization. So clarifying those roles, we really want to look to communications so that we can be sure that community and staff are aware of the changes and the direction that this project is going. This is also when we'll dive into having a shared equity centered practice for advisory bodies across the organization. So this really means that I will work to better understand what is the capacity and what is the need and what is needed to increase diverse participation to support inclusivity, and then really ensure that equity is centered throughout all of these, all of these processes and phases. And then in late summer, we'll move into the final phase, which would include a final report and then sharing the findings and outcomes internally, as well as with community, because it's so important to let community know what we did with all of the great information that they've shared with us. So with that, that concludes my presentation and I look to you all for direction. I'm happy to answer any questions. And I of course, I have a few questions for you all there on the screen here, assuming that we can get to this point, but I would love to have some better understanding of what your information needs are, and then how you would like us to proceed.
212 Thank you so much, amanda. This is really exciting and just noting that you referenced a packet, and we'll make sure to put that up on e council so the public is able to see that as well. Looks like colleagues have some comments and questions. Councilor Clark.
213 Thank you, madam chair. Hi amanda. Welcome. Good to see you. I'll try to go quickly. You want feedback? I would say shrink the number of committees. Number one, standardize the process. You're already you've already listed some of those. I would say the district balance is another thing I would like to see. You mentioned the appointing authority scope. But district balance I would highlight I would like to see to make sure that you're going to hear this from me more and more that some of our that we narrow the focus of the committees and that they also include an outcome focus that we help hold the bureaus or whomever accountable. But we that we have outcomes. And related to that, I would say you mentioned improving the human experience. I really appreciate that because I think we need to have a greater respect from for some of our volunteers that serve on committees and that are in some sort of some form of engagement. I would just share that recently I was at a, a coffee I had and one of the neighborhoods, and there were people there that had been intensely involved in some community engagement project pre-covid 2019 and for several years they'd have been involved quite a few of them, and they were never consulted again. And I think we need to make sure we close the loop with people who we invite in and advisory committees or whatever capacity. So I would add that to really respect our volunteer engagement. So I appreciate that you, you said improve the human experience. But those are those are my comments, madam chair.
214 Thank you so much, councilor.
215 I'll just. Mr. Ryan. Yeah.
216 It's good to see you, amanda. I know we had a chance to have a longer conversation earlier, a few weeks ago. I just want to second what councilor Clark said. And I actually hope that's one of the goals that you have, because that's just too many. Yeah. And I think we all know that. And I think there's probably some that haven't been very active. And so maybe there'll be some easy ones to cut. But I look forward to hearing. And what's the timeline for you coming to us to tell us about that, or do you just have to give that information to the city administrator?
217 So I'm happy to come back with updates as we go through this process and let you know. I tried to put some of those touch points on that timeline, but I'm happy to add if it if your preference is to come to this committee to let you know what we're finding in terms of potential sunset of.
218 Thought partners with you, I think that would be helpful.
219 Absolutely.
220 I want to acknowledge ocean. Hi ocean, you've been carrying the water for this for a long time, and in my one year of again of overseeing civic life, I, I built a lot of empathy for what was on your plate. And I became painfully aware of how the lack of criteria and the lack of standards across the board of all these advisory committees, some seem to have some influence, and I think the volunteers felt needed and wanted, and then others, not so much. And unfortunately, I think the majority of the second category at times. So I think we have a lot of work to do here, and it's exciting work, and I hope that it doesn't drag on too long, because this should be really timely for us to move quickly on some of these adjustments. I don't think they'll be as much pain with these changes as there are in other changes that we're experiencing.
221 Let's hope right?
222 Thank you.
223 Councilor pirtle-guiney.
224 Thank you and thank you for bringing the information today. I'm speaking from a perspective of having both staffed and served on a number of advisory bodies at different levels of government, some of which have been very functional and some of which have been a body looking for a purpose. And I appreciate on your slide around timeline that you talk about clarifying the intent and purpose of advisory bodies, because there's nothing more painful than being on an advisory body looking for a purpose. And yet, I think that getting rid of these bodies will still be equally painful, because you do have folks who have become invested in being a part of the conversation, even if we aren't taking feedback from them, even if they aren't directing the work of the city in any way. And I hope that as we go through this process, which I think is an important one, and I don't want to pre-assume what the right number is, because I think the right number of advisory bodies is the number we need to help ensure that we're getting all of the perspectives necessary to do the work of the city, and that may change from time to time. So I hope as we go through this process, that you are thinking about two things in the long term, as well as making sure that our advisory bodies are respectful of the people whose time we're asking on them. The first is if we're getting rid of advisory bodies because they're not in a space where we need their advice, but they are in a space where we are ensuring that a whole lot of portlanders have good information about what we're doing. I hope that we fill that void with other ways of getting information out to community, and that we are more intentional than we've been in the past around making sure that our community members know what work is happening in the city. The second is that as we move forward and this is a charge, I think, both to you and to us, if there are new advisory bodies created in the future that may not have a long term need, but have a very important short term need, I hope that we still create those bodies, but put a sunset on them. I know that there are bodies that are created to oversee the implementation of a ten year report, and in year 11 and 12, they're still there. And there's inertia, but the report isn't there anymore. Let's actually put the sunset on. And if we still need those bodies, we can have that conversation ten years later. But we don't get stuck with bodies that are looking for a purpose after that. So I hope that you and we can keep those two things in mind as you move through this process and as we continue to get updates from you about it.
225 Thank you.
226 Councilor Dunphy.
227 Thank you, madam chair. Thank you for the presentation. Thank you for finally tackling this project. This is not something that you are directly responsible for, but I'm noticing that a parallel from the previous presentation, and specifically I just wanted to call out something that was in the notes of the previous presentation. That said, specifically, as a result of the outreach efforts, 245 members applied to the commission. 13 applicants came from district one, 63 from district two, 71 from district three, 74 from district four, and 20 from surrounding areas. I think you will see similar results in every advisory body that we have. My district has for decades been proven that it's not worth showing up and they don't. I would so my ask specifically is, as you are scoping this and considering equity in these and all the ways that that is interpreted, specifically, what other tools you need specifically in order to make this an equitable outcome and putting even a finer point on it. I think we need to pay people. I think we need to be able to compensate volunteers for their time, andnd especially when people are coming from 145th and division after work in traffic with their kids. We need to be able to compensate people for volunteering. I'm not saying hire them as employees, but we need to think about what that looks like, and I would love to make sure that that is part of the consideration.
228 So thank you.
229 Thank you.
230 Thank you, colleagues for great comments and questions. My question is, what can we do as the governance committee to best support you as you're doing this work? You can also think about this and let us know later. But if you have anything top of mind.
231 Sure. I think what you've offered so far is really great. Anything that any other considerations, I would love to see those even if they come to you later. But if you're comfortable with this draft plan giving me the thumbs up to start this work I think would be also wonderful. And then I just wanted to respond to a couple of comments, but it is now the time for that. Okay, so thank you, councilor Ryan, for calling out ocean. I was remiss, but ocean did a lot of work and I know that other staff as well, worked on that inventory and have been very interested in seeing the advisory bodies be a better pathway for folks and to just be more intentional and relevant to the work that we're doing now. The city councilor, pirtle-guiney president, council president pirtle-guiney. Yes, absolutely. Advisory bodies are one of the many pathways to participating in in decision making for communities. And so really looking at how can we do that well and with intentionality. And so I appreciate your comments there. And then councilor Dunphy, yes, I from my previous jurisdiction, we said stipends and honorariums because compensation carried a different legal term. But absolutely, there are lots of barriers to participation, especially from communities of color and historically and currently excluded people. And so we really want to think about what are those barriers, how can we address them. And that is just one component of really looking at recruitment. How does that look who's involved, what community, you know, culturally specific or culturally responsive partners are we working with to really make sure that people know these are things, these are places where they can be involved in decision making that can impact them, where they can, where we can help them understand what that looks like, provide additional support where needed, so that people can have the onboarding that they need. They can feel comfortable applying for these boards, and we can really support them in that process. This is work that I have done in other jurisdictions, and it is near and dear to my heart and really important. I think this is where people can really have an opportunity, and lots of folks come from places where this isn't an option for them, or they are disenfranchized or they don't see the point. And so it's important to me to help in whatever way that means for them, so that we can show that the city of Portland wants to hear from them, that you all want to hear from them, want them to be involved and are looking to their advisement around all kinds of work that the city does. Absolutely. Thank you.
232 Councilor pirtle-guiney.
233 Chair, I just wanted to mention that we got the offer to have an update come to this committee, and I would love to have that opportunity. Depending on the timeline, it may, because of our budget timeline, we may have some constraints in having a presentation in person if you see fit to make time for that, I think that would be fantastic. But if not, a written update to this committee might work as well. But I would love to hear more about how the work is progressing before we get the final report.
234 Absolutely. I think that's a great idea and something we can make time for and look forward to hearing how things are going. Vice chair Ryan.
235 Yeah.
236 Thank you. Chair I'm going to try to just let's see, in my experience, when you're when you supervise, when you manage, you're managing up and you're managing these advisory boards, these commissions, what I've learned is there's several layers. So there's like the people that are in the executive positions that have a lot of influence. There's the people that are actually doing the work on the ground. And then there's the middle area. And what's hard sometimes is you get a composite. We have all three, and they speak different languages, and it's hard to see the work moving. So what I did at one organization is I had three levels, and I figured we figured out how to have them connect with each other. But you wouldn't get outcomes if you were just talking up here in the clouds. If you don't include the voices and experience of the workers. And so I don't know where we're going with this. You would think I might, but I just wanted to voice it to you that I don't think we have it. We don't think we have a very smart system in terms of how we engage volunteers sometimes. And it's hard to do systemic work. I always say that if you don't get the wisdom on the ground involved, there are voices involved in any major transition work, any major system change work, then it's probably you should understand this one as a teacher. So you have the big people at the top saying whatever, and then you have to deal with the reality of teaching a class. And if whatever they said was just jargon that made no sense to you, you just shut the door and keep teaching. So. I hope that wasn't offensive.
237 No. Okay.
238 I didn't think it would be, but good. I think that experience is what I also witness here sometimes. So you have the people that work at PBOT that are actually on the ground doing all this work. And then you have the engineers and designers up here talking about this, and then we get the phone calls, more about the fact that there's potholes. So you just have all these miscommunications. So my hope is that we take a pause. Also figure out a new level of being sophisticated and how we build these systems. And they are connected with operations plans for the city. So then when someone shows up, they'll actually feel like they're needed and wanted because they're about the big picture system work. But you figure out how to voice from those that are doing the actual work, those that have some influence up here. And then I'll just tell you, the middle part is always the most complicated, and it's where things don't move. Think about that.
239 Well, I hope that's part of why I'm here.
240 Well, I already feel impressed by the inventory of the different bodies that's available to anyone. You can go online and look at those. It was helpful because I talked to many different people and no one was quite sure how many we had, and so I'm excited to see the next steps. I echo what I hear from my colleagues about encouraging you to share how the journey is going. Let us know what you need from us, how you can lean on us, how we can support. And just to share with my colleagues that I have found amanda and ocean to be very open and collaborative and excited about this work. And so I believe that if we ask, ask questions and ask to engage, that that will be met very well. And this is not a specific resolution or we don't have to accept anything. But I did hear for a super formal thumbs up, do we feel like we can give some thumbs up about them moving forward on this project? I see, nodding, I saw okay all right.
241 Great. Thank you so much for your time.
242 Thank you so much. Thank you ocean. All right. So at this time I would like to hand things over to my vice chair. Vice chair Ryan, right now who wanted to talk a bit about the need to address our protocols around public testimony. This is a good time for that. I just.
243 I think some of you may know we're we're building a system here. And when you're building, you're going to have some messy moments because that's just the authentic way of actually building something. And I think I was on spring break, but you couldn't help to hear that. There was some challenges last week with how we were implementing transparency and inclusion in government process. So I think that we need to prioritize this topic at a meeting soon. And this is like our makeup game, if you will, because we were out last week. I'm so glad that you also honor spring break chair, and I think that next week it should be a priority on our our meeting, because I think we put a certain committee last week in a we didn't do anything. We just are building something. And meetings don't always land perfectly in alignment. And yet it really spoke to the urgency of that topic. I'll try to refrain from my opinions on what happened last week and just say that in this committee role clarity. I think that is our responsibility to bring that conversation to the public and for us to make some decisions that won't put chairs in the future in in that predicament, if you will. And so I'm looking forward to making that a priority at our on our agenda next week.
244 I really appreciate you bringing this up. Vice chair Ryan, this is very important and I commit to prioritizing this a week from now at our next meeting. In addition to talking about the sustainability and climate commission code. And I also want to I know I've said this multiple times, but I would like to uplift how hard I believe our council president is working to put in different rules and guidelines. And I think the reality is we're the two the only two moms on council with small kids right now. I think the reality is, is that so we're familiar to this, is that there is some asking of many different people until you kind of get an answer that you want. And so I agree that we need to have things written down. We need to make it a little clearer. I believe the council president has done what she can to put put things out, but there are times that that questions are being are being asked around her as well. So we will work on that and make sure that, you know, I believe some boundary testing is healthy and it helps us see where we need to work on things and, and fix some holes. And I commit to next this next meeting talking specifically about some committee rules specifically around public testimony.
245 And I hope that we'll break it down into when we're looking at ordinances with codes in a different way than we look at resolutions, obviously, and we look at reports. And I know we've had that conversation before, but I think we need that type of really crystal clear clarity, because last week was an actual ordinance. Yes. That is exactly why it was elevated to be a concern.
246 Can I ask a question about that? I don't know what you're referring to.
247 It was in the housing committee.
248 Last week. But let me ask a clarifying question. This has come up when we're doing an ordinance. I just want to make sure, let's say the ordinance gets a hearing in a policy committee. And they voted out and it goes to the full council. Do we have to have two? We have to have two meetings around that first hearing. And then we vote on the second hearing.
249 Correct.
250 I just want to make sure that.
251 The.
252 That the policy committee hearing and support doesn't count in the two hearings that go to the council.
253 This is.
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254 That's actually written into the charter that you have to have a first and second hearing in. Foreign or council resolutions.
255 It's irrelevant. But I just it just comes out of the policy committee to the full committee.
256 And made one.
257 Yeah. Just one. Okay. Just want to make sure. And by the way, I, I know I'm supposed to be working on the code of conduct, and I have a stack of, like, lori gave me about this high that I have to review. So give me some time.
258 So I would love to hear. I don't know if I'm opening up a can of worms, but I would love to. We can also share that decorum. Code of conduct is on the list. That's something that councilor Clark is taking up. It's really important that will be coming up in in a future governance meeting. I also see I appreciate like we I feel like we talk about things deeply and there are some things that we need to kind of make sure we get in place for committees. Does anyone want to raise their hand and share something else that you feel like needs to be dealt with in the next week, if possible? Committee rules around public testimony. Decorum is on the docket, councilor Dunphy.
259 Well, I'll get into the nitty gritty. We're getting to weeds here, but because I would like to have us clarify specifically when hearing an ordinance, we have a we typically have a presentation, we have testimony, and then we have a discussion whether that discussion triggers an amendment, whether that amendment triggers another public hearing. I think I've seen it done both ways, like in the legislature, for example, to have a public hearing. They'll come back as a work session, they will introduce amendments, they will debate the language and then advance it on to the main body. I've also seen where anytime the language is changed, that deserves another round of opportunity for people to testify on the language before it. I'd like to just get that super crystal clear and come out. My personal belief is that we should have an opportunity in committee for committee for testimony. The committee should respond to that testimony. If that response looks like drafting a an amendment before we advance it to the main committee, that's our responsibility that that that that job is done at that point. And then the if somebody wants to testify on the new, ostensibly a new bill that should be before the full committee or full council, otherwise we will be, you know, right now we have two weeks of waiting time when a when an ordinance is introduced before we get a council clerk, okay, for the code. And then we have to do at least one hearing in a, in a committee, and then we have to do two full committees. I mean, we're we're stretching an ordinance into 8 to 10 weeks. And if, if the committees are supposed to be the deliberative places where we are wordsmithing things, if we also have to add a public hearing every single time, I think we're just never going to get done.
260 Can I comment on that? I think part of the problem, and we've all expressed an interest in having maximum, maximum community engagement is that we don't have enough time in our committee hearings, the two hours for some of these complicated issues that come up, it's just not enough time, especially if there's an amendment or another amendment or another amendment. So and I and I've mentioned this to council president too, is at some point maybe at the end of the year, we reevaluate this. And how can we get more time in committees? I know, I know that some councilors have requested a three hour meeting, and maybe that's necessary from time to time. But I think part of the problem is we're just rushed.
261 Yeah.
262 Thank you so much for all of these. Thoughtful. Things that you're bringing forward. Councilor. Pirtle-guiney.
263 Councilor Dunphy, I appreciate you bringing up that question around further testimony. And one of the things that I've thought about is that balance, because we do want folks to be able to testify again, if council or if a committee makes a change that is significant. And that was not part of what we heard from the public during testimony. But if we create a steadfast rule there, we could inadvertently disincentivize the bringing of amendments or the adopting of amendments. And so I think you're right. We should keep some flexibility there. But I also would hope that chairs would take on the responsibility of ensuring that if there are significant changes being made, that the public hasn't had a time or a chance to react to that, they create the culture of allowing that time for the public to react before sending it to council, where with 12 of us, we can't take on a whole lot of issues that still need meaty debate. So I think there's a there's a policy that we put in place, and then there's a practice that we put in place. And this seems to me like one where we may need a little bit of difference between those two things. Councilor Clark.
264 If I may. That raises the question, I guess, ultimately, of what is the role of testimony in a full council hearing, which then honestly raises the question of why do we have evening council hearings, right? I mean, if, if, if the majority of deliberation is supposed to happen at the committee level, why bother when I don't agree that that is the case? I don't I'm not saying we should, but I feel like there has to be the. There has to be a streamlined process in some capacity to be able to unearth meaty issues where it's not appropriate for all 12 of us to dive in. But then if we're going to institutionalize the need for committee or for full council testimony, there has to also be an ability for us to be responsive there, too. So I don't know that we.
265 It's an important.
266 Yeah, this is a big one.
267 It's an important big issue. And it's an issue that I think this committee hasn't dug into in that way that you laid out. Right. Because I would be curious at some point, chair, to have a conversation about whether this committee thinks the bulk of the work should be done in full council or in committee. I hope that the bulk of the work is done in committee, but I might be in the minority in that belief. And I think you're right. If that's the case, our evening council meetings, so that the public can see what we are doing and have more transparency, or is it so that the public can weigh in and testify? And if that's the case, how do we ensure that we have that testimony opportunity for things that are happening in committee, too? I would note that I have asked council operations to collect information from all of the different bureaus that support us around what they would need in terms of additional staff capacity or contracts to be able to support us in a broader way, so that we can consider ad packages for the 2526 biennium or 2526 fiscal year. If we want to do things like have longer committee meetings or evening committee meetings, that's, I think, a choice we have to make around cost versus accessibility and where we want discussion to have. But I am trying to get us the background information so that we can have that conversation in a meaningful way.
268 Appreciate that. You know, in a long, long ago in a faraway land, we had this discussion about trying to take most of our testimony, if not all of it in a policy committee, so that we didn't have to go through everything all over again in the full council. Just to remind people we have that discussion. I know we we're learning along the way, but I think that was sort of the preference of the.
269 It is that. Yes. And we heard from gtac that is the hope. And also we heard from gtac that if you're doing the bulk of the work in committees, you need to have evening opportunities. You have to have. Multiple options for people to testify. And I also know that vice chair Ryan has been waiting patiently.
270 Oh it's okay.
271 So remember I started this conversation by saying I didn't want to go into the details because we didn't have it on today's agenda. So I just want to repeat that. I'm trying to play by the rules here, but I do think that we need to call out that we had like anytime we had a we have a case study that happened last week. We don't want to do that again. That's my clear opinion. And I also want to remind us that before this form of government, we had planning commissions. We have drac and they would have a lot of testimony. You know this from staffing commissioner Fish and testimony would take place at those. We'd sometimes get a split vote that would come to us. And then you knew it was going to be a riveting repeat of testimony. Right? So it's really not that different. So I think we just have to accept the fact that we're in a lot of meetings. I'm trying to accept that. And, and that, that when we have issues that are very challenging, we need to spend some time on them. And like in the case study last week or the week before or two weeks before I was in the committee meeting, you were there, but two people were absent. They were in Washington, dc. And so it was a three of five were there for the first. It was maybe ten, 15 minutes at the end. There wasn't any robust testimony. So, you know, that's just a great case study that we did not go through. I don't want us to ever experience that again. And we're going against all of the principles of what I think people voted for when they put in the new charter, and we abolished it in that process. So I don't want to experience that again, which is why I hope that next week we can have additional dialog and we can actually start to land a policy that will help all of our committee chairs know what the rules are and that they're consistent. That's all.
272 I appreciate you bringing all of this up, vice chair Ryan. And this all was under announcements in terms of chair preview of upcoming topics. So you got some previews. These are things that we need to be dealing with soon. We hear that loud and clear I think there's agreement around that. And you can expect that just next week we will be talking not only about the sustainability climate commission code, but also more about some committee rules. And we'll be talking specifically with council ops about what are they seeing, because they see all of these different committee meetings. What are the urgent things? What do we need to make sure we're addressing asap? And we look forward to hearing updates on the process around advisory bodies, colleagues. Our next meeting will be April 7th at 2:30 p.m, and we will discuss a whole host of things. Thank you to everyone who presented today. This was really great and thank you to all the hard, behind the scenes work that council ops, the clerk clerk's office, all of you put into making this happen. And with that, the meeting of the governance committee is adjourned.