Transcript
Automatically generated transcript. It may contain errors and includes testimony in languages other than English that is not individually marked up for assistive technology.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Good morning, all.
We have a pre-gavel presentation today, so before we officially begin our meeting, I am going to turn the floor over to Councilor Dunphy.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you.
Um, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and for those who don't know, prior to my time working here in City Council.
I spent the last 5 years working for the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, working to make sure that we can use public policy to reduce the burden of cancer for families everywhere across the state.
I'm honored to be joined today by a lot of really great advocates who are in the fight against cancer.
I'd like to, if I could briefly invite up our very brief panel, and I will note to our panel, we each have 1 minute to talk.
So, um, come on up when I call you.
Uh, Nikhil Surya, Dr. Alexandra Zimmer, Missy Spelunky—.
Kalunky—.
I can't remember your last name.
Kalunky.
And Susan Stearns, CEO of the Pink Lemonade Project.
Um, thank you.
Nick, why don't you take us away?
Good morning, everyone.
Thank you for inviting me back this year.
My name is Nikhil Surya, and I'm a sophomore at St. Stephen's Academy.
Last year, I shared my mom's story, a story of hope, awareness, and early detection.
This year, I'm grateful to stand here again, not just as her son, but as a partner in spreading awareness with the City of Portland, American Cancer Society, OHSU Knight Cancer Institute, and the Pink Lemonade Project.
Together, they help families access information, screenings, and the kind of support that saved my mom's life.
My mom's journey began with a mammogram that showed she was clear, but it also noted she had dense breast tissue.
Dense tissue can make it harder for a doctor to spot cancer in a mammogram, so her doctor recommended an MRI.
That MRI revealed the cancer the mammogram had missed.
Catching it early made all the difference in her treatment and recovery.
Without that MRI, my mom might not be here today.
Since sharing her story last year, I've learned how much awareness and policy go hand in hand.
Starting September 2025, a new FDA rule requires all mammogram facilities to tell patients if they have dense tissue.
That simple change will help millions of families make informed choices and catch cancer early.
But awareness only matters if people understand what to do with it, and that's why proclamations like today's matter so much.
So today I ask everyone, schedule your screenings, ask questions, and spread the word.
Together we can turn awareness into action and hope Thank you, Nick.
Dr. Zimmer.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Hi, I'm Alexandra Zimmer.
I'm a breast cancer program director at the Knight Cancer Institute, and, uh, I, I'd like to focus on the— you know, we know that breast cancer is a very common disease, uh, and, uh, you know, kills a lot of people from time to time and modifies the lives of several families.
And I think the focus on early detection is the most important at this moment because, you know, with early detection you can actually improve the 5-year survival to up to 99%.
So that's impressive.
And the best way to understand, to do that, is look for your healthcare provider.
People at 25 years old should have an evaluation to understand yes.
And the majority of people will not be high risk and will then have the recommendation to start with mammograms.
And then of course there's the recommendations for further tests, but at least with mammograms at 40 years old, and that should be continued for every, every year or every other year.
So that's an important thing.
And I just want to express that people should look for help even if they don't— if they lack insurance or anything like that.
We have, by the way, just focused on trying to get access to people, and our breast imaging center at our South Waterfront is working now evenings and weekends to have people tested, having access to mammogram.
We have other areas with that and also have the van program where it's a mobile mammogram that can reach to people.
And also the Breast Health for All program where people uninsured or underinsured can have access to that as well.
The treatment has improved a lot through the years.
We have new things going on and access to our center.
I want to, you know, make sure that people are aware that we have access to world-class treatments here in Portland as well.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
And we will continue to work for that and hope for everyone to reach out.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you, Dr. Zimmer.
Missy.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Good morning.
Thank you all for inviting us here today and recognizing Breast Cancer Month.
My name is Missy Kalunke, and I will be fighting breast cancer that has metastasized to my bones for the rest of my life.
I've been a volunteer with the American Cancer Society, ACS, for 10 years.
10 With Relay for Life, and 9 with the Cancer Action Network.
I was drawn to ACS because they fight for every cancer and every life.
ACS's mission is to save lives through early detection, research, and patient support.
We encourage people to use the ACS 1-800 phone number if they don't have insurance or their insurance doesn't cover other cancer screenings.
They're able to direct them to local resources who will assist them as well as provide educational information and patient support.
With regards to collective action toward eliminating barriers, Councilor Smith.
Barriers to care.
We're working at the federal level to make sure Affordable Care Act tax credits are extended and also fully funding the Center for Disease Control breast and cervical cancer screening programs because we know that early detection will save lives.
So thank you again for your acknowledgement of Breast Cancer Month.
Jamie Dunphy
Thanks, Missy.
And Susan.
Hi.
Hello, councilors.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you for having us.
Loretta Smith
Jamie, thank you for the invitation, and Priya and Nick, really, for their leadership to pull together this Thank you.
Thank you, Council President Elana Pirtle-Guiney.
Thank you to our impressive panel today.
I'm Susan Stern, CEO of Pink Lemonade Project.
Pink Lemonade Project is a Vancouver, Washington-based community nonprofit that serves all of Oregon and Southwest Washington.
We offer the full cancer continuum of support from education and awareness through after a diagnosis support, education, financial and emotional support for those diagnosed with breast cancer.
We know that COVID has been hard on our disease Breast cancer is the top diagnosed cancer, and 1 in 7 women are at risk of breast cancer in the Pacific Northwest when the national averages are 1 in 8.
We also know with new data that screening has dropped more than 10 percentage points in both Oregon and Washington since the pandemic.
So Breast Cancer Awareness Month is critical, and we appreciate opportunities like this to talk to the broader public about how important breast health is so that we can in fact catch cancers earlier, catch breast cancer earlier, and hopefully improve the quality of life, reduce the harsh treatments, and extend lives of so many affected by this disease.
Jamie Dunphy
So appreciate your leadership.
Loretta Smith
We love a proclamation opportunity and always partner— appreciate the partnership with the City of Portland.
Thank you for a few minutes to talk about this important community health issue.
Thank you.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you all so much for joining us this morning.
And on behalf of the mayor, I have a proclamation that I'm going to read.
Um, whereas October is globally recognized as Breast Cancer Awareness Month, a time to raise awareness, promote early detection, honor survivors, and remember those lost to the disease.
And whereas breast cancer remains among the most common cancers in the United States, affecting, as Susan was saying, 1 in 8 women in their lifetime nationally, but 1 in 7 here in the Northwest.
In 2025, an estimated 316,950 women and 2,800 men will be diagnosed, and more than 42,000 women will lose their lives.
And whereas men and people assigned male at birth can also develop breast cancer, though they are often diagnosed later due to low awareness and delayed reporting of symptoms, whereas health disparities by income, race, age, and gender continue to create unequal outcomes, and Whereas when detected early, breast cancer has a 99% 5-year survival rate, highlighting the life-saving importance of regular screening and timely follow-up care.
And whereas federal requirements ensure patients are informed of their breast density after a mammogram, that's like the same, and advised on the supplemental screening such as MRI or ultrasound when appropriate, a critical step for detecting cancers that may be obscured in dense breast tissue.
And Whereas the American Cancer Society is dedicated to improving the lives of people with cancer and their families through advocacy, groundbreaking research, and comprehensive patient support, striving to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to protect, prevent, detect, treat, and survive cancer.
And whereas the Pink Lemonade Project provides education, mentorship, and financial and emotional assistance to families navigating breast cancer across Oregon and Southwest Washington.
And whereas the OHSU Knight Cancer Institute works to free the world of the burden of cancer, one patient at a time, treating thousands each year and advancing hundreds of research and community partner projects across Oregon.
And a youth advocate inspired by his mother's breast cancer journey has partnered with the City of Portland, OHSU Knight Cancer Institute, American Cancer Society, and the Pink Lemonade Project to expand awareness in the community, demonstrating that compassion and advocacy have no age limit.
And, oh, me.
Whereas Councilor Jamie Dunphy has championed this youth-led initiative by sponsoring this proclamation and elevating it before the Portland City Council, helping unite community partners including the American Cancer Society, American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, OHSU's Knight Cancer Institute, and the Pink Lemonade Project around a shared commitment to awareness Early detection, equitable access, and hope.
Now therefore, I, Keith Wilson, Mayor of the City of Portland, Oregon, City of Roses, do hereby proclaim October 25th to be Breast Cancer Awareness Month in Portland and encourage all residents to observe this month by participating in activities that promote awareness, support research, honor survivors, and prioritize regular screenings to save lives.
Thank you, colleagues.
Thank you.
Thank you all so much for being here this morning.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Did you have a question?
Jamie Dunphy
Hi, thanks for being here.
Could I just want to ask you a question?
Could you give us more information on why you think the screenings have dropped 10% since the, since the pandemic?
Oh, um, uh, completely related to COVID.
Loretta Smith
So, um, uh, there's data out of the National Cancer Institute and EPIC, which is our sort of underlying health information system that shows that screening dropped over 90% in spring of 2020.
So people are afraid to go into the healthcare system.
Jamie Dunphy
Life has been busy.
Loretta Smith
It's the pandemic.
People are trying to support their kids learning from home, all of that madness.
And so trying to get people back into the routine screening mammograms has just been a bit of an uphill lift.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Loretta Smith
I would say the other critical change, just since we're talking about it, and thank you for the question, the leading guideline organization for the standard of care of cancer treatment across the United States is the United States Preventive Services Task Force.
A year and a half ago, the task force reduced the recommended age of screening mammograms from age 50 down to age 40.
So there is a—.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
40.
Loretta Smith
10-Year window that we want to get the word out that women should be going in for screening mammograms.
And we also know that the trends right now is there's an increase in people under age 40 getting diagnosed with breast cancer.
So the breast health awareness is even more critical, and people of all ages should be noticing changes in their breast health.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Loretta Smith
Regardless of gender, age, or, I mean, they should, yeah, regardless of gender and age.
Yeah.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you so much.
It's so, I always look forward to you coming and I had to ask you a question to enlighten me more.
And I also wanna just acknowledge Nick and the proud mother in the audience.
Okay.
Loretta Smith
Yeah.
Nick's a brave son.
He's doing a great job.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yeah.
Loretta Smith
All right.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you for the time this morning.
Yeah.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor Dunphy, for bringing this pre-gavel to us and helping to raise awareness today, and for helping to raise awareness about the mayor's proclamation by bringing it to the council meeting.
With that, colleagues, I will convene today's Portland City Council meeting.
It is 9:45 AM on Wednesday, October 22nd.
Keelan, could you please call the roll?
Good morning, Clerk.
Here.
Present.
Jamie Dunphy
Here.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Here.
Here.
Here.
Jamie Dunphy
Councilor Green.
Loretta Smith
Here.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor Zimmerman.
Here.
Present.
Here.
Present.
Loretta Smith
Here.
Present.
Present.
Present.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Present.
Jamie Dunphy
Present.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Present.
Jamie Dunphy
Welcome to the Portland City Council.
To testify before council in person or virtually, you must sign up in advance on the council agenda at www.portland.gov/council/agenda.
Information on engaging with council can be found on the council clerk's webpage.
Individuals may testify for 3 minutes unless the presiding officer states otherwise.
Your microphone will be muted when your time is over.
Presiding officer preserves order.
Disruptive conduct such as shouting, refusing to conclude your testimony when your time is up, or interrupting others' testimony or council deliberations will not be allowed.
If you cause a disruption, a warning will be given.
Further disruption will result in ejection from the meeting.
Councilmember Anyone who fails to leave once ejected is subject to arrest for trespass.
Additionally, council may take a short recess and reconvene virtually.
Your testimony should address the matter being considered.
When testifying, state your name for the record.
Your address is not necessary.
If you are a lobbyist, identify the organization you represent.
Virtual testifiers should unmute themselves when the council clerk calls your name.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Colleagues, before we begin, I will note that our agenda should run us right up until 1:00 o'clock today, giving us a half-hour break before our work session that begins at 1:30.
I know that our staff and many of us need that break to get some food, stretch our legs so that we can fully concentrate on the work session this afternoon.
I believe we can get through everything in time.
It is scheduled to be able to, but if we have things run long, I will cut us off at whatever item we are debating at 1 o'clock.
We'll finish that amendment or section of the debate or agenda item that we're on.
Thank you.
And we'll need to carry over the rest of the agenda to a future meeting so that we can make sure to give everybody that space and still convene close to on time our afternoon work session.
The first item on our agenda is agenda approval.
Are there any motions to reorder the agenda?
Okay.
Seeing none, do I have unanimous consent to approve the agenda?
Aye.
Okay, Keelan, there are no objections.
The second item on the agenda is public communication.
Keelan, can you please call up our first guest?
First up, we have Grady Preston II joining us online.
Jamie Dunphy
Hello, councilors.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Can you hear me?
We can hear you, Grady.
Jamie Dunphy
Hello.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Great, thank you.
Jamie Dunphy
Good morning, councilors.
My name is Grady Preston II.
I live in District 3 in the Creston neighborhood.
I'm here today not as a resident only, but as a person who believes in the promise of this new government.
You were all elected to be bold.
You were chosen to break the white supremacist patriarchal hold on this city.
Don't second-guess yourselves.
This council was built to do things differently, and the people of Portland are counting on you to lead with courage, not caution.
The people sleeping in tents under bridges don't have time for delay.
Your years of hesitation weakens the impact of this council and undermines the very change it was designed to deliver.
Councilor Eric Zimmerman, these meetings are not your personal podcasts, and you shouldn't stop wasting valuable city time with your political theater.
To my councilor Angelita Morillo, thank you from the bottom of my heart.
You bring the passion and energy of my generation into these chambers, and it matters.
Your voice resonates with those of us We need you to keep pushing.
Now let me speak plainly.
We are under siege, not just by corporate greed causing poverty, displacement, and neglect, but by a rising tide of authoritarian violence that threatens the very soul of Portland.
And every night I see what happens when it goes unchecked.
Thank you, Councilor Mitch Green.
I see lives shattered and permanent trauma etched into the bodies and minds of my neighbors.
These vile, gleeful Proud Boys wearing ICE badges are pointing live weapons at disabled people, threatening lives and laughing about it.
Tear gas seeps into our homes.
The air we breathe is laced with the ash of superheated heavy metals and chemical irritants.
Councilmember Schools are closing, and community members are being forced from their community.
One of the most horrifying acts I've witnessed was the assault on Quinn Harlow, a blind man who peacefully protests outside the Portland Ice facility.
He's known in the community as the King of the Ice.
Thank you.
As a gentle, lawful, always carrying a stuffed animal, he sits quietly on the curb across the street holding his stuffy towards the agents.
He doesn't shout, he doesn't provoke, he simply exists as a symbol of resistance and love.
And yet federal agents target him without warning.
They grabbed him, violently dropped him on his head.
A blind man peacefully Lawfully disabled and assaulted for what?
For daring to be visible?
This is not enforcement.
This is cruelty.
This is fascism.
Why isn't the city, county, and state leadership charging these agents with kidnapping?
Why are they allowed to commit hateful violence and abuse law without discipline?
I don't hold the legal authority to stop it, but I gave that power to you.
Be the change.
Be the inventors of a future where progressive retribution meets fascist Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I'm so sorry that we need to make sure to have time for everyone.
We appreciate your words and being here to speak to our work.
Next up we have Vadim Mazursky.
They canceled their request.
Mark Porras is next, who also canceled.
Next we have Nathaniel Hudson Hartman.
Good morning.
Welcome.
Morning.
Jamie Dunphy
You all look lovely today, and my mother's a 2-time breast cancer survivor, so I really appreciate the acknowledgment, the proclamation.
Um, save the tatas.
Um, but for the record, my, my name is Nathaniel Hudson Hartman.
I've been a rideshare driver in the city of Portland, the state of Oregon, for almost 9 years now.
But more importantly, I represent our essential transportation providers.
You'll see none of them here today because they are out working our streets, getting people around safely.
Some of them are living out of their cars right now.
And I'm here today just to remind you all how actually amazing 2025 has been for Uber and Lyft.
You look at their financials.
They are paving the road to profitability on our backs.
They are the scorpion.
We are the frog.
And I know the frog has taken on new meaning in our city, so I want to let that sink in.
And I don't do it to be cute.
I do it to illustrate our desperation.
And how we are under the thumb, no, the stinger of these companies.
And all you have to do is look at their financials.
Uber has just announced recently another $20 billion stock buyback.
Yet our driver community, we have several members that are sleeping out of their cars or one bad day away from homelessness.
I want to draw your attention to a screenshot here of a recent trip where a passenger was charged $116 and the driver was paid only $18 out of that for 2 hours of work because we do not have compensation standards to ensure that we're making a fair and livable wage.
I'm representing a driver right now, family of 4, an immigrant driver who was deactivated not on one but both Uber and Lyft.
Once for legally changing his name, accused of intentionally falsifying documents.
The other one falsely accused by a drunk passenger of intoxication.
This driver's name is Ali.
He is a Muslim driver.
He has not touched a drop of alcohol a day in his life, but him and his family are underwater Underwater, amassing thousands of dollars of debt.
Why?
Because drivers do not have a fair and transparent appeals process by law, like they do in Washington, like they do in Colorado, like they do in Minnesota, like they do in New York.
You see where I'm going with this, and we have no support center.
It wasn't that long ago that this council over the summer passed a $2 fee increase without.
A way to support drivers.
And we are still desperately— that urgency has only gone up.
So we can't have a pay standard, we can't have deactivation appeals rights, we can't have fair transparency for our passengers without a driver resource center to tie it all together, to give drivers the support that we need.
And so I again urge every single one of you, the time is now.
The time was 2 years ago.
Please, let's go to work.
Thank you very much.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you so much for being here.
Next up, we have Gene Jackson.
Jamie Dunphy
Good morning all, and thanks for this time.
I would like to know whether the mayor— Mayor Wilson has the authority to cancel—.
Oh, thank you—.
To cancel DEI that was adopted in 2013 by the council without current council approval, as was done in 2013.
Either the council needs their own lawyer, or you're complicit with the mayor's attempted to bring back Jim Crow.
I have never known a mayor of the city of Portland that would for one second commit such a cowardly, cruel, and blatant act of racism.
We already have a president that wants to erase the history of people of color, and now the mayor.
It does not matter what we as Black people have suffered to defend this country.
Your America will never be our America.
Your Portland will never be our Portland.
This is reminiscent of the Jim Carrey movie The Truman Show, where he discovered that everything in his life was a lie.
And to quote Claude Brown's Manchild in the Promised Land, what do you run to when you're already in the promised land?
We're constantly having the rug pulled from under our feet.
I would like to know how much money has been spent on the Prime Contractor Development Program's technical systems.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yes.
Jamie Dunphy
And, uh, the administration cost of the prime contractor program in the past 3 years, with a breakdown of that cost as to who received what assistance and for how much, you will see that the program has never been a budget buster.
It's only because of the illegal acts committed by the previous CPO and his staff that they want— the mayor wants to get rid of this program rather than dealing with it.
Now the hiring of another CPO not only has little knowledge in this area of minority businesses, but absolutely no interest or commitment to the program.
And the city is paying $135,000 to the Hispanic Chamber and the Minority Contractors Association to just shut up and dribble.
One of the cruelest things is that the mayor's executive order was July 13th.
During that time, prime— 2 prime contractors, PCDT contractors, were the lowest bidders on projects in July, in early July, and were not notified until September 30th that their bids were going to be rejected and rebid to the open market.
With all of the numbers that have been exposed, they had those projects scheduled to perform the work and not bidding on other projects because they didn't want to overbook their ability to perform.
And they're spending money holding on employees for work that is not going to happen.
And now they have to compete with larger firms in the open market, and it's like minnows competing with sharks.
The PCD program, which I wrote, has never been a race-based program, and to cancel it until a disparity study is done is totally unnecessary.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
We appreciate you being here tonight.
Thank you for bringing this forward for us.
That completes communications.
Thank you, Keelan.
Colleagues, the next item on our agenda is the committee referral report.
At some point, we're going to have a better way than me reading this out loud.
Adopt the fiscal year '25-'26 fall supplemental budget and make other budget-related changes was referred to Finance.
Authorize revenue bonds in an amount sufficient to Aye.
Opposed?
Abstain.
Motion passes.
Resolution number 2, provide no more than $41 million to finance city fleet maintenance facility improvements, went to Finance.
Authorize the city to acquire certain permanent and temporary rights for construction on Southwest Upper Drive, went to Finance.
Outline decision-making criteria for the designation of council meeting items on the consent agenda, went to Governance.
Appoint and reappoint members to the Development Review Advisory Committee, went to the Homelessness and Housing Committee.
And authorized streetcar settlement payment was referred to full council.
Colleagues, that brings us— we don't have a consent agenda today, so that brings us to our regular agenda.
Keelan, can you please call the first item on our regular agenda?
Item 4, pay settlement of Adam Gregg lawsuit in the sum of $300,000 involving the Portland Police Bureau.
Thank you, Keelan.
Colleagues, as a settlement, this comes straight to council as an emergency ordinance, so there is no committee staff summary or chair report, uh, but we do have Mike Porter and Rose Radich here to remind us of the basics before we hear public testimony.
Jamie Dunphy
Good afternoon, Council.
Uh, we are, we are asking Council to approve a settlement in the case of Gregg versus City of Portland.
This case stems from a 2015 conviction for heroin distribution.
Mr. Gregg pled guilty and served over 4 years in prison for that offense.
While Mr. Gregg committed the crime, the key issue in this litigation is how miscommunication led to his guilty plea.
At the time, the district attorney handling the case believed that someone had died after using the drugs Mr. Gregg had That information turned out to be wrong.
City records show that the DA had been told the victim overdosed but survived.
However, at least one police report incorrectly referred to the person's death, and another was later changed to say the victim had died.
One of the responding officers, Matt Brown, actually performed CPR at the scene and likely saved that person's life.
His original report accurately described the victim as alive when submitted.
Unfortunately, it appears that during a clerical records process, Officer Brown's report was modified to indicate the victim had died.
It then appears that the DA and defense attorney both proceeded under this mistaken belief that someone had died.
That misunderstanding influenced Mr. Gregg's decision to plead guilty.
Years later, after learning the person survived, he filed this claim, uh, his case, claiming that he was misled.
The prosecutors have been dismissed from the lawsuit due to immunity, which means that if this case went to trial, the city would be the only remaining defendant.
Thank you.
That creates a real risk that a jury wanting to hold someone accountable could place full responsibility on the city.
A verdict against the city could result in millions of dollars in damages and attorney's fees.
The proposed settlement, $300,000, avoids that risk and reflects the calculations used in Oregon's wrongful conviction statutes for similar cases.
Finally, we would like the council to know Mr. Gregg has turned his life around.
He is now a student at Lewis Clark Law School and spends some of his free time volunteering in the community.
The city believes the settlement closes a difficult chapter for everyone involved, recognizes the mistakes that occurred, and reflects Mr. Gregg's rehabilitation.
For those reasons, we recommend the council approve the settlement.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you very much.
Ms. Radich, do you have anything to add?
No, thank you.
Okay, councilors, any questions on the content before we hear from the public and then move into discussion?
Okay, seeing none, Keelan, do we have anybody signed up for public comment?
Yes, we have 4 people signed up.
Uh, we have— I'm gonna, uh, call them, uh, 3 up together who would like to approach the testimony table as a group.
Mark Welcome.
Thank you all for being here today.
You are welcome to begin as soon as you're ready.
Jamie Dunphy
Uh, thank you.
Good morning, Council.
My name is Mark Porras.
I use he/him pronouns, and I'm with the group Portland Cop Watch.
Since 1992, Portland Cop Watch has been working towards a police bureau that's free of brutality, corruption, and racism.
And this item falls under the corruption heading.
We understand the parties have come to an agreement, and we have no objection to the city writing a check for $300,000 to settle this civil rights and malicious prosecution lawsuit for an event that happened over 10 years ago on May 23rd, 2015.
This is different from the usual cases we testify on— people in mental health crisis who call for help and are killed by PPB, like Michael Townsend; mistaken identity and the inherent racism in policing, like that of an unarmed Black man, Manny Clark, who was shot in the back and killed even though PPB was looking for white men, and the many individuals brutalized by police while expressing their First Amendment rights, including the 9 journalists and legal observers who are plaintiffs in the Index Newspapers lawsuit.
This one's different.
Maxine Bernstein wrote about this case last September, and the Oregonian's editorial board followed up shortly afterwards with an opinion piece titled A Lawsuit to Hold the Justice System to Account.
The story, according to court documents and the Oregonian's reporting, is that Mr. Gregg and another man, Mr. Cook, were both sentenced to prison for their roles in selling heroin to a man who died of an overdose.
Or so they were told by two Portland police officers and two Multnomah County deputy district attorneys.
The glitch was that the man did not die of an overdose, although police reports written by PPB officers Carrie Hutchison and Tequila Thurman said that he did, and the deputy district attorneys used that misinformation to get both men to agree to plea deals and serve time in prison.
In fact, according to court documents, Officer Thurman was told by the girlfriend of the man who overdosed that the man was still alive the very same day of the overdose.
3 Days later, Officer Thurman wrote a report that omitted the fact that the man survived the overdose.
Officer Hutchison's report, written the following day, noted that Officer Thurman interviewed 2 individuals who had been with the man the night before his death.
Mr. Cook was sentenced to 366 days in prison and in May of this year received a judgment in his federal lawsuit awarding him $45,001 plus costs and attorney fees.
According to city officials, these amounts don't yet appear in the monthly city administrator's closed claims report.
Because final billing and related expenses associated with the claim haven't yet been paid.
According to court records, Mr. Gregg filed this lawsuit to obtain compensation for the 5 and a half years he spent in prison believing he had killed a man, all based on the defendant's lies.
I neglected to mention that Mr. Gregg did not learn that the man was still alive until after he was released from prison and had gone looking for the man's family to apologize and seek their support for his plan to go to law school.
The corruption exposed in the DA's office on this case is now a separate and it's ongoing piece of litigation as Mr. Gregg has appealed the court's dismissal of the deputy district attorneys from the suit.
Today's settlement, though, will end the city's involvement if it's approved.
A district attorney's office's work is always preceded by police work.
According to the Oregonian's reporting, the lead prosecutor stated that he simply believed what was in the police reports when negotiating.
When the police work is negligent or incompetent at best and corrupt at worst, people will be overprosecuted or falsely prosecuted and lose their liberty in the process.
Thanks.
Mr. Chotska is up after me.
Hi, my name is Philip Chotska.
I use he/him pronouns.
I am also with the group Portland Copwatch.
We appreciate the inclusion of the Bureau claims data along with the ordinance, which states that the 1-year total paid out to claims for the PPB is more than $5.7 million, not including this settlement of $300,000, the associated $45,000 Court judgment plus attorney fees for Mr. Cook, and not including the Manny Clark settlement of $3.75 million.
Once paid out, the— it will push the total to at least $9.75 million this year.
This ordinance does not mention it, so for the record, the Multnomah County court case number is 23-CV-44189.
We are disappointed that after reading this ordinance, a person could have absolutely no idea what terrible things happened that caused the city to settle for $300,000.
We hope the city will provide greater transparency in the future.
According to Section 2 of this ordinance, it is classified as a bodily injury lawsuit, only this is not a bodily injury lawsuit.
That is a copy and paste error, and fitting for a case in which 2 officers wrote faulty police reports.
Until the Community and Public Safety Committee starts hearing these cases, I support Councilor Kanal's request for increased transparency on these settlements and that the full council continue to discuss the policy decisions or violations that keep us coming back to testify on police misconduct cases in the hope that future harm can be prevented.
This ordinance states that no public involvement or input was sought and no future public involvement or is anticipated or necessary.
The community is deeply impacted by police corruption incidents such as this one.
If you want community to trust the police bureau, then the police bureau must be trustworthy.
Here are some potential lessons for the community for this case.
When the police knock on your door, it might be better not to answer.
If the police give you information, do not expect it to be the truth.
Be wary of officers' ability to write factually accurate If you are sentenced to prison in part because the police said you killed someone, do some research and find out if that person is still alive, because the state and police may have failed to provide basic facts of the case and exculpatory evidence as required by law.
At the PCC EP meeting tonight, they will be discussing the exculpatory evidence directive, which would require the police to provide basic facts of the case and exculpatory evidence chief as required by law.
Thank you.
Day wishes to weaken the directive and risk more cases such as this one.
The city should provide, provide all exculpatory evidence to the DA proactively and not wait for the DA to ask about police witnesses that might be unreliable.
Loretta Smith
Thank you.
Good morning, Council.
I'm Charlie Michelle Wesley, a member of many Northwest tribes here and I'm here with Portland Cop Watch, but including personal input.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So where do things stand now with the police officers who lied to Mr. Gray?
Loretta Smith
Officers Thurman and Hutchison are both still employed by PPB.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
We do not know if either officer was disciplined for falsifying information, as neither officer has a case listed in the DPSST's Professional Standards and Economics Sanction Database.
Loretta Smith
What we do know is in October thank you.
In 2024, Officer Hutchison was promoted to sergeant.
However, we are pleased that Mr. Gregg is in his 3rd year at Lewis Clark Law School after serving nearly 5 and a half years in prison.
His display of ingenuity turned this injustice into a means to protect and serve others.
We greatly appreciate that Mr. Gregg volunteered to serve on the Portland Committee for Community Engaged Policing, PCEP, all Thank you.
Although his term was cut short, as we understand it, because the city attorney claimed there was a conflict of interest due to this lawsuit.
We remember Vice President Koyama Lane's words during deliberation on Manny Clark's settlement.
She said, when trust is broken and needs to be rebuilt, I believe as a value that those who have been harmed really need to lead the way in what that rebuilding looks like and also also get to decide when there is real change.
This is exactly what Mr. Gregg was trying to do when he volunteered to serve on PCAP, when the city attorney removed him from that committee.
We bring this up because the city is currently performing background checks on the already appointed members of the Community Board for Police Accountability.
It is no secret that there are appointees with criminal histories.
Who better qualified to shape true accountability policing than those who have firsthand knowledge of the harshness of the system.
A system that includes a moral character policy of honesty, and if out of policy, consequence is supposed to be termination.
However, barriers to actual accountability is aided and abetted by the same suppressive injustices.
Another PPB principle, procedural justice, states involves giving people a voice and being trustworthy.
But Mr. Gregg and others with that actual truthfulness are removed to keep the truth from succeeding.
Amartya Sen talked about procedural justice, and I quote, in seeking resolution by public reasoning, there is clearly a strong case for not leaving out perspectives and reasonings presented by anyone whose assessments are relevant, either because their interests are involved or because their ways of thinking about these issues throw light on a particular judgment.
And in closing, as a recovering addict for 25 years myself, the primary reason recovery programs are so effective is foundational principles of honesty.
With PPB without honesty, the remaining principles are meaningless and continually lead to lawsuits, which are not accountability nor justice and keep some of the most ethical, knowledgeable community voices overpowered and often with tragic outcomes.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Thank you all for being here.
Uh, next up we have Jared Essig.
Welcome, thank you for joining us.
Jamie Dunphy
Good morning, uh, City Council.
And Multnomah County District Attorney, if you're listening.
My name is Jared Essig.
I'm appearing on behalf of the citizens of Portland and Multnomah County and representing the Rose City Iron Front.
On September 12th of last year, 13th, after the day after OregonLive exposed this prosecutorial negligence or corruption and the police misconduct that resulted in this yes.
Unlawful, unjust incarceration of Mr. Gregg.
I appeared before Multnomah County Presiding Judge Judith Matarazzo in an ex parte off-docket hearing, and I asked her to adopt the policy that had been proposed by Senior Deputy District Attorney Kelly Rhodes but had been not adopted by the District Attorney's Office.
And she agreed miraculously, and it's now verbally ordered, so ordered by the Yes.
Multnomah County Court that they will not accept a negotiated plea offer unless— in a case involving a homicide, unless there is proof of death in the form of a medical examiner's report or other affidavit testimony from some reliable witness.
Now, that should have been done by the prosecutor in this case.
That's why this whole qualified immunity thing has to be eroded, because the, the DA's office is the primary culprit in this misconduct, not the city.
And you should direct the city attorney to work with me to hold the district attorney's office accountable and to ensure that the, uh, the judges abide by Judge Matarazzo's verbal ruling that she made to me.
I'm going to appear tomorrow before her again with a written order and ask her to memorialize that and institutionalize it in the local court rules.
I'm a pro se litigant and I'm an amateur lawyer, so it'd be nice to have some professional legal advice and help in my public advocacy efforts, which will save the city money in the long run.
Now I want to shift— oh, also, the court records are sealed.
Okay.
I couldn't get court records for State versus Greg or State versus Jeremiah Cook.
This violates the Oregon State Constitution's Article 1, Section 10, which guarantees the right to a public trial, as well as the U.S. Constitution.
Justice is not a cloistered virtue.
We need to see these records to understand what happened and hold our public officials to account.
I also want to shift gears a little bit.
Say, a lot of leaders want to hold— want to hide behind the police and then blame them when things go wrong.
That's not okay either.
We need moral and intellectual leadership from people like yourselves and from the judge.
Now, authoritarianism, anarchism both support each other.
It's really easy to blame the federal government while refusing to deal with the problem of the ideology of violent revolution, and, uh, which is very popular in Portland.
In fact, Terrorism is more popular than the police are.
Okay, so declare a curfew at the ICE facility.
It's really easy.
Can avoid the deployment of National Guard.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you very much.
We appreciate hearing from you today.
That completes testimony for this item.
Thank you, Keelan.
Colleagues, we will now move into any discussion before taking a vote on this agenda item.
Councilor Kanal.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you, Madam President.
So I do have a question for Mike.
It wasn't a technical one, so, but I'll just build to that.
So first and foremost, I do agree with a couple people who said that this issue was primarily but not exclusively a county issue.
But I also want to point out that due to state law providing prosecutors with near absolute immunity from civil liability, the county and DA's offices had the cases against them dismissed.
In other words, while the DA's office and police officers were both originally respondents to this lawsuit, it's now just the police officers involved that we're addressing here.
And I want to point out to my colleagues, I, I personally believe, and I mentioned this in our work session on the legislative agenda, that prosecutorial immunity to this level is ridiculous.
Multiple advisory groups to this council have recommended that the city take a stand on this issue at the state level, and I would like to see the city's Office of Government Relations and Thank you.
Councilor Dan Ryan.
Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
I have a question for Deputy City Administrator Donnie Oliveira.
I believe that the city has been instructed through the legislative agenda to lobby on an ongoing basis to eliminate it.
And this is also something that I believe would support our police officers' ability to be held to a standard that is fair for them.
Related to that, but a little different, is my question.
There is a portion of this that was alleged in the lawsuit to be a responsibility of the city, of PPV.
So I want to ask 2 questions.
One is, have there been any policy changes as a result of cases like this one?
And was anything done specifically with and I want to stress with, not to.
Has anything been done specifically with the officers involved on this particular case?
Thank you, Councilor Kanal.
So to your, to your questions, yes, as a result of this case, there have been modifications, some of which were alluded to in the testimony, specifically that there will be confirmation of death when death is part of the case.
As to the report writing, there's been continued training I would also respond, I think, and it's appropriate to your question, that there were investigations into this.
That's how we know that Officer Brown, for example, had— his report was accurate and then was modified through the system.
Officer Thurman has been on leave since before this litigation commenced, and so that investigation is just on hold.
And Officer Hutchinson had a sustained finding for misinformation ending up in a report in violation of a directive.
Thank you.
So those are, that's sort of consequences as a result of this.
Thank you very much.
The only other thing I'd like to mention going forward is I do agree that we should mention 2 things in the documentation for settlements.
One is the case number.
I do think that'd be very helpful for the public and frankly for councilors too to do our own homework on it as well.
I know it's often provided elsewhere, but, and the other piece is if there are related cases.
I did not know about the case related to Mr. Cook until I got an email from a constituent referencing a $45,001 settlement there that because it's under $50,000 did not come here.
Yes.
So for those who don't know, $50,000 and above come to City Council now.
It used to be $5,000 prior to January 1st.
So I think having that be involved and I'd ask, I guess it's probably not you or your office, Mike, but the risk management folks, whoever files it.
So with that said, I guess the question before us to me is, does an open confession to a crime and conviction selling heroin that resulted in an overdose lose you your civil rights, lose you your right to be given the accurate information about the impacts of that crime?
And I think the obvious answer is no, which means I think the obvious answer to thank you, Councilor.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Colleagues, I just want to note on the record there's a question raised in testimony about Section 2, um, of the ordinance itself, which talks about bodily injury.
Um, what the attorneys have shared with me is that we categorize claims in 2 ways, either bodily injury or property damage.
This more closely aligned with bodily injury.
While that's not exactly what happened, that is the category it would fall in as opposed to property damage.
So that's why that's listed in the emergency clause.
I don't know if either of you want to speak to that at all or if we should just move on to the next question.
Yeah, just briefly, that is sort of how the claims are set up, is there's kind of 2 buckets that they can go into—.
Loretta Smith
Property damage kind of reserves and claims, and bodily injury.
So bodily injury ends up having to cover emotional distress, civil rights violations, employment claims, things that aren't what you think of as like a physical injury.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
It definitely is something though where we could change the wording if we want to have it kind of clarify a little bit, even if that's just how it's set up in our system and how the templates get set up.
Jamie Dunphy
We could change the language to reflect more clearly what it is if you'd like.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you for clarifying that.
It may be that that's more of a broader forward-looking issue.
Councilor Clark.
Thank you, Madam President.
I don't have a question, I just want to make a statement.
I'm not very happy about this settlement.
Generally, I don't want to vote to reward an admitted drug dealer at one point.
I'm also someone who had a felony on their record and, and had that erased earlier in my life.
But I've heard from other councilors here on the dais outside meetings that— Councilor Smith, Councilor Novick, and others— that point out that this person turned their life around.
I also recognize that pursuing this could potentially cost the city a lot more than the cost of this settlement.
So I will reluctantly be voting yes on this.
I also want to take exception to some of the testimony we heard this morning that I think that saying this is corruption is really an overreach.
Maybe it was sloppy on the other end of the continuum.
I think it was a breach of trust.
But I don't think it was corruption.
So I just wanted to say that.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Smith.
Loretta Smith
Thank you, Madam President.
I believe this settlement is an important reminder that how we do things is as important as what we are doing.
As city officials, we must hold ourselves to a higher standard because the public put full faith in us to do so.
This individual paid his debt to society while living with the guilt of taking a life he did not actually take.
I couldn't imagine what it feels like to have felt that you, for 5 and a half years, that you killed someone and you didn't.
I admire the drive, the tenacity, Of Mr. Gregg.
And putting himself through law school is exactly what we would want for people who have served their time.
This is exactly what I want, and I think the system that helped people rehabilitate themselves is the system that I want to be a part of.
And we have to be held accountable when we mislead folks as we're trying to prosecute in our very hurried lives.
And we have to be very careful how we do things.
It's not because of what he did, it was how we enacted as being the person who yes.
Is in charge and the person who is supposed to be doing things by the book.
And I don't know if it's overreach that the previous Copwatch folks said that it was corruption.
Well, I think it's somewhere in between, but it is definitely something we should not do.
It was definitely, as we looked at the data, it was put in 2 different places.
So we have to be held accountable for that.
I appreciate, uh, Mr. Gregg being able to rehabilitate himself, and I'm looking forward to see what he does with this law degree.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Zimmerman.
Jamie Dunphy
Thanks.
Um, I just have some questions.
How many prosecuting attorneys does the City of Portland employ?
None, Councilor.
Loretta Smith
None.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Jamie Dunphy
Um, did we prosecute this case?
No, we did not.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Loretta Smith
What—.
Jamie Dunphy
For the distribution of heroin, what is a standard jail sentence that a person would get if they, uh, pled to that?
So, uh, I'll answer your question.
There's a sentencing guideline or grid that the courts use and the recommended, or the presumptive sentence, that's the language they use in this particular case, would've been 80 months.
Say it again.
Loretta Smith
80 Months.
80 Months.
Okay.
Jamie Dunphy
So in your estimation, does the jail sentence that this person served for distributing heroin match the normal course of what a drug dealer would have received?
Councilor Zimmerman, I think that to answer your question, uh, I would say that the presumptive sentence is the sentence that would— the court was presumed to give when under these facts.
Mr. Gregg's allegations are that at the time he felt that given the, uh, court's posture that he would have been able to get a reduced sentence if he'd been able to argue this point and didn't know it.
I, I think that's the distinction between the two.
Okay, that's helpful.
If, if a person is facing a drug dealing charge in our courts, does the guilt of the drug dealing itself matter with respect to whether or not a person who purchased those drugs died or did not die?
Is drug dealing illegal whether you live or if your victim lives or dies?
It is illegal.
And the charge in this case, uh, an element of it was not the status of the victim.
Okay.
One of the testimonies received was malicious prosecution, and I, I know that a lot of Portlanders center their public safety concerns at the city, but I want to use this opportunity to remind folks that the City of Portland does not prosecute any cases.
In fact, it's an entirely different government who prosecuted this case.
I— to me, this looks like a failure on behalf of the defense attorney.
It looks like a standard jail sentence for a person who's convicted of dealing drugs.
I am concerned that we are continuing to cite turned their life around yes.
As a reason why in this situation where some false information was in a police report is an argument for a payout.
That is troubling to me.
I think that if we're on the hook for any misinformation in a police report from the moment for something that a different government prosecutes, And that a person cops to and pleads guilty to, that if they don't turn their life around, would we not be in a situation where we would settle?
This seems interesting to me that that's coming up.
But if I would be far more comfortable making this settlement agreement if you were here telling me if the person was— had served a sentence related to the death of another human, but that's not what I'm seeing in any of the documents or any of our briefings that we received, that the sentence was served unrelated to the death of a person.
Because distributing heroin, it wasn't distributing heroin, comma, someone died.
I guess I'm concerned about a precedent that we'd be setting as a city.
I think that's a good point.
That after you tune your sentence, if you can find any scribner's errors, any information errors, anything at the point that the City of Portland is the piggy bank to come to and not Multnomah County, who has the duty for investigating and negotiating plea deals and prosecuting cases.
I, I don't want to say that, uh, I don't think the information in those police reports should be ignored.
I think my colleagues have made really good points about that, and you've indicated some changes there.
What I'm failing to understand is why, when there's another government who prosecuted this case, a judge who put out this sentence, a defendant who pled to this charge, why this lands here.
So, Given all of that and this idea that we're going to negotiate with drug dealers, I feel very dissatisfied with being brought this settlement.
I think we should go to trial.
I think Portlanders expect us to go to trial.
When you, when you do the time for the crime you committed and pled to, I, I don't see the, the concern here in the way that it's been described in these documents.
So I do appreciate that we've gone into some detail previously.
I thank you for that.
I, I appreciate your professional opinion on this.
Uh, I'm uncomfortable with just how many of— or I guess our aversion to going to court on some of these.
I think it would be in the best I think it's the best case for us to say, you dealt drugs, you did your time for dealing drugs, not for killing a person.
And they can make the case in front of a court.
But I won't be supporting the settlement.
I understand there is considerations about greater loss, et cetera.
But I do think there is a point in which we have to look at some reasonable facts here that we're being sued for by a person who did time for the crime they committed and which they pled guilty to, and it had nothing to do with the death of a person.
But somehow we're letting that false fact come in and say that because of that, their dealing of drugs is somehow not something to be held accountable for.
So I'll stop there.
I do appreciate folks who— their comments that have been made.
I think they're all well put.
Thank you.
I agree with Councilor Clark.
I don't expect that there was other undercurrents in this.
I think that mistakes happen and we've dealt with that, but there are other checks in terms of prosecutorial.
And this is 3 DAs ago, by the way, I'll say.
Not the current DA, not the last DA, but the one previous in 2015.
So I think that this case should rest at Multnomah County and not the City of Portland.
Loretta Smith
And I think that we should be careful about what we say.
Thank you.
Jamie Dunphy
I— if the case needs to be argued, I think that that's the right place for it and not these chambers.
But thank you all.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Novick.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you, Madam President.
First of all, my inclination is always to go with the city attorney's recommendation as to a settlement when they're saying that if we don't settle, we have a risk that the taxpayers will wind up paying more.
There are some circumstances in which a proposed settlement seems so morally abhorrent that I would say no, let's roll the dice, even if that means the city pays more.
And I understand people being concerned about making a payout to a drug dealer.
However, I want to second the point made by Councilor Smith, which is that this guy spent years under the impression that he had killed somebody.
And unless he is a complete monster, then suffering under that impression for years is, to me, Likely to have been at least as painful as if he'd been savagely beaten by police officers.
So I want to assume that most people are— even drug dealers are not monsters.
So the fact that this guy suffered for years under the impression that he had killed somebody, to me means that despite generally I wouldn't want to give money to drug dealers, The City Attorney's recommendation is not morally abhorrent.
So I fall back on my general idea that as a matter of fiscal responsibility, I defer to the City Attorney's judgment as to what the risk, what the financial risk is.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Smith, we'll get back to you after others have an opportunity to speak first.
I hate to do that when I'm next in the queue.
That's a bit awkward, but here we are.
Um, I appreciate the comments that my colleagues are making.
I want to be clear that when we're talking about a settlement, it's not about Mr. Gregg.
It's not about his past.
It's not about his future.
It's not about whether he's a good guy or a bad guy.
And it's also not about whether the sentence was right.
It's about 2 things.
Is it likely that we messed up in this case in a way that may have affected his civil rights, and what is the legal risk compared to the cost of settlement.
And I want to make 2 things clear.
I don't believe that we should be taking the ultimate responsibility for this.
I think the facts of the case show that the real responsibility rests with the county and the DA's office.
And I believe that we have amazing city employees who do incredible work for Portlanders every day, and nothing about this case changes that.
But because we have amazing city employees, we have to hold ourselves to the highest standard.
And when we fall short of this standard, we have to make it right.
And in this case, I believe that there's enough risk that we fell short of our standards, our legal standards, and there's enough risk that the cost of moving forward would be greater than the cost.
Councilor Morillo.
Thank you, Council President.
I definitely agree with everything that you stated and that Councilor Smith stated before us.
I think the reality is that the law has to be dispassionate.
So this is not about our personal feelings about this is about whether or not his due process rights were violated, and his due process rights were violated.
And while this wasn't being handled within the city of Portland, we do have some responsibility.
It was our officers that lied about whether or not he had killed someone, and I think most people who have any compassion in their hearts, regardless of the life that they lead, would be concerned, upset, and outraged by that.
Councilor Dan Ryan.
And have long-lasting emotional damage if they thought that their actions had led to someone's death.
So I also just wanna push back on some of the comments that we heard previously because our legal system is not consistent and judges often use their discretion to make decisions about people's lives.
I think there were multiple studies done that show that weather changes can impact whether or not a judge is going to give a harsher or lighter sentence.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
If someone's sports team loses, they could give a harsher or lighter sentence.
People are very complicated, and there is a lot of discretion in how people make decisions that changes day to day.
So someone being apologetic for what they have done, I think, absolutely impacts a judge's discretion in this.
So we at the City of Portland, we're responsible for our police and the things that our police say and do, especially if it can impact someone's sentence long-term, and we do have to take responsibility for that.
I also think that we really have to— I really appreciate Councilor Clark sharing part of her history here with us today.
I think that's extremely powerful, and she's a city councilor now, and I'm happy to serve alongside her.
And that means that when we say we're negotiating with drug dealers, what does that mean when someone has thank you.
If a person has served their time and is now doing different things and has a law degree, they're not a drug dealer anymore.
They are a person who is doing something different with their life, and they deserve to move on and to be a productive member of our society.
So we have a responsibility here.
We have a responsibility for our police.
We have a responsibility to move through this without passion and to just say, are we partially responsible for this?
And our police are, and we are responsible for our police.
So I am going to vote to approve this settlement, and I hope that people understand that no matter who you are or where you come from, you deserve to have your civil rights protected.
You deserve to have due process.
And at a time where our country is actually taking away so many people's due process, I hope that the city of Portland will show that no matter who you are, where you come from, you are owed that in a just society.
Thank you.
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Smith.
Loretta Smith
Thank you, Madam President.
And I just want to go back and piggyback what, uh, Councilor Murillo said.
Under the Constitution, we are granted due process of the law.
Under the 14th Amendment, We are granted equal protection under the law.
And I want to ask you a question.
I'm sure— we don't have the tape or the transcripts to show, but I bet you a dollar to a donut Mr. Gregg was told, if you do not take this plea deal, we're going to charge you with murder.
Yes.
You gave us 80 months as a possible timeline of what he would have spent.
80 Months is 6.2 years.
How much would, would he have gotten if he was charged and found guilty of murder?
Jamie Dunphy
So, uh, Councilor Smith, I can— I'll speak to that.
The, the presumptive sentence for the drug charge was 80 months.
The, the was in fact A written offer from the DA's office to his attorney that said, if you don't plead, there will be potential federal charges.
And those federal charges, while not murder, would have brought many more months or years of, uh, of time in a federal prison, not a state prison.
And some of those would have been likely, based on the record, uh, related to the death of the person who overdosed.
Thank you.
So yes, it would have— he, he was threatened with a longer sentence.
Loretta Smith
So we can safely say without this plea deal, he was looking at a lot of time.
And so he made a choice to take the lesser of time, which he was afforded due our Constitution, right?
And he was getting everything that anyone who was in this position would, would have been able to receive.
There's a negotiation, there's a deal.
When you're doing this.
And so I agree, you don't have to agree with, with what the person did.
We don't like it.
It has the potential of causing all kinds of things with our kids and our grandkids and those kinds of things.
But at the same time, if our police gave information that caused him to make this decision, I'd say in addition to the DA's office, We are equal— equally responsible.
So today is not about, like Councilor, um, our Council President said, this is not about if we like this person as a person.
This is about equal protection under the law.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Kanal.
Jamie Dunphy
Thanks.
A lot of my colleagues said a lot of what I was going to say, so I'll just, uh, hit it quickly.
Uh, strongly support Councilor Smith's assertion about our high standards and holding ourselves to them.
I agree with both Councilors Clark and Zimmerman about frustration with the county's lack of responsibility here, and we'll talk about the legislative agenda when we do.
I agree with Councilor Zimmerman's point that turning your life around or not is sort of immaterial to the question of whether— of the settlement itself.
It's a nice-to-know piece of information, and I appreciate hearing about it, but I think that even if this plaintiff had done the same stuff after his sentence was completed.
The question is immaterial to the settlement.
The settlement is about, did we create a harm and would we be paying it?
Or in this particular case, is there a risk that a court would find that?
So that makes sense.
I will say one last thing, which is that I do— I really appreciated the conversation about whether or not this was corruption or a mistake.
From my read of the record, it did appear to me to be a mistake.
Okay.
On behalf of the officers personally.
That was my most likely outcome takeaway here.
And I think that it's still important to hold officers to a standard of conduct that's been set without necessarily saying you did this intentionally, right?
That's a criminal question sometimes, but not necessarily in our administrative context, and also not in the civil context.
Having said that, I totally understand why there's a lack of trust, and I think that's really important.
Thank you.
I understand why people might come to their own conclusion that it's more likely than not that something was— something wrong was done here.
That doesn't mean I agree.
I just understand that there's been enough distrust created over the years to see how it's easy for someone who doesn't have all the information we have, in part because we don't necessarily give all the information that we have, might get there.
And I think it's a perfectly fair assessment, even if I don't necessarily agree with it.
Agree thank you.
With it in this case.
And I want to close by thanking Councilor Murillo for saying exactly what I was going to say, which is that due process matters to everyone, whether it's any of us up here, Mr. Gregg, or an immigrant.
We need to be standing up for universal rights and principles.
Thanks.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Seeing no one else in the queue, this is an emergency ordinance.
It requires 9 votes to pass.
Keelan, could you please call the roll?
Jamie Dunphy
Clark.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Green.
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Zimmerman.
Jamie Dunphy
No.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Avalos.
Aye.
Dunphy.
Aye.
Smith.
Aye.
Kanal.
Aye.
Ryan.
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Koyama Lane.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Murillo.
Aye.
Novick.
Aye.
Pirtle-Guiney.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The ordinance passes with 11 yes votes and 1 no vote.
Thank you, Keelan, and thank you to our legal and risk teams for their work on settling this case.
Keelan, could you please call the next agenda item?
Item 5, amend city code to adopt State of Oregon building codes by reference, amend Code Title 24 and Sections 25 thank you, Keelan.
And this is a second reading of an ordinance.
If there is no discussion or debate, we will move to a vote.
Seeing none, Keelan, could you please call the roll?
Jamie Dunphy
Clark.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
I'm sorry, Councilor, did you have a comment on this?
Yes.
I apologize, I thought that was a legacy hand.
Item 5.
Okay, okay, go ahead, Keelan.
Thank you.
Clark?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Green?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Zimmerman?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Avalos?
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Dunphy?
Jamie Dunphy
Thanks to Terry Harris with this.
I vote aye.
Loretta Smith
Smith?
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Kanal?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Ryan?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The ordinance passes with 12 yes votes.
Thank you.
Keelan, could you please read our next agenda item?
Item 6, research disparities in public contracting, workforce, and employment in Portland, and report back thank you, Keelan.
And before we start, I want to thank Councilor Smith.
This was on our agenda a few weeks ago, and because of some other timing issues, we needed to bump it to today.
I appreciate your partnership in figuring out a time for it to come back.
Colleagues, we have a committee staff summary, I believe, from Craig.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you, Mayor.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I'm not sure if he's online.
I know he was out yesterday.
He's here.
I'm looking to our Council Operations Manager.
We will figure out where our committee step— what?
Excuse me, my bad.
Okay.
Loretta Smith
Madam President, I can give you some background so we don't have any why don't we start with the committee chair report?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
And I believe you're the carrier as well.
Yes.
Though I think Councilor Green may have presided, so we'll come back to Councilor Green with a chair report.
Why don't we start with the carrier's report?
Loretta Smith
Yes, we actually put this up twice and I brought it forward and I was looking to use already existing resources to pay for a disparity study.
And I was told that I couldn't do the state of Oregon, and I couldn't do the Port of Portland or any other previous disparity study that was not specifically for the city of Portland.
So at any rate, we had to put it back on the docket.
And thank you, Councilor Green, for presiding over that.
I had a family funeral to attend, but I brought this resolution to the Labor and Workforce Committee on September 25th for one important reason.
The city must conduct Yes.
The council has directed the city to conduct disparity studies to support our contracting practices and adherence to Mayor Wilson's executive order.
That requires analysis of the knowledge, skills, abilities, and other qualifications of the contractors competing for projects.
When we discuss disparities in government contracting and procurement, we aren't talking about mere differences in how government contracts are awarded.
We're talking about Who are, are the awarded— who awarded those contracts?
And in many cases, the recipients are not members of communities of color.
Disparities arise when contracts are awarded based on factors other than the applicant's qualifications and ability to do the work, often due to bias based on a person's race, ethnicity, and sex.
Discrimination on the basis of race, Councilmember Herbold.
Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
Discrimination based on sex, ethnicity, religion, or other protected classes in government contracting is illegal under the Civil Rights Act.
I still strive for that day when discrimination against women and people of color has disappeared.
But until that day, disparity studies are an essential and necessary tool for identifying discrimination in government contracting and procurement.
Procurement.
That is why I brought forward this resolution.
I believe this is the work required of us at this moment, at this time, in this very volatile, uh, kind of federal, uh, reign of, of, of tyranny on cities and states as it relates to, uh, DEI.
Uh, the other piece is that I have to bring to the clerk's attention is that either we sent you the wrong updated, uh, resolution for the disparity study, um, and that was put online.
We have to amend the current, uh, resolution that's online, and I'd like to do that.
I don't know if this is the time to do that, um, Madam President.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Um, why don't you wait until we hear the committee staff summary and the overview, and then we'll have you move an amendment before we take public testimony.
Is that okay, Councilor?
Okay, excellent.
Okay, should we move to that?
Okay.
Mr. Cook, thank you for joining us.
I think we went a little faster than folks were expecting on some other items.
I apologize, but I'm glad you're here.
Jamie Dunphy
My apologies.
Madam President, Councilors, for the record, Craig Cook, Council Operations Policy Analyst and staff to the Labor and Workforce Development Committee.
The resolution before you, document number 2025-13, 377 was heard in the Labor and Workforce Development Committee on September 25th, where it was referred to council with the recommendation to be adopted.
The resolution directs the city administrator to initiate 2 studies to evaluate disparities in city contracting and workforce participation.
It requests the city administrator engage a qualified consultant to perform these analyses and directs that the studies be conducted in a manner emphasizing community engagement.
The amended resolution sets the deadline for the city administrator to the resolution acknowledges that funding for the requested studies must be requested in the 2025 fall technical adjustment ordinance and that work cannot begin until funding is identified.
The resolution also commits council to supporting the city administrator in utilizing the findings of the disparity study to inform policies and practice— practices that promote equitable access to contracting and workforce opportunities for all Portland residents.
The full impact statement on the item includes information on financial and budgetary impacts, economic and real estate development impacts, and community impacts and community involvement.
There was one amendment in committee adopted during the September 25th committee meeting, which changed the deadline for the requested report from March 1st, 2026 to December 31st, 2026.
One person provided verbal testimony in advance of committee action.
General themes included importance of having a diverse, robust, and professionally trained workforce, strategic pathways to ensure equitable workforce development in light of Mayor Wilson's executive order on compliance with nondiscrimination laws, EO 2025-01, insight from disparity studies to center workers who wouldn't otherwise have equal access to opportunities, previous studies that were requested by council but not funded, and exploring working with Prosper Portland and others to ensure funding for studies.
Yeah, I just want to add that the discussion at committee was very robust.
I think what one of the themes that came up is we reaffirmed the importance in this moment not to sort of shy away from our values commitments in the city, but to invest in our communities.
Thank you.
In the studies that we need to do to say without a doubt we are justified in saying we do think that our procurement policies and our contracting policies should be— should try to correct previous harms.
And so we had that discussion.
All committee members present voted to sort of Co-sponsor this resolution.
So this was a very unanimous committee-based approach, and we were just really excited to bring this forward.
One of the things that we did talk about during that meeting was how that there are also intersectional disparities that emerge for people of color, women, the LGBT community.
So this is, this is far-sweeping work, and it's important that we refund the money to pay for it.
And that's, I think, all I needed to add to that.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you very much.
Colleagues, are there any questions for— about— are there any questions about our committee staff summary or any technical questions?
Councilor Avalos.
Thank you.
Yeah, I have a couple of technical questions.
Loretta Smith
So first, thank you to Councilor Smith for bringing this forward.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I think this is super important, especially in this day and age.
And so, um, I think that's why my questions are about just trying to understand first, given that the last city disparity study was done in 2009, I guess I'm wondering why it took so long to revisit the work, uh, and how we can ensure that studies are happening on a more regular cycle moving forward.
Jamie Dunphy
I don't know who that question needs to to be directed at though?
Loretta Smith
Who would that go to, Councilor?
So thank you for the question because I think it was the previous, it had to be the previous council and mayor.
And I don't think we can talk about all the things that should have been done and could have been done by previous councils.
And I think that the important thing is that we have decided to deal with this in this council this quickly.
And, um, I am actually going to put a first amendment in to say that we need to have the report by May 31st and not December.
And the reason why I say May 31st is that we have to have this information before we go into the next fiscal year, or we'll be in limbo for 2 fiscal years before we actually have the diversity data on contracting.
So, um, that— so I— so to answer that question, I don't know why they didn't want to do it.
You have to go talk to all those folks and ask why they didn't do it, because they were very, uh, pro-minority contractors and, uh, supporters of, of DEI and equity and all those things that, that, um, try to make sure that we're equitable as a government.
So I don't know.
I won't even try to, uh, respond for them.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Um, yeah, I, I appreciate that context, but I think then more specifically, let me ask this.
Loretta Smith
If the—.
Jamie Dunphy
If they authorized this funding for 2022 and it was never done, what happened to those specific dollars?
Is that an answer that I can get?
And I see that Jonas is out, so—.
For 2022?
Yeah, so that was what I understood, that they had authorized—.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I believe that we have Haley Blonsky here able to answer some of these questions.
Okay.
Hello, Council.
For the record, my name is Haley Blonsley.
I'm a senior project manager for the city operations service area.
In answer to your question, there were never funds allocated to the disparity study.
It was just the, the resolve to do the study.
It was wanting to act upon it, and then those funds were never actually realized in the budget process.
And so that's why the study wasn't conducted.
We are, are our understanding of this current item is that council intends, and we do have an item within the fall TAO, to have funding recognized for this.
And so that was the major hangup for the previous council.
Jamie Dunphy
And how much funding is it?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The funding in the fall TAO, so it's a 2-part—.
$450,000.
Okay, $450,000.
And that's for both contracts and workforce, so it's 2-part.
Loretta Smith
Okay, thank you.
That's all, Council President.
Madam President, and the reason why it was $450,000, and the orig— the original reason why I, I pulled it from the, from the original, um, council date, committee date, was because I thought it was going to cost $2 million.
And then I learned after talking to, um, our procurement, um, director that it was— we were going to get a pretty good deal because of the partnership that they were going to do with Prosper Portland, who was doing another similar um, disparity study.
So that's why it's only $450,000.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you for clarifying that, Councilor.
Councilor Avalos, thank you for the questions.
Councilor Kanal.
Jamie Dunphy
Yes, thank you, Madam President.
My question, it was related to— we had, um, and it's probably a procurement question, um, or I might put, uh, DC Abiri on the spot here, but, uh, the this is based on the testimony we got in the, in the, um, public communications as well.
I also got an email from a different constituent.
It was about whether or not the prime contractor development program is entirely being ended, uh, and if we could just get that confirmed, and, and if so, a reason why, uh, for that.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I believe we have somebody here to speak to procurement.
Jamie Dunphy
Good morning, Council President, Council Vice President, councilors.
Councilor Kanal, actually yesterday I held a convening, the first meeting to revamp the Prime Contractor Development Program with all parties being present.
But that did, of course, we depended upon funding to be able to stand it completely up in terms of support.
That also includes everything, everything was discussed including risk support, bonding, and insurance.
So being, Revamped, not being ended.
It was never ended.
It was paused due to funding and the fact that the pool was so small and it was always so lenient to a certain demographic and was not diverse.
And then my other question is more of a technical question for the clerk.
I just wanted to note that in committee, both myself and Councilor Green indicated a desire to become co-sponsors on this.
I'm very glad that I was, but I just wanted to make sure I daylighted that in case that's still possible to do, uh, just for the, the eventual historical record on this, because I know Councilor Green supported it very strongly in committee as well.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Green, if you'd like that to be added, why don't you send a note to the clerk?
Councilor Clark.
Thank you, Madam President.
Um, thank you, Councilor Smith.
I'm very supportive but I do have some questions because I'm also really concerned about the budget.
I'm— this is what's keeping me up at night as we start to think about '26-'27.
So I just have a couple questions for you and Councilor Green potentially.
You mentioned the Port of Portland and the State of Oregon have done disparity studies in—.
Loretta Smith
Yes, the Port of Portland Portland, and the latest one that was done in 2023 or 2022 was done by the state of Oregon.
So I originally asked, could we use that as our baseline?
And in the committee, and I was told by former DCA Morrissey that we could not, that we were not able to use someone else's disparity study.
It was a statewide study, not thank you.
So the study was not exclusive to Portland, but a lot of their disparities came from the Portland area.
So that being said, in order for us to be right with the world and, um, being able to, uh, protect ourselves from the federal government, we wanted to make sure that we had, uh, disparity studies that were specific to the city of Portland and our procurement practices and what we were doing.
And so that is why I'm supporting this, and that's why I put it forward.
And the other reason, you know, shortly after that we learned that there, there possibly is a budget gap, and I thought, oh my God, so I can't put this on because we don't have any money for this.
But, um, after learning that this was going to be recommended in the TAO, and it's for $450,000, and, um, that's a decision that we're going to have to make when that comes before us.
But we're going to get a work session today so you can learn a little bit more about it.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I appreciate that.
I just was wondering if, if there's some way we could build off the, uh, state, um, study, if there's, if there's any way we can use that.
Loretta Smith
Yeah, I think they are, and I think that, um, Councilor Green is going to add some things that we would be building off of that study.
So they, they, they, they're going to have a, a good baseline of, um, information.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, um, let me just ask another question, and maybe this will come up in this afternoon's conversation, but I'm just wondering, um, can we share the cost of this with some other institutions in the region?
Loretta Smith
So we're basically sharing the cost with Prosper, and that's why it generally costs— for one disparity study, it generally costs $1 million.
Okay.
So we are kind of piggybacking off Prosper Portland because they're actually doing a disparity study too.
And I think that but the folks that are doing theirs, they're giving us a break because it's going to be the same demographic in the same city.
And that's why we needed to do it so quickly.
And that's why we wanted to make sure that we put this on our docket.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I just wondered if maybe we'd ask for some contribution from TriMet or some other government.
TriMet and the county are both pursuing studies within this contract as well alongside us, which is what helped bring our rate down a little bit.
Okay, great.
Good to know.
That's really good information.
And then I just lastly, just because of the cost, and we'll deal with that, we'll talk about that this afternoon, is just if this is something that could be phased.
Do we have to do it all at once?
Loretta Smith
You would want to do it all at once because you need that information.
If we phase it in, people change.
And I imagine, Procurement Director—.
Jamie Dunphy
The cost would be— The cost would increase.
Loretta Smith
The cost would increase, exactly.
And I imagine the people will be different too, because if there's, there's some contracts that we're not putting out, and some of due to that delay, it's probably going to cause a lot of people to go out of business.
So as we're trying to phase things in, it may phase some companies right out of, out of business.
I think we need to do this quickly and we need to do it now.
Okay, thank you.
Jamie Dunphy
May I, may I also add that policies will be derived from this actual study, and our practices will align with those policies as well.
So this is, this is probably very important as we realign in engagement with the executive order.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, Councilor, is that all?
Councilor Green.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you, Madam President.
I just wanted to weigh in on the deadline that's in the resolution and just provide some context for the rest of the council on what we talked about during the committee.
The original deadline was amended based upon a conversation I think that Councilor Novick and I think also Councilor Kanal had engaged with, with Hayley about the feasibility of the timeline given that we would find the money in the TAO.
And I think the spirit of that conversation— and feel free to step in at any point, Councilor Novick— was that we want the deadlines in the resolution to be achievable.
And so if we thought that— I think the original one was March— if we thought we wouldn't secure the funding for this disparity study work until after resolution of the fall TAO, that places us in a very difficult timeline to execute and get a final report by March.
And we want to make sure the work is good and not, you know, sort of just a, oh, you know, deadlines are deadlines, we don't take them seriously in our resolution.
So that's why the deadline was shifted back.
I think Haley assured us that it's entirely likely that we would get the results of this much earlier than the December one, but I just wanted to lay that out for folks as we talk about this part of the—.
Loretta Smith
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor Green?
Loretta Smith
With a sense of urgency, understanding that we have to make sure that our policies are lined up before next year's fiscal year, this gives us the urgency when we start looking at that, um, at our work session and all those set-asides and those carryovers and new money, that, that this is one that has to pass because this is going to impact all the hundreds of millions of dollars that we contract out into the community and that we accept from the federal government.
So this is one of those must-dos.
So if we can push it back to December, I think that just pushes back our sense of urgency of how important this is to what we do.
We're infrastructure government.
We do contracts all the time.
That's how we make our money.
And We got a $2 billion water project out there that is unprecedented, and we cannot allow this to, you know, sit until December 31st.
Jamie Dunphy
I mean, I tend to agree with you.
I guess I would ask, is it possible— we've got some folks from the Bureau staff up here— can we— can you weigh in on the timeline stuff given what we've heard from Councilor Smith?
I cannot definitively say that we can have it by March.
That was the original estimated date when I first engaged with the contractor.
That may slip until probably at the— probably toward the end of the fiscal year.
I can definitely reengage with the contractor and see if we can expedite some of the activities, and I can come back and report that.
Loretta Smith
Yeah, even if we said June 15th or May 31st, I mean, at least it gives us an opportunity.
We have some cushion in there if we can get this passed in the town.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
And I think that that's kind of the crux of it, is as soon as we get the TAO passed and that is part of the package, it would allow us to go execute that contract based on the timetable that the contractor provided.
They're estimating about a month of preparatory work and then 2 to 7 months— for month 2 to 7, doing the actual surveying and data collection.
And then they're estimating about a month and a half for their own analysis.
So depending on— we could go have a conversation with them acknowledging this is the scope for both the city's 2 studies as well as the county and TriMet.
So we could also talk about kind of order of operations with them of, you know, what analysis they can kind of prioritize first to get it faster.
But I don't see it as coming in March just from an execution of contract standpoint.
Thank you.
And if we're looking at June, I think we would just need some time to contract.
Loretta Smith
Okay, I can compromise on this.
Okay, we'll leave the date at December, but everybody at this table right now understanding that it is urgent that we try to get this information back before we pass fiscal year '26-'27.
And so we'll leave it as is, but there is a sense of urgency, particularly if we pass the TAO that has the resources to pay for this yes.
Absolutely.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Councilor Novick?
Jamie Dunphy
Yes.
I confess that I should know this because we just did have the TAO in finance the other day, but does the current TAO proposal from the administration assume a $450,000 expenditure for this, or would we have to It is in the towel.
Loretta Smith
It is in the towel.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Jamie Dunphy
Um, and we now just agreed that we're going to, we're going to leave it at, we're going to leave it at December.
Loretta Smith
We'll leave the December date.
Um, you know, but with the understanding that I am going to be calling and being some of you all's new best friends.
We look forward to it.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
That's not very unique.
Can I get clarity?
Does the TAO include 400 or 450?
Because I'm hearing and seeing those different numbers in different places.
I believe it's 450.
Let's look to Jonas so that we can get some accurate information maybe about that and also about how that number relates.
I think Councilor Novick was talking about the presentation in finance, how that number relates to yeah, thank you, Council President.
Thank you, Council.
Jamie Dunphy
For the record, Jonas Biery, City's Chief Financial Officer, sitting in for the City Administrator today.
The amount that's in the ordinances currently filed, which was heard by Finance Committee yesterday and will come back for final vote, I believe is $400,000.
So we have a little work to do to figure out where the other $50,000 is coming is from.
Thank you.
Coming from, why that wasn't reflected in the TAO.
But we'll be ready to come back.
Loretta Smith
And maybe you're right, CFO Biery, maybe it is just the $400,000.
I thought it was $450,000.
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, we'll do a little digging to make sure that we have either the right number in the final TAO that passes or we make sure we're aware of the actual costs and have—.
Loretta Smith
Okay, excellent.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor, did you get your question answered?
I think so.
Can I also just clarify, I know that we'll be talking more about the TAO later, and for the $400,000, $450,000, that will need to be voted on separately as an amendment to the ordinance, which is the TAO.
So a vote for this resolution would be kind of a value statement of saying that we support this?
Loretta Smith
Exactly.
Yes, it won't be an extra.
It's a part of the whole TAO package.
This is not an amendment to the to the amended TAO.
It is already in the TAO.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Ryan?
Jamie Dunphy
Yes, uh, thank you, Madam President.
I just first of all want to thank you, Councilor Smith, for bringing this forward.
I also just want to acknowledge, um, you, Director Donaldson, and former Director Taylor, rest in peace, that I assumed there was something in the budget because we looked at this data all the time, and it's because the former council had to look at every contract and so it was brought up frequently.
It was so helpful, at least in the procurement space.
So I just want to acknowledge the hard work that your group has been doing on this for several years, and I really appreciate it.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Thanks.
Jamie Dunphy
And I get why it's important to formalize this at this time.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
I just pulled up the DP for this.
It is 450.
Okay.
Thank you, Hayley.
So maybe we can— Figure out that discrepancy before TAO comes to a vote to council.
Jamie Dunphy
Can I ask one more question?
'Cause she's—.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
It is 4:50 in there.
Thank you for clarifying, Councilor.
Councilor Ryan.
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, another question.
I, you know, I often don't know the answer to the question that I ask, which makes me different than some politicians, but I do have a question.
Isn't there a fund that went from the city to Prosper to help with this?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Not that I'm aware of.
Loretta Smith
Okay.
Jamie Dunphy
I'll look into that.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yeah.
It's rusty, but okay.
I can do some digging.
Loretta Smith
All right.
Yeah.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor Knoll.
Jamie Dunphy
Thanks.
Yeah, Councilor Ryan made me remember something, which is that actually on his way out of the role, our former procurement director, Biko Taylor, who yes, rest in peace.
And by the way, if you wanted to hear more about him, there's December 19th of last year, there was a lot of conversation at the council meeting that I think was instructive.
But one of his interviews as he was exiting the position at the city was about the need for a disparity study specifically.
And it's in— if you search his name, I think it's in the Portland Business Journal.
But just that, that's, I think, particularly relevant that there is there's so many little spots along the way from so many different leaders of the city talking about the necessity for this action to be taken.
Um, and I appreciate the perspective from Councilor Ryan as well as Councilor Smith on this and, and all the different spots, but I think we could find hundreds of times where we said we needed to do this in the past, um, since 2009.
I think it's time we do it.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Colleagues, we do have public testimony, but I know that it is helpful for the public to know what amendments are coming before we take public testimony.
Councilor Green, do you have an amendment you'd like to put on the record?
Jamie Dunphy
I do, Madam President.
Um, I'd like to put on the record, and this is filed already on the clerk's website, but I had some conversations with council—.
Loretta Smith
Could I do mine first and then you amend mine?
The new— because I have to amend the entire—.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Well, let's, let's let Councilor Green put his amendment on the record.
He has the floor right okay.
And then Councilor Smith, why don't we come to you for amendments as well?
Jamie Dunphy
I'll note that, Councilor, it looks like the amended version is inclusive of what you— okay, so anyway, so what I'm doing here in the amendment is speaking to some of the written testimony I received from some of our labor partners that wanted to make sure that we, as we do this disparity study, we're capturing sort of all relevant data that might have outcomes and impacts on the outcomes In particular, that we're also looking at the impacts of project labor agreements and community benefit agreements on disparity outcomes, and that we're also taking a sort of race and gender look as well, because that's also a piece that's pretty determinative.
So in the now therefore be it resolved section of the resolution, I'm adding under item 1 where it says utilizing data from the State of Oregon, the Port of Portland, Portland and Prosper Portland, as well as obtaining— I'm just inserting any relevant data specific to the City of Portland to make sure we have an expansive universe of data on which to pull.
In subitem 2, I'm just sort of appending at the very end of that procurement directive, I'm saying that in addition to conducting disparity studies to perform the analysis, ensuring that the study adheres to best practices and legal standards.
I'm adding comma, with attention paid to the potential for disparities to emerge from the intersection of race and gender.
I then add another bullet after item 3 so that becomes item 4 that says that the studies analyze impacts of project labor agreements or community benefits agreements on disparity outcomes.
And that's it.
And that's what I'm adding.
I think what this does is it just adds other relevant information for us to look at and doesn't take anything away from the core value of the resolution.
And I would ask the councilor to be friendly to this amendment.
Loretta Smith
I am friendly to that amendment, but it may not be amending what you just said because I don't think the council president understood that it is an entirely different resolution that I'm gonna be amending.
And so you're amending my second resolution, not the first.
Jamie Dunphy
The thing that's attached to the website is, is going to be consistent with what you're, what you're going to offer.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, let's hear Councilor Smith's amendment, and if we need to do a little wordsmithing to make the 2 amendments work together, we can certainly do that during discussion.
Right now we just need to get things on the record so that we can take public testimony.
Loretta Smith
Go ahead, Councilor So I'd like, in the first, uh, in the resolution that I have, I'd like to, um, scratch the first line that says research disparities in public contracting.
Clerk Keelan, can you see that?
Striking research disparities in public contracting workforce and employment.
Second.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Are you proposing to amend the title of the item?
Yes, it's— yes, yes, ma'am.
Can we amend a title of an item and still have it be that same item?
Jamie Dunphy
I, I would like to check my answer, but I believe the answer is if it's on the same subject and it still follows a single subject rule, it's appropriate okay, thank you.
Loretta Smith
And so it will read, a resolution of the Portland City Council Labor and Workforce Development Committee.
We're going to scratch the first whereas, and the title is going to be the new title, Resolution to Initiate 2 Disparity Studies on City Contracting and Work Force participation.
We have a new whereas.
Whereas the City of Portland spends millions of dollars each year on procurement of goods, services, and construction, and— Whereas the city has a responsibility to ensure its public dollars are spent in a way that benefits the community it serves, semicolon, and Next.
Whereas the City of Portland is committed to advancing equity, anti-racism, and inclusive economic opportunities through its contracting and workforce policies, semicolon, and whereas executive order to the city employees to comply with all federal law, parentheses, EO 2025-01, Aye.
Paragraph requires compliance with all applicable federal civil rights and nondiscrimination laws, including, comma, but not limited to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, semicolon, and whereas EO 2025-01 presents an opportunity for exploration into new strategies to support small businesses and develop the local workforce in preparation for participation on public contract opportunities; and whereas, Council has received passionate testimonials from the local small business community in support of the city conducting a disparity study.
In addition to improving services In addition to improving access to resources like business technical assistance and workforce development services that support participation on public projects, semicolon, and next, whereas the last disparity study conducted by Procurement Services was completed in 2009, semicolon, and whereas peer cities have invested in conducting a A disparity study at least every 5 years as a best practice, semicolon, and whereas a disparity study would provide updated data about business availability challenges, changes, and enhance the chief procurement officer's ability to accurately assess the efficiency of various procurement programs.
Second.
Next, whereas a contract disparity study would allow the Chief Procurement Officer to examine the utilization of MBEWESB and other diverse businesses in city construction, professional services, goods and services contracts.
And the next, whereas a workforce disparity study would allow the Chief Procurement Officer to evaluate how How construction work hours on city construction contracts are divided among apprentices, workers of color, and women.
And the next, whereas the city previously authorized a disparity study through ordinance number 190781, which was passed on April 20th, 2022, to evaluate disparities in contracting and workforce participation.
Whereas the city recognizes the importance of conducting a comprehensive disparity study that considers data from the State of Oregon, the Port of Portland, and Prosper Portland to ensure a thorough analysis of disparities in contracting and workforce participation.
And whereas Prosper Portland is currently engaged in a disparity study—.
Jamie Dunphy
Councilmember Herbold.
Loretta Smith
Study, comma, led by Keen Independent Research to analyze disparities in the utilization of disadvantaged minority woman emerging small and service-disabled veteran-owned businesses, DMWESB SDVS, in its construction-related contracts and public-private partnership agreements.
And whereas the State of Oregon has conducted a disparity study, also led by Keene Independent Research, to evaluate disparities in contracting and workforce participation across various state agencies.
Let's see.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor, while you pause there, I am noticing that most of these are the same as what is currently online.
Do you want to draw our attention just to the differences?
That might be easier than reading through it all.
Loretta Smith
It's not the same.
So I can go down.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Can we get a written copy of the differences?
Because this is way too hard to track verbally.
I want to make sure.
So far I've noted 2 differences, the deletion of the first whereas and the insertion of the word new in the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6th whereas.
But everything else appears to be the same.
Loretta Smith
Whereas the breaks— let me ask you this, um, Keelan, do you have my updated resolution?
Jamie Dunphy
We have what was sent to our office at—.
Loretta Smith
This morning?
9:19 This morning.
That is the one that is the, the clean copy of the new resolution and all the deletions that are on there?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I don't, I don't know that it's a strikethrough underline version.
I think that's—.
Loretta Smith
You don't have a strikethrough at the bottom?
No.
So if my staff could send everyone the strikethroughs that you sent me at the bottom.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Are there changes to other whereases?
Loretta Smith
Yes, they're just cut.
They're just stricken.
Okay.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
From the, um, record.
Which ones are struck from the record?
Loretta Smith
Whereas in December 2024, the White House Council of Economic Advisers published a report and meta-study on racial disparities in government contracting established several important facts.
That's stricken.
Okay.
And the points under that are stricken.
Great.
And so we go to, now therefore be it resolved by the Portland City Council Labor and Workforce Committee.
One says that the city administrator initiate 2 disparity studies to evaluate disparities in both city contracting and workforce participation utilizing data from the State of Oregon, the Port of Portland, and Prosper Portland.
Number 2 says that the city— strike request that and go directly to that— the city administrator, in partnership with the chief procurement officer, engage a qualified consultant with expertise in in conducting the disparity study.
Number 3, STRIKE directs that, and begin with that, the disparity studies be conducted in a manner that emphasizes community engagement throughout the process, ensuring that input from historically marginalized communities is STRIKE documented and input reflected in the work.
Second.
Number 4 is the last strike.
Strike request that the city administrator submit a written, written report on— strike that— add that the findings and recommendations of the disparity studies— strike to city council— and add be presented to the Labor and Workforce Development Committee upon completion.
And strike and no later than March 1st, 2026.
Go down to the next, um, sentence and strike after participation, strike the and.
And then there's one more in the next paragraph under the be it further resolved.
Before the be it further resolved, work cannot begin until funding is identified.
Second.
And strike the semicolon and and.
Under be it further resolved that, strike City Council Labor and Workforce Development Committee commits to supporting the city administrator.
And at the end it says adopted this insert date, strike that, strike the last sentence Portland City Council Labor no, no, no, keep that.
So that's finished.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, I think folks need a written copy of this.
There were a fair amount of changes there.
Um, Councilor, if you can try to get a written copy of that to everybody while we listen to public testimony, that would be helpful.
I suspect that we are going to see some wordsmithing to this.
Yep.
For folks testifying, we have 2 amendments that we expect to be considering.
Neither have been officially moved and seconded yet, but we know that they are on the table.
Why don't we move to— well, there are 2 hands up.
Councilor Murillo, did you have a question before we move to public testimony?
Point of information.
Jamie Dunphy
I just want to make a— so, Councilor, the language that you sent me while we're in this session, all of that, unless that has changed since you sent that to me, all of that language is in my amendment.
So it's already on this website.
So folks want to read the full complete resolution as it stands with my amendment, that's there.
Loretta Smith
That's the old one, I believe.
Jamie Dunphy
That's the one you sent me at like 9:38, 9:45 AM.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, why don't the two of you figure out if the language that is the base for Councilor Green's amendment is accurate to what you are trying to amend or not.
Let's get that worked out while we hear public testimony so that we can continue moving.
Councilor Murillo, did you have a question before we move to public testimony?
Uh, no, I was requesting it written so that we could follow this.
And this is also just going to be another push for me to say that I think that we absolutely need mandatory deadlines for when we submit amendments because doing this on the fly is not good for anybody.
I can't process everything that is being said verbally right now.
It's just not good governance.
Loretta Smith
You're absolutely right.
And what should have happened is—.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Hey, Councilor, can I just jump in?
You should have gotten it.
It's fine.
Let's keep moving.
It's fine.
Councilor Kanal.
Okay, I understand.
Loretta Smith
This was not a yesterday amendment was what I'm trying to say.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Understood.
And Councilor Murillo, you will see a proposal from me soon that includes some posting deadlines for amendments at full council.
Let's move to public testimony so we can hear from members of the public where I suspect we are going to hear requests for additional amendments as well.
Thank you all for being here and answering some of those more technical questions.
We will likely need you back as we consider amendments, so please don't go far.
Keelan, can you please call up our— We may be able to do it in one panel.
Of public testifiers, or do we need 2?
Maybe 2.
Okay, can you call up our first panel of public testimony?
First up, we have Terrence Hayes, Lauren Bulling, Zach Culver, Randall Friesen, and Lori Wimmer.
Loretta Smith
Terrence.
Jamie Dunphy
Oh, I can go.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank y'all.
Loretta Smith
How you doing?
Jamie Dunphy
My name is Terrence Hayes.
Um, Councilor Loretta Smith, I would like to just thank you first for recognizing the need for disparity study.
As a small business owner that do business with the city, um, I would love to just double down on the fact that there is still a lot of work ahead.
Um, the city has done well in hiring some folks, and I think We need to continue to hire equity officers and people that is focusing on not only making sure that small and minority businesses getting opportunities with the city, but just as importantly, that they're succeeding and they're having success.
It is very complicated when it comes to small businesses' ability to have success with city and governmental agencies.
That's just a fact.
Every disparity study have continued to say that over and over again.
Councilmember Again, I would recommend that one of the things that we look into is quick pay.
I've talked about this before.
Small companies, especially small minority companies, struggle with city and government contracts because net 30 makes it really complicated to pay your employees on time.
I would love for that to be a focal point.
Thank you all for your time.
And again, Councilor Loretta Smith, thank you for bringing this forward.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Um, could I have a seat to Lori?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Good morning, councilors.
Loretta Smith
For your record, Lori Wimmer representing Northwest Oregon Labor Council.
My written testimony is also in your record.
Uh, I am pleased to testify this morning to the concepts in the resolution to study racial and sex disparities in city contracting and workforce Thank you.
Thank you so much for your participation, and I hope that you will indulge me in a few suggestions to make this study— these studies more robust and relevant.
Jamie Dunphy
We hope that the purpose of your inquiry is to determine whether the city's diverse values are reflected in worker demographics that public dollars buy.
That question's worth asking, though, only if we also want to know not just whether BIPOC and female workers, for example, are able to get A job, but whether they're hired for a good job, meaning family wage job.
Loretta Smith
Such an analysis would not focus solely on a headcount, but rather would look at the types of work diverse communities are able to access.
For this reason, we believe that the studies must determine the earnings and benefits by race and sex as well.
The best way to unearth Councilor Smith.
True earnings opportunity is to look at the contracts let by the city for union participation.
Being a part of a union increases the median wealth of households of color, for example, by up to 228%, and that's according to the Center for American Progress.
Union membership addresses structural inequalities through better wages, benefits, retirement, training, safety, and job If it were up to me, every dollar the city spends would reward these good union contractors who help workers and our communities to thrive.
The study should also examine the owner-to-worker pay ratios of businesses who contract with the city to ensure that Portland is not inadvertently working with businesses that are contributing to the ever-widening pay gap.
It's grown dramatically in recent years.
Top firms have an average of 290 to 1.
CEO to average worker salary, and low-wage firms have an appalling average ratio of 632 to 1.
Jamie Dunphy
Again, it's not just the equity value of letting contracts to women and BIPOC owners that matters.
Loretta Smith
It's also the opportunity for their firm's employees to share in the prosperity their toil generates.
Jamie Dunphy
Too often, that second-level look is not part of the analysis.
Loretta Smith
So thank you very much for considering my ideas.
Happy to take your questions.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Jamie Dunphy
Sure.
Members of Council, thank you for the opportunity to testify today.
For the record, my name is Loren Bulling, and I'm here on behalf of the Ironworkers Local 29.
Diversity, equity, and inclusion for the Ironworkers is fundamental.
On average, our state registered apprenticeship program is between 250 and 300 apprentices, and our numbers hover around 35 to 40% diverse, while our overall membership is 24.5%.
Just for reference, the 2020 census data showed that 83.2% of the state identified as white, non-Hispanic, or Latino.
While we are certainly not perfect, we are doing the work to create a more diverse, skilled, and local workforce.
As Lori mentioned, we are supportive of the proposed disparity study.
However, we also think there are things that could Councilor Green's amendment 1 covers a majority of what we'd like to see, but I think it would also be important to say and look at when a project is done under a PLA or community benefit agreement with enforcement teeth compared to when a project was done under an equity agreement or something without legitimate enforcement teeth.
We really need to make sure that this study shows us which policy tools are more effective at achieving our goals.
Thank you.
The other thing that we would really like to see is workforce diversity, and especially when a contractor is given exemption from labor standards, we often hear that those contractors have a diverse workforce, but we really like to see data that actually shows that is true.
And this is especially important if we want to grow our diverse contractor pool.
As for construction, if you need to get a COBID certification, you must have either the relevant license or relevant work experience to actually get that certification with the city.
The other thing that we would suggest is looking at local academics or researchers to conduct this study.
As nonprofits, they're typically much cheaper.
And I think as well, it's important to note that Prosper's firm only has one person who actually lives in Oregon on their website.
You know, I can't say it enough, but local understanding is really key to ensuring that we get the best data.
The other thing that we would encourage is transparency, and we hope that council will push to make sure that data collection the disparity study now will have long-term effects on how the City of Portland procures future projects.
This needs to be done right to ensure that both workforce and contractor equity are addressed in future policymaking.
And we believe a focus on creating a more diverse workforce is the best way to achieve the goal of fostering a more diverse contractor base as well.
Thank you for your time.
Loretta Smith
Councilmember Herbold.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you very much.
Go right ahead.
Hi, good morning.
Jamie Dunphy
Uh, good morning, President Pirtle-Guiney and Vice President Koyama Lane and members of the council.
Thank you for allowing me to address you today.
For the record, my name is Randall Friesen.
I serve as the executive director of the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council.
We proudly represent over 16,000 construction workers, construction professionals across 22 local unions and 14 of the 15 building trades crafts in the Portland metropolitan Southwest Washington areas.
We are here today to support conducting this disparity study.
This is a vital, necessary tool for gathering the essential evidence-based metrics we need for our local contracting and procurement standards.
A comprehensive study is crucial for 2 key reasons.
It will identify which of our current policies are effective and which are not.
It will also provide critical insights To ensure the study is a success and provides the most valuable data, we respectfully request that the council mandate the inclusion of the following 3 key parameters.
And some we've already covered this morning, so thank you.
Just to reinforce that, we want— we'd like to see that the council uses Portland-specific demographic data.
The study must be conducted using demographic data and certified payroll specific to the city of Portland and the metropolitan area in general.
If you use a broader, like throughout the state of Oregon, it's, it's going to skew the results and it wouldn't be as accurate as it would be for our region.
And we don't want to undermine the study's findings.
Inclusion of all relevant firms.
The study must gather workforce data on all firms, including certified businesses, as Lauren stated, to include DBE COVID firms, etc., and any firms that are currently excluded or exempt from equity goals or specific project labor standards and agreements.
We believe this will provide a more accurate and comprehensive representation of how various policies are working in practice to fulfill our community's economic and equity goals, and how exemption or enforcement of policy relates specifically to the workforce.
That's not necessarily just to the contractor, but the folks they they also hire.
We also want to utilize local-based expertise.
Again, to touch on that note, I think and know that if we used local community-based organizations to do this study using Oregon— State of Oregon, or excuse me, the University of Oregon LERC— they could do a study like this and it would be less money and better results, right?
Or more accurate is what we're looking for.
So the affiliated unions we represent are deeply committed to improving the lives of working people in our communities.
We're very proud of the hard work they have demonstrated in diversifying their membership.
At a time when federal policy related to diversity, equity, inclusion is being challenged, it's worth noting that many of our unions already have a diverse membership that exceeds many of the goals established by agreements like the Regional Workforce Equity Agreement.
A, uh, U of O LURC study reinforces our belief that the union model remains the best choice for achieving sustainable, measurable equity in the workforce, as 55% of BIPOC in union programs had an average wage of $40 or more compared to, uh, just 20% in non-union programs.
Thank you for your time.
I appreciate you all.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you all.
Loretta Smith
Zach.
Jamie Dunphy
All right, good morning, uh, Council.
Thank you, President and members of the council.
Thank you for allowing us time to provide testimony on the disparity study.
My name is Zach Culver, and I'm the business manager for LiUNA Local 737, which is a laborers union representing over 3,000 members across Oregon.
It includes construction craft laborers working in local communities around the state.
For many decades, highly skilled and trained LiUNA members have worked on and continue to build critical projects throughout the Portland area, such as the public library bond, the North Columbia Wastewater Treatment Plant, and Bull Run Facility Filtration Project.
As a member-driven union, our membership and joint labor-management registered apprenticeship program reflect the makeup of our local communities.
Since 2021, The Labor Apprenticeship Program has registered 503 total individuals.
Of those 503 individuals, 47 self-identified as people of color, 21% identified as women.
During that same time period, 94 people of color, 40 females, and 1 non-binary individual have completed our apprenticeship program.
About half of those who registered are still engaged in our apprenticeship program.
Making progress towards completion.
Publicly funded projects that include apprenticeship utilization standards offer our apprentices the opportunity to earn family-sustaining wages and critical on-the-job experience that is necessary to complete their training and advance their careers.
Based on a 2021 University of Oregon Labor and Education Research Center study, the number of females and people of color who enrolled as new apprentices in 2020, had increased by 50% compared to the previous decade.
We believe this important increase in historically unrepresented workers entering the construction field can be attributed to the public policies that have established minimum apprenticeship utilization requirements for certain projects, and in large part to intentional efforts by both unions and contractors investing in state-registered apprenticeship.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Opposed?
Jamie Dunphy
Any abstentions?
Motion passes.
Thank you.
LaUNA encourages local public policies that continue to reinforce and expand their fair opportunity for historically underrepresented workers in our construction industry.
So the laborers want to support and commend the city for considering this contracting disparity study at the current moment.
Should this resolution be adopted, we hope that the resulting findings can reflect the continuing need to prioritize participation of contractors who are invested in BOLI-approved registered apprenticeship programs, supporting advancement opportunities for the next generation of skilled, skilled construction workers.
And I will go ahead and submit these for the record.
Thank you all for your time today.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you very much.
Keelan, do we have additional public testimony?
We have one more testifier.
Corey Stubenrock is joining us online.
Okay, Corey, go right ahead.
Jamie Dunphy
Uh, thank you.
Uh, good morning, President Pirtle-Guiney and Vice President Koyama Lane and members of the council.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify on the thank you, Mayor.
Loretta Smith
I'm here to speak in support of the proposed resolution to study disparities in city contracting and workforce participation.
My name is Corey Stubenrock.
I'm an organizer and proud member of Smart Local 16.
We represent over 2,000 members in Oregon and Southwest Washington and currently 265 state-registered apprentices.
Our apprentices earn while they learn with full family medical and retirement benefits at no cost to them.
Jamie Dunphy
They also receive a college degree when they graduate from our program with no student debt.
Loretta Smith
We pride ourselves on providing families sustaining careers for over 135 years.
More than just a nice story, I'm part of this history of lifting up working people as a proud journeyman with 17 years of sheet metal experience in the field before coming—.
Jamie Dunphy
Becoming an organizer for our union.
Loretta Smith
Diversity, equity, and inclusion are core values for my union because they make us stronger.
As part of our commitment to diversifying our workforce, my union began an intensive program for diverse apprentices that empowers them to succeed by partnering with— partnering with successful members— by partnering them with successful members and mentors who share their lived experiences.
The program allows small cohorts to advance through our program together with an active and conscientious commitment to their success from fellow members and employers.
We have already seen great success and are working to grow the program so that more historically underrepresented people can join our trade.
Jamie Dunphy
Reevaluating the way that workforce development is done is crucial to meeting the needs of our diversifying workforce.
Loretta Smith
That is why our union has partnered at the national level with the tutress childcare options that SMART is providing for our members.
I know that programs like this make the difference in being able to follow a career path in construction.
I detailed the impact of the childcare crisis on workers in the construction industry during Trades Women Build Nations in 2023 when I spoke to over 4,000 women in construction about my personal experience.
Jamie Dunphy
Despite my love for the craft and dedication to my union, I had to briefly step away from sheet metal due to challenges I faced finding adequate, affordable, and accessible childcare.
Loretta Smith
Women are underrepresented— are an underrepresented part of the construction trades and contracting industry.
Let's make sure that this study not only looks at one facet of an intersectional issue, but instead also addresses women in the trades and how we can continue to make these career pathways a viable and attractive option for women.
Jamie Dunphy
The choices you make today will have long-term effects on the workforce that the City of Portland has available for future projects.
Loretta Smith
The decision that you make needs to be the right one to ensure that both workforce and contractor equity are addressed for the future.
Without my union, without my union, I would not be a tradeswoman.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Please do not do anything that would close the door for those that come after me.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you for your time.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you very much.
Thank you to all of you for testifying today, lending your support, and also bringing your suggestions.
We do have another item on the agenda.
We have an agenda after this that we'll need a solid hour to get through because we have amendments to that item as well.
Um, I want to see what we can do right now as we move into discussion, but I want to note that we do need to close our work on this item at noon.
So we have 2 amendments before us.
Um, Councilor Smith's amendment, I think everybody now has in writing.
And Councilor Green's amendment, which is posted online.
Councilor Kanal, you are in the queue.
Go right ahead.
Jamie Dunphy
This is a, a question.
Are we, are we all on the same page about that the track changes are from the same starting point for each of these 2 amendments?
Because I know there was a question around that, and I'm a little confused if anyone's done the compare versions yet.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I believe that Councilor Green's amendments with One or 2 small exceptions fit the tracked changes that are on Councilor Smith's amendments.
So for example, if you look at the therefore be it resolved in Councilor Green's version, he is amending from resolved clauses or therefore clauses that begin with that the and not directs or requests.
There are a few small differences that, I believe Haley has caught for us, but for the most part, Councilor Green's amend the amendment brought by Councilor Smith, not the underlying.
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, just the blue text is what I'm amending to whatever Councilor Smith is bringing forward here in these red lines.
And that's— that works with the crosswalk.
So if I were to take this, accept all changes, that would be what you started with?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yeah, correct.
With a few exceptions that I think we should let Haley note.
There are exceptions.
One exception is in the now therefore section.
Councilor Smith's version says that there— now therefore be it resolved by the Portland City Council Labor and Workforce Committee requests.
I don't know from a legal technical perspective if we can change the now therefore clause to specify a committee over council.
So that was one flag.
And then the last difference that I caught was in the resolved section.
In Green's version, there is a piece that says— let me pull up this other— Councilor Green's version notes that there will be a presentation to first the Labor and Workforce Development.
So this would be 5 in Green's version.
5.
5 says findings and recommendations would be presented first to Labor and Workforce Development Committee and then to entire council.
In Councilor Smith's version, the presentation is solely to the Labor and Workforce Committee.
Jamie Dunphy
Okay, uh, and then have either of these been formally moved?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Nothing has been formally moved.
Jamie Dunphy
Okay, that's— thanks for my clarifications.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilors, would either of you like to move your amendments so that we can move— right now we are in debate on the underlying resolution.
Councilor Smith?
Loretta Smith
I'd like to move, um, my amendment to the original resolution.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Second.
Okay, I heard Councilor Ryan second.
Uh, Councilor Green, are you in the queue to discuss the amendment?
Jamie Dunphy
Yes, I would just like to offer that my changes in blue That are posted just be folded in as a friendly amendment to your amendment so we don't have to take it up separately.
Loretta Smith
Exactly.
I accept it.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, so we are now looking at a combined ver— well, actually, let's go to the seconder.
Councilor Ryan, do you accept?
Absolutely, yes.
Okay, so councilors, we are now in debate for a combined version that includes both sets of amendments.
Councilor Knoll, to the amendments.
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, though I support these broadly, I had 2 questions and a comment.
So the— I didn't— I'm still not 100% clear why each of the 2 whereas clauses that were removed were removed, or 3, sorry, whereas clauses in this amendment.
It seemed to me that this was helpful context and helped sort of advance the argument.
So I wanted to know why.
And it's— these are the— Councilor Dan Ryan.
First one on whereas equitable access to contracting opportunities, whereas, and then the ones that kind of cross the page gap there, whereas the city's efforts to combat, and whereas in December 2024.
Loretta Smith
We were trying to be a little bit more concise.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Jamie Dunphy
Um, and then the other piece of it is, I, and, and Haley just mentioned this, I, I don't, I would not support now therefore be it resolved that the Labor and Workforce Committee requests the is an action that the whole council would be taking, and I'd want it to be clear that that's the case.
I don't have a problem with changing it elsewhere, um, to where the reports go, but just that, that header, um, I think it's— it narrows the scope of what we're, what we're asking for.
And I'm also not sure if there is a legal question, but even if not—.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
I do think that on the therefore be it resolved part once the council takes this action, it won't be the Labor and Workforce Committee requesting this.
It will technically be the full council requesting it.
So I'm not sure legally what that means about what we need to say there.
Colleagues, I am next in the queue for debate.
I appreciate both of these amendments being brought forward.
I am generally supportive of where both are going, but I wanted to note a few things.
I have a few, one concern and a few things that I would love us to consider either adding separately or as a part of this amendment package.
Unlike my colleague, Councilor Knoll, I actually do have a concern with stating that the report will be brought back to the Labor and Workforce Committees.
Committees are by nature a subgroup of council.
So by saying a report will be brought back to council, I think we could refer that to to a committee for consideration first instead.
We don't know next year what our committees will look like.
We have had robust discussions about having different committees.
This committee could be folded in with other work.
It could be the same work but have a different name.
And I think that it would be much cleaner for us to just talk about reports coming back to Council or perhaps saying Council or the relevant Council committee rather than calling something out by name.
Thank you.
I wanted to note that.
I also want to note that I think where in the green additions to the amendment, number 4, we say that the studies analyze impacts of project labor agreements or community benefit agreements, we should also add, or the Regional Workforce Equity Act.
We have a very strong specific agreement that we are party to at the city, and I think that we should compare other work to that agreement that we've often raised as a gold standard in the community.
I wonder if the councilors would be interested in accepting that.
And the third thing that I wanted to suggest— again, this could be a friendly to this amendment, or I could bring it separately— is the idea that after 4, we add a new 5.
And I apologize to do this on the fly, um, which would say That we analyze earnings of workers by race and gender under projects of the city contracted with those agreements, the agreements above, project labor agreements, community benefit agreements, and the Regional Workforce Equity Act, as compared to projects of the city that are not contracted for under those agreements.
I know that was 3 things.
I apologize.
Um, point of information, you said that was going to be—.
Loretta Smith
You're going to make it number 5?
Because I see that there are already 5.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
There would be a new 5 because it's related to 4, and the current 5 would move to a 6 if we were to do that.
Loretta Smith
Got it.
Madam President, I like everything that you said up to that point because I'm not sure if that's the same thing that we're trying to solve for on your 5th point.
I think that's a whole different ball of wax.
And I think your other suggestions are right on, spot on.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The first 2.
Loretta Smith
The first 3.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Um, adding Regional Workforce Equity Act, changing from the named committee to Portland City Council.
Loretta Smith
Exactly.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Or an appropriate committee.
Loretta Smith
Exactly.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
And but you did not like, um, you did not—.
Loretta Smith
I think that last one is something a little bit different from the disparity and I'm— where's— did you understand that?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I—.
Loretta Smith
From—.
Jamie Dunphy
To my understanding, it is going— getting down to the actual outcomes of the study.
Sounds good.
Loretta Smith
So would that help?
The last— I heard some things in there that I wasn't quite sure of.
Jamie Dunphy
Ultimately, quite frankly, ultimately the study is supposed to be somewhat neutral binding research technique.
That technique can take into account comparisons, but we can draw those comparisons based upon the data that we have internally.
But it's basically a very vanilla study to basically ask questions and to identify those participants as well.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Jamie Dunphy
And then from those outcomes, we then develop policy and actions.
So the resolution is guidance, but it should not get into the operationalization So that's why I was concerned about that last— Sorry, I didn't mean to sound like a procurement wonk, but—.
Loretta Smith
No, no, no, you're not sounding like— I'm just trying to— it hit me in a way that I didn't— I think that's outside of what we're trying to do.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
But the third piece—.
Jamie Dunphy
But I will say this, Council President, that there is specifically carved out a workforce element to the study.
And in that study, we can say, identify markers that will definitely address your concerns.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So the third piece wouldn't direct how the study was done, but would just note that we needed to have that workforce piece in the study and that specifically that workforce piece needed to analyze the difference in workforce, Earnings and benefits.
So the earnings and benefits of workers by race and gender on projects that were contracted through a project labor agreement, community benefit agreement, or Regional Workforce Equity Act, as opposed to projects that were contracted in other methods.
Loretta Smith
Right.
And I don't think that that deals with the disparities.
I think that is going underneath the hood on on how minority contractors pay their folks versus non-minority contractors who have bigger contracts.
I think we're just getting into— it's not dealing with the disparity.
We need to understand the top-line disparity within the contracts that we do.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So I want to keep us moving.
What I'm hearing is that the first 2, adding Regional Workforce Equity Act to number 4, and anywhere where we call out a committee name—.
At City Council.
Striking the committee name and saying Portland City Council or a relevant committee.
Loretta Smith
Exactly.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
That those would be friendly to you?
Loretta Smith
Yes, ma'am.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor Ryan, would those be friendly to you?
Yes.
Councilor Green, you're now a part of this too.
Would those be friendly?
It would be, yes.
Colleagues, I'm happy to get that in writing to you if somebody can send me a version of this electronically, or if that is straightforward enough that we don't need it in writing, that's fine as well.
Does anybody want that in writing, those 2 things?
Loretta Smith
And I sent it to you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yeah, perfect.
Okay, I'll work on that.
Councilor Novick?
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, I just had a couple of questions.
Questions.
Um, one, I just wanted to ask staff, do Councilor Green's amendments cause any heartburn for you in terms of adding to cost and timing?
In terms of research, the breadth of it, it could, it could potentially impact, impact the group, the group study.
Yes.
Hmm.
Uh, okay.
How long would it take to figure out the extent to which it might I will have to engage with, engage with the parties involved in order to be— to roll that out and see how much it costs.
It could be very insignificant, but the execution of it, the outcomes could be, could, could be a challenge at times.
Okay, thank you.
And also, I just have to say I'm confused looking at the— we talked about going back from March to December, but looking at the current version that I see online and written I don't see any reference to either March or December.
So is that deliberate?
We're no longer putting in a specific deadline?
Loretta Smith
I'm looking for it.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
This is the version, uh, that Councilor Smith's office circulated.
And so in the resolve section, uh, it says upon completion in what is now the number 5 the March 1st date was stricken, but we can add back something as well.
So colleagues, what Hayley has up is the amended with Councilor Green's rolled into it, I believe.
That is correct.
And you're working on rolling in the 2 things that were accepted as friendly that I raised.
Is that correct?
Yes, the number 4 has the RWIA piece added, and then the number 5 reflects the change where it now says studies to City Council or a relevant committee.
To Councilor Novick's question, there is no date currently.
It just says shall be presented upon completion.
Correct.
Councilor Novick, did you have additional questions?
Okay, Councilor Ryan.
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, um, I just have a question for you, Councilor Smith.
I wasn't involved in the details of this, but listening to the testimony, we heard, um, that we wanted to look at wages for women and, and people of color, and I couldn't tell if this is now included in this, uh, resolution.
I'm con— and I'm confused why not.
Loretta Smith
Looking for the wages, because we're looking for the disparity first.
That is what we're paying for.
Jamie Dunphy
We're looking for the disparity just in who's employed but not what they're making.
Loretta Smith
Exactly.
I think if we want to add additional things like this, that we should— I mean, it's going to take additional money.
I, I believe to do that analysis of all the salaries and all of that, that's a whole different ball game.
And I think it's getting into other people's work.
I think they— if they— I think if it's something that people want, if contractors want it, they can, they can pay for that.
What we need for our executive order is how are women and people of color despaired in our contracting.
Jamie Dunphy
Now, I get that with the, the owners and such, but, you know, we got into a lot of workforce conversations, which is the value added, in my opinion, on where we're going, because that's always been what has been omitted.
And we're not going to really get to the heart of the matter about the apprentice.
Loretta Smith
Part of the matter is who's getting contracted.
That's Yes.
That's the top line.
That's what we need to deal with because the issue is COVID firms and women-owned and minority businesses are not being contracted at the same rate.
There are several sub-levels that I would like to go under, you know, in terms of how many contractors use their wives for fronts.
I mean, that, that part, I mean, it's getting into some of those things.
We have to deal with the disparity.
Let's just see that show minority and women are being disparate.
Jamie Dunphy
I'm clearly glad I daylighted this because you're pretty passionate about the conversation, just like—.
Loretta Smith
I've been dealing with this for, for over 20 years.
Jamie Dunphy
That's why I wanted to get under the hood and talk to you about it.
Loretta Smith
Right.
I think we need to do that in something else when we have a little bit more money.
Yeah, we don't have enough money for all that.
Jamie Dunphy
Well, I'm just really glad that you lifted the workforce that was here, and then that made me want to ask these concrete questions, because this is the— this is the biggest tool we have in equity in our city.
This is our biggest impact we can do for equity in our region, is this legislation.
So I just want to make sure—.
The struggle is real.
It took some time to have this conversation.
Thank you, Councilor.
That's not a friendly conversation or amendment to add at this time.
Loretta Smith
Uh-uh.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
One could raise that after we vote on this amendment if one wanted to.
Yes, sir.
I don't know that we'd have time for that today.
Jamie Dunphy
Why don't we do that?
For sure, 'cause then we're getting to the heart of the matter of this conversation of equity.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor Morillo.
Thank you.
So it sounds like we're not gonna have time to fully finalize this today.
And I'm asking because I really appreciated what some of the folks who came up to testify said about making sure that we're using local academics to look at some of these studies.
And I guess I would push back and I would say that I think it is important to see not just who we're contracting with, but also how their employees are treated and the positions that they're getting at the city.
Because I know me and Dan Ryan are agreeing.
Can we memorialize today?
I do.
But I think I understand what you're saying is that there has to be a narrow scope, and maybe this is a separate issue to look into, but I think the consistent issue that we also have at the city is that we are looking at the people at the top and what they're getting and not what the employees who are and I worry about, you know, I think that making sure that we get an analysis on the positions, pay, and benefits of women and people of color at the city so that we can see, are they actually getting into managerial positions?
Are they in director positions?
Are they only ever doing different types of work?
You know, I think all of that is really important to this.
Thank you.
So I would approve those types of amendments, but I don't have language at the top of the amendment.
Loretta Smith
Yeah, we can look at that.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilors, I wanna make a suggestion because we are over time and I know that we have a few other things we need to get done this morning still.
I'd like to suggest that we limit debate just to anything else we need to say on this amendment, vote on this amendment as amended, Hayley had, had it up on the screen.
Yes.
And then there's a fair amount of additional work that it sounds like folks want to do.
That's work that is more often done at a committee level, but we had some things brought to us today that were not brought forward in committee.
I think we can finish that work at full council.
I don't think we need to send it back to committee, but I would suggest that we then entertain a motion to hold this over to an additional meeting to take some of these other topics that are not directly related to the amendment before us.
Loretta Smith
Madam, point of order.
So are you saying we need to take a vote if we're going to approve this first?
I am.
I would like to— we can take this at an additional meeting, but we need to take it back to the labor.
If, if that's what you all want, let's take it into my committee and have a deeper conversation about it.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I think we could do that at committee or at council I would entertain either motion, but I would suggest that we vote on this amendment that's on the table open to correspondence.
Loretta Smith
Yes, ma'am, I agree with you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So seeing no one else in the queue, Keelan, could you please call the roll on the now amended amendment brought forward by Councilor Smith with changes from Councilor Green and myself, which Haley has up before us and which I believe the clerk has a copy of?
Jamie Dunphy
I think we need to be able to see what we're talking about because we, we can't scroll with her.
Loretta Smith
Right.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, Hayley, could you slowly—.
Jamie Dunphy
It's been a mess since minute 1.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
That it has.
Could you slowly scroll through so folks can see this?
Yes, and I can also just abbreviate.
So there was a title change.
The first whereas in the original resolution was struck.
The term the mayor was removed from the executive order piece here.
New strategies included as part of this.
Whereas statement, the bulk of the rest of the original remains the same until we get to the end of the whereas statements, where the final two whereases are now stricken as well.
And yep, okay.
Jamie Dunphy
The two parts that are being oh you want to read the stricken part?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Got it.
Loretta Smith
Okay.
Back to my committee.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, because I'm okay with either.
I just don't think we can get through all the conversation today.
I know, it's a mess.
And thank you, Haley.
Okay, folks are ready.
Let's keep scrolling.
And then I did, uh, correct in the now therefore section where it now just reads Portland City Council rather than Portland City Council Labor Workforce Committee per our legal advisement.
I'm rather confused.
I had 2 friendly amendments accepted.
My quick scan earlier was that they were, but if we're going to— One of the changes was in number 4 right here, addition of RWIA.
And then the second change that I took up was the, uh, resorting this back to a presentation to City Council or a relevant committee.
I think we may have missed one or two of the places where it called out a committee, but if we're going to take this up another day, I'm happy to bring a specific redlined version for those other ones.
And those are namely just at the bottom here and here where it just states that the Labor and Workforce Development Committee acknowledges the funding piece and then is going to be supporting the request.
So I can revert those if that's preferred.
Please.
Loretta Smith
Yeah, point of information, those are both going back to City Council to say City Council.
Jamie Dunphy
Okay.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Uh, we were about to vote, but we now have 2 hands up.
Let's— okay, Councilor Novick, is yours for after the vote?
Jamie Dunphy
Uh, no, it's before.
I just want to be a broken record.
I just want to verify that staff said that, um, some of these amendments, including the ones that I certainly agree with in concept, like setting the impact of project labor agreements might affect the timing and the cost of the studies.
That is correct.
It can definitely impact if we won't— we don't engage with the previously negotiated contractor.
It could adversely affect the timeline, not by months, it may be over a year.
I mean, the timeline, given that we don't have a deadline, maybe is not as relevant, but I am worried about the cost as well.
The cost can be significantly more.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I think that response— was that response though to adding Regional Workforce Equity Act?
No, that is to—.
Some of the other concerns that were raised that we've not yet incorporated.
Jamie Dunphy
I think that we can have a conversation with those parties and come to some sort of understanding about the necessity and need.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, colleagues, we really need to move to a vote.
Councilor Dunphy.
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, I just want to note that I think we're missing adjectives in this.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yeah, we will have an opportunity to make further amendments.
Okay, so—.
Councilor Clark.
Just a question about that.
We will— it'll come back, and we can also talk about LERC and what the role of LERC might be here, that they may be able to either, you know, work with the contractor.
Okay, let's vote on what's before us.
Okay, Keelan, could you please call the roll on the now amended amendment which is before us, which Haley has the official copy of?
Jamie Dunphy
Clark?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
Green?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Zimmerman?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Avalos?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Dunphy?
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Smith?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Knoll?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Ryan?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Koyama Lane?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Nay.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The amendment is approved with 11 yes votes and 1 no vote.
Okay.
Councilor Kanal.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you, Madam President.
I'm looking forward to getting the opportunity to work on this a little bit more, including the, the point that Councilor Dunphy just raised, including the whereas clauses and some of the things things that Councilor Clark and others have mentioned as well.
Um, it is clear we're not going to be able to do that in this council today, and given the advice from Councilor Smith on where to take it, I move to refer this back to the Labor and Workforce Development Committee.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
No, unless you'd like to second that, Councilor.
Loretta Smith
I'm not seconding it.
I want this to be approved, and we can talk about that other stuff on another amendment.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Your amendment was just approved, Councilor.
Loretta Smith
So what are we sending back to?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The now amended version so that these other topics can be discussed.
Loretta Smith
So, so we're not passing it as a go, we are bringing it back to committee.
I thought we were bringing back the other issues in a different, in a different resolution.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor, what I'm hearing is that there's a lot of interest in discussing other amendments, and we are 15 minutes over when I had said we needed to move on to the next agenda item.
So what I would like us to do, what I thought that I was asking you a moment ago, was would you prefer to take up some of those other discussions before we pass the final in committee or at a future council meeting?
Loretta Smith
It wasn't clear on me until after you— after we took the vote.
So no, I didn't understand what you were saying.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Loretta Smith
I think if we're going to do something, and this is the problem, I just found out about this No, listen to me.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor Kanal just made an amendment.
Loretta Smith
I know, but I'm trying to get a point of order.
Point of order.
I just got this, and I did a friendly amendment to Councilor Green because I thought it was good for this, for this resolution.
And now people are not wanting to do it, and you're trying to bring it back to my committee when we should just pass it so we can get this stuff done.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor, we don't have the time to take up all of the discussion that I hear our colleagues wanting to take up today.
So I can hold this over to another council date, or we can send it back to committee for more work.
I am happy to do either of those, but I don't think that we have the time to get through all of the discussion folks want to have.
Loretta Smith
Send it to another council date.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Jamie Dunphy
I'll withdraw the motion.
I misunderstood.
Loretta Smith
Sorry.
Yeah, so you misunderstood what?
So he misunderstood.
So we can take the vote.
Jamie Dunphy
No, no, no, I, that— I'm just withdrawing the motion to refer it back to committee.
I'll let everybody else determine what happens next.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So colleagues, I am going to hold this over to a future council date.
Um, we will bring it back as quickly as possible so that we can continue this discussion.
If everybody who has brought up other ideas can please bring amendments Prefiled to that meeting.
I think that would be very helpful.
If stakeholders have other things you've brought up that you want us to consider, please find an advocate on council to work with and get that in writing before this comes back to full council so that when it next comes back, we can do straightforward work and get it passed.
Keelan, do you need anything else for us to formally hold this over and move to the next agenda item?
Okay.
Could you please call the next agenda item?
Item 7, adopt the Portland Urban Forest Plan to improve public health, build resilience to climate change, and promote environmental justice.
Okay, thank you.
Colleagues, we were in the middle of debate on this item when we ended a previous meeting, and We had, I believe, 2 open sets of amendments.
I believe we had adopted some of Councilor Dunphy's amendments and had other amendments open.
And I believe we also have a Novick amendment open.
So Councilor Dunphy, could you please start by letting us know which of your amendments are open and giving us a brief overview of what they do so we know where we're starting?
Absolutely.
Jamie Dunphy
My remaining 5 amendments that are on the table are in 2 chunks.
I have Dunphy Amendments 1, 2, and 3 as a package, and Dunphy Amendments 6 and 7 as a package.
Dunphy Amendment 1, 2, and 3 would specifically— Dunphy Amendment 1 talks about completing a funding plan for ramping up annual project completion goals, prioritizing low-income, low- yes.
And then Amendment 3 adds that the pilot project will be focused on creating more shade residential neighborhoods, reporting annually starting in November of '27 on locations, funding strategies, innovation, district-level key performance indicators.
Dunphy 2 simply adds ensuring that at least one pilot area of the pilot project is included in District 1 for the street tree maintenance program.
And Dunphy Amendment 3 adds the phrase phased to prioritize low-income and low-canopy areas as it pertains to street tree maintenance program.
Colleagues, you also note that in the official documents on the file, we have received specific feedback from Public Works about this.
They have across the board said that these are minor and can be accommodated.
And so that is Dunphy Package 1, which incorporates amendments 1, 2, and 3, and I would move those as an amendment.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, do we— I believe these were already open and moved in second.
I think you're right.
So those are on the table.
Um, these are all the Dunphys.
There's Dunphy 1 through 3.
We have Dunphy 6 and 7 open as a package, and then we have Novick.
Um, I believe yours is one amendment with 3 things in it.
Jamie Dunphy
Should I Let's explain 6 and 7 also really quick.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yes, quickly detail 6 and 7, please.
Jamie Dunphy
6, 7.
Dunphy Amendment 6 is specific to their performance measures and includes requesting specifically, adds 3 words, by council district.
This is to specifically give us a report about how these performance measures are being used or the plans for going into it broken out by district.
And Dunphy Amendment 7 creates a new cross-bureau team to propose potential permanent funding mechanisms to council.
And those would be together as well.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, thank you.
And Councilor Novick, please remind folks your amendments.
Jamie Dunphy
Yes, actually I had 2.
One is to Action Item 2-3, And I'm going to pass them out now.
Item 2-3 would take the— I mean, the amendment to Item 2-3 of the recommendations would take the current language, fund and implement a comprehensive citywide street tree maintenance program by November 2027, establish a plan for the city to assume legal and financial responsibility for street trees.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Etc., and replace that with sustainably fund and implement— replace that with the language that was originally in the plan that came to committee.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Jamie Dunphy
And make it sustainably fund and implement a comprehensive citywide street tree maintenance program to reduce financial burdens for Portlanders, improve the health and safety of the city's street trees, and support habitat connectivity.
I note that Councilor Dunphy and I are both proposing amendments to this section.
I, if we're voting in his first, I would vote for his 'cause I think it's better than what we have now.
But then I would move to revert to the original language.
And my concern here is that although the Portland Clean Energy Fund is already paying for the first 5 years of a program to take over street tree maintenance, I— the Clean Energy Fund moves in 5-year investment plans.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
5-Year.
Jamie Dunphy
And I personally am concerned about the idea that taking— although I think it would be great if the city could take over the burden of maintaining street trees, I do not want to presume that for the foreseeable future, taking over the burden of street trees from people in rich areas is more important than anything else we might do with Clean Energy Fund money.
And to the argument I've heard from some people that, well, it doesn't say the Clean Energy Fund, my response is, or where the heck else is the money going to come from?
On item 2.4, I would replace the current language, identify financing strategies that include new funding sources, cost-saving measures, and other ways to improve pedestrian accessibility and reduce costs to property owners for repairing sidewalks damaged by trees, and by 2028, develop a plan for how the city could assume legal and financial responsibility for street tree-related sidewalk repairs that takes into account blah, blah, blah.
I would replace that with the original language in the plan, which was simply identify financing strategies, cost-saving measures, and other ways to improve pedestrian accessibility and reduce costs to property owners for repairing sidewalks damaged by trees.
And again, I think that ideally the city should be paying to address damage to sidewalks caused by trees.
But in a context where we have a transportation system that is woefully underfunded, where we have our streets literally falling apart and no current plan to fix them, I am concerned about language that to me implies that we are assuming that the city is going to assume legal and financial responsibility for sidewalk repairs.
And I realize the language doesn't say definitively, yes, we will, but I'm not comfortable saying we should develop a plan for it until we've decided we're going to do that.
Councilor And I think that such a decision should be preceded by a debate about other priorities.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
So we had these 3 packages on the table when we left before.
In the order we were planning to take them, we were going to do them in that order, Dunphy 1 through 3, Dunphy 6 through 7, and then Novick 1 and 2.
So I would like to move us to discussion on Dunphy 1 through 3.
Councilor Otto.
I see that you're in the queue.
Were you in the queue on a different piece or on a broader topic?
Jamie Dunphy
I was going to make a comment about Councilor Novick's amendments.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Can we do them one section at a time so that we can keep our comments cohesive?
Thank you.
Is there any discussion on Dunphy 1 through 3?
I'm going to give folks a moment because I know we're warming back up on this topic.
I'll note while we take a moment that we had originally intended to end this meeting by 1 o'clock so that we could have a half an hour break and start our work session at 1:30.
I think in order to complete this work, we will need a little more time.
I hope we can finish this by 1:15.
We are gonna go until 1:15.
If anybody needs a break, please just take it on your own time so we can get through this.
We will then break from 1:15 to 1:45. to give everybody a half-hour lunch break.
We will start our next work, our work session 15 minutes late.
And Acting Administrator Biery is going to somehow figure out how to shave 15 minutes off.
Thank you for the thumbs up before I said this out loud that you would try to do this.
I appreciate it.
Councilor Ryan, I stalled enough.
Jamie Dunphy
That's okay.
Thank you, Madam President.
Councilor Dunphy, I've read your amendments and we've had a lot of conversations about this.
Obviously it was in the committee and I'm looking out at the urban forestry staff and I think what I thought is, I thought they were already planning to do these things that you're mentioning.
So I guess I'm confused on, you're nodding your heads.
There is a—.
Why are these necessary?
You know, there's a lot of plans that the city has where in the body it talks about prioritizing district parks.
District 1, East Portland, low-income areas, low shade, all these sort of things.
I'm trying to be explicit about it in the individual notes.
I will just mention that, for example, PCEF dollars throughout the entire program explicitly say that they are prioritizing low-income areas of the city and heat islands.
But if you look at the actual dollar breakdown of where dollars are being invested, we are about 50% of compared to Districts 2 or 3.
So I want to be explicit wherever possible.
Absolutely, I fully believe that the urban forest plan will address this and the work generally will be guided by these principles.
I just want to be explicit about it in every situation that I think is relevant.
Okay, I'm glad we are having this conversation.
And I've been listening to urban forestry for a minute, and I always hear them talk about everything that you just said.
So it's almost like we're getting a friendly amendment from the city.
Okay, ladies and gentlemen, they're all going like this.
All right, thank you.
I guess that's all I need to talk about.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Green?
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, I just wanted to say briefly I support these amendments, uh, because I think it's— it is important to be explicit about, um, where we want to make our investments with priority.
Uh, it is unequivocally hotter on the east side of Portland.
Just a fact.
And it's also the same reason I supported SIP, where we were being very explicit on sidewalk prioritization that affects District 4.
I think it's also fair to say District 1 is in sore need of infrastructure called trees.
So that's why I'm supporting this today, guys.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Colleagues, is there any further debate on Dunphy 1 through 3?
Okay, seeing none, Keelan, could you please call the roll?
Loretta Smith
Clark?
No.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Green?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Zimmerman?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Avalos?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Dunphy?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Smith?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Ryan?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Koyama Lane?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Murillo?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Novick.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Pirtle-Guiney.
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The amendment is approved with 10 yes votes and 1 no vote.
Thank you very much.
Councilor Dunphy, could you, you actually, you overviewed amendments 6 through 7 for us.
So colleagues, I would like us to take up any discussion or debate on Dunphy 6 through 7.
Eric Zimmerman
I'd just like them separated.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thanks.
That was a motion to separate?
Yep.
Okay, Councilor, would you like us to take 6 first or 7 first?
6, Please.
Okay, can you remind us what it is?
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, uh, 6 amends the performance measures on page 71 to include a district-level lens for all performance measures.
It specifically adds 3 words, um, by council district.
This aligns with some of the work that is already going on in the Bureau about investments across the city.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Zimmerman.
Jamie Dunphy
Thanks.
I appreciate separating them.
I have definitely appreciated the memo I received from the Parks and Public Works section.
My reason for separating is I do have concern around Dumphy 7.
In the response that I got from the Parks Bureau, really I respected what they had to say about maybe not putting themselves in the position to develop that funding strategy.
And I really value that they brought that up.
In the competing interests of city priorities, I think it best if we stop having smaller groups try and say this is the method, because all that ends up doing is having methods that are competing and not looking at the whole picture.
Because if your job is to serve— solve this one problem, I think you view it with a certain lens.
So I'm likely leaning toward a no vote on Dumphy 7.
While I understand his point, I do appreciate the Parks Bureau memo on this and their thinking about why it wasn't included originally.
Thanks, Councilor Dumphy.
Thank you, Councilor.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Colleagues, is there any discussion to Dunphy 6, which is the amendment before us on the table?
Okay, Keelan, could you please call the roll on Dunphy 6?
Loretta Smith
Clark?
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Green?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Zimmerman?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Avalos?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Dunphy?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Smith?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
No.
The amendment is approved with 10 yes votes and 1 no vote.
Thank you, colleagues.
We now have Dunphy 7 before us.
Is there any discussion on Dunphy 7?
Eric Zimmerman
Ditto to Councilor Zimmerman's comments.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
You know, I had some notes written out.
I'm next in the queue, but honestly, my concerns are quite similar as well, so I will just put myself in that category too.
Any other discussion on Dunphy 7?
Councilor Dunphy?
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, I was wondering if, uh, uh, CFO Beery might be willing to speak about the financial plan for this and the concerns specifically here?
I'm sorry, Councilor, I'm just not— For number 7, we are asking to convene a new cross-bureau workgroup on the financial plan for this.
There were some specific concerns about who's the right person?
And this puts it in CFO's position.
And so there was concern about whether or not that's the right position, whether there's an expense, whether that is something that is— Yeah, I guess I would just say, Councilor, I'm not prepared to talk about what those costs may be.
Certainly happy to accept that if that's the will of Council and take that forward.
You know, we do have a lot of things going on at the city, and this will certainly compete for those limited resources.
But that's something I'm willing to accept and take forward as effectively as we can.
And colleagues, I hear the concern for sure, and this is not a hill I'm gonna die on.
I'm still gonna vote for it, but, you know, vote however you wanna see.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Any other discussion on Dunphy 7?
Okay, seeing none, let's move to a vote.
Loretta Smith
Clark?
No.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Green?
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Zimmerman?
Eric Zimmerman
Nope.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Avalos?
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Dunphy?
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Smith?
Kanal?
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Ryan?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
No.
Koyama Lane?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Morillo?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Novick?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
No.
Pirtle-Guiney?
No.
The amendment fails with 6 yes votes and 5 no votes.
Thank you, Keelan.
Councilor Dunphy, thank you for bringing forward all of those proposals.
Councilor Novick, we have your amendment number 1 on the table, which amends action item 2.3.
Is there any discussion to Novick 1?
Councilor Avalos.
Yeah, we kind of ended the last meeting on this note, and I had had a couple of comments about it.
Jamie Dunphy
Back then.
It looks like this hasn't changed from the last time, right?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So these amendments are exactly the same as they were proposed last time, yes?
Jamie Dunphy
I actually thought that one of them has changed, and I forget, to be honest, which one it is.
I can't remember whether I had alternate language for 2.3 or 2.4.
So what you have in writing is the I would look at both of them.
For sure.
Loretta Smith
I think still the general gist here for me is, I'll speak to.
Jamie Dunphy
So first I'll say that we talked about this a little bit last time, but a plan would be non-binding as it's currently written.
I know that we had some discussion with, you know, staff about it, but I remember that being one of the outcomes of that question.
And I understand why people are concerned about committing the city to anything that we don't feel that we have funding for, especially as we're staring down another brutal budget.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
But I think the concern that I'm hearing, and I share, by removing this language and therefore the direction to make the plan, is that once we get those costs back, it's gonna actually take longer then to come up with the plan.
So what advocates were trying to communicate is that they feel that we don't wanna unnecessarily delay the construction of the plan.
It's not binding as written.
Thank you.
Jamie Dunphy
And it is, you know, having it constructed in a way that pushes and directs the city to make those plans now can include all of these other financial analyses, and we can have that broader policy and financial discussion.
So I will not be supporting these amendments for that reason, but I just wanted to add, lift up what I was understanding the advocates were saying, 'cause people had asked.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Jamie Dunphy
They had questions about why they didn't support your amendments.
That is why, and that's also why I do not.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So I won't be voting for these.
Jamie Dunphy
Thanks.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Kanal.
Jamie Dunphy
Thank you, Madam President.
I worked with several groups, the staff of PBOT and Parks, to develop this along with the advocates that are being referenced here.
So this amendment, this language.
The, the version that is now original to us today was an amendment that I put forward in committee.
I understand the concern around the idea that the text we currently have might be committing us to effectively doing whatever the plan says, sight unseen.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I—.
Jamie Dunphy
That's not how I read it, but I think it is a legitimate, um, concern.
I also fully agree with Councilor Avalos about the idea that we're both creating an interim step and not thank you.
I had a suggested piece of text because I— it says establish a plan for the city to assume, and that appears to be both the actual text that's being changed here and where the concern actually lives.
It's not fixing text that references other text.
So I wanted to ask Councilor Novick if the— if a phrase such as, for example, develop a plan that would, if implemented, allow the city to assume, would resolve the concern around a establish being very directive in terms and potentially implying that it would be implemented no matter what.
And also by explicitly saying if implemented and putting that would in there, establish that there is a further decision point beyond this decision point for whether or not to I would say that I think that would be preferable to the language now.
However, I would prefer to simply go back to the original language that came to committee after a robust process, which the advocates all said was a good process, and which is more open-ended and says sustainably fund and implement a comprehensive citywide street tree maintenance program to reduce financial burdens for Portlanders, improve the health and safety of the city's street trees, and ensure that the city's and support had with that connectivity.
So I'm a little confused because I'm talking about 2.3 right now, I believe, and my understanding—.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
It was aye.
Jamie Dunphy
That is not the amendment I'm seeing proposed in writing.
I saw the reversion in 2.4.
Um, actually, I thought I did.
I— did you not get— I just, I just passed this out.
Oh, it's right there.
Did not even see that.
Okay, well, Given that, let me say that I am open if these amendments should fail as they currently are with the reversion to something like what I just said, establish a— sorry, develop a plan that would, if implemented, allow the city to assume for both 2-3 and 2-4.
And I do sincerely hope that that is an open conversation because I do hope that these 2 amendments fail as a result of that.
I think I will say that there was a you're right that there was a process that was developed and went through to get to this point.
I also praise the community engagement work that Malcolm Hoover and team, along with, I think it was CELS, did in developing this.
But I also will say that the process to get to these amendments was equally robust in terms of working with advocates, working with PBOT staff in one case, working with Parks and all the cases, and they are the ones who actually wrote this text.
It wasn't coming out of a council office.
It wasn't coming out of the advocates.
It was actually city staff that developed the text that is where we are now.
So I'll be voting no on both of these.
I'm open if they should fail to having a conversation about how to improve it while still retaining the, well, everything Councilor Avalos said, so I won't repeat it.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Green.
Jamie Dunphy
In the interest of time, I'm just going to echo what Councilor Avalos and Councilor Kanal said and say that I will not be supporting these amendments.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Uh, I share Councilor Novick's concerns about tying us to, uh, funding or, uh, legal liability before we're ready to do that.
I also think it is helpful to get plans in advance so that we can make those decisions well.
Councilor Novick, I will be supporting you on your first amendment because I do believe that the language there will get us a plan that we may be somewhat locked into.
I'll note now so that I don't have to speak later that I will not be supporting the second amendment because there what I'm looking at is identifying financing strategies.
Thank you.
But not requiring that we move forward with them.
So I feel comfortable with the language that was changed in committee in the 2.4 section.
Colleagues, is there any other discussion to Novick 1, which amends action item 2.3?
Okay, seeing none, Keelan, could you please call the roll?
Roll call.
Aye.
Green.
Nay.
Zimmerman.
Eric Zimmerman
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Avalos.
Candace Avalos
Nay.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Dunphy.
Loretta Smith
No.
Smith.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Can I— Novick.
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Guiney.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The amendment fails with 5 yes votes and 6 no votes.
Colleagues, is there any discussion on Novick 2, which amends action item 2.4?
Okay, seeing none, Keelan, could you please call the roll?
Clark?
Aye.
Green?
Olivia Clark
No.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Zimmerman?
Aye.
Loretta Smith
Nay.
No.
Jamie Dunphy
No.
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
No.
No.
Mitch Green
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
No.
The amendment fails with 4 yes votes and 7 no votes.
Okay.
Colleagues, is there any discussion to the underlying urban forest plan?
Jamie Dunphy
Councilor Knoll.
So first, let me say that I stand by what I said a few moments ago, and I am still open if there is a desire to address that, to that change, 'cause I don't think that that loses any of the gains that have been made.
Uh, in terms of the, the text that was, in my view, improved in committee.
Um, separately, I, I do think that there— it's worth noting that having property owners bear financial responsibility for street trees and street tree-related sidewalk repairs deepens and furthers inequities.
Um, I think that there is a clear argument that, that, um, accepting a street tree can create a liability for, um, people in lower-income— homeowners in lower- Lower-income neighborhoods because they may not know that they're going to have several thousand dollars around for repairs.
The city has a demographic profile on the website by neighborhood.
You can look at it.
I think it's just neighborhood demographic profiles.
Civic Life, I think, maintains it where you can see a pretty clear correlation.
It's not perfect, but between the level of the percentage of people who live in poverty in each neighborhood.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yeah.
Jamie Dunphy
Inversely to the percentage of tree canopy.
And so there are reasons for that that go in both directions causally as well as coming from a tertiary source.
There are parts of each of those that perpetuate the other inequity is a better way of putting that.
And I'll also note that as you look at these as well, it's just a couple pages higher or lower, That, that also correlates with the percentage of poor owners of color in each of these neighborhoods as well.
So I want to look at options for maintaining our street trees and sidewalks beyond property owners footing the bill.
If a plan that we created allows for the exploration of adjustment by voter approval to any charter amendments, I'm open to that too.
I think that's what the purpose of these amendments are about, is to Is to say, how would you get from here to there?
Identify a potential destination that we're interested in looking at and, and having staff say, what would it take to get there?
And what would it take to do each of the steps along the way?
If one of those steps fails, and sometimes that require— would require an adjustment, sometimes it would require completely giving up on it in the case of a charter restriction.
But that doesn't mean that we shouldn't at least say, hey, if there's a charter restriction, It is theoretically possible to refer something to the ballot to change that charter.
And then if voters agree, then it's a good idea because voters said so.
And I think that we often get a little too stuck in how things already are in this building instead of being willing to trust the voters on it in certain scenarios.
And I think while we have limitations in terms of the funding for how to get there, that's really important.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Laura?
Jamie Dunphy
In the big picture, we can't make a decision without doing first the research.
And I think these improvements that we've already made, getting locked in through approval of the Urban Forest Plan, will help us to do that.
So I'll leave it at that.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Novick.
Jamie Dunphy
I just wanted to say that I very much appreciated the suggestion that Councilor Kanal made earlier on changing language.
And if he wanted to move his proposed change language as an amendment, I would be happy to second.
In addition to that, I'd like to say that I appreciate those of you who have said that despite my concerns about how it might be interpreted, none of this language commits us to do anything.
And as a result of that and the fact that we've had a robust discussion, I am planning to, however it winds up, voting to approve the urban forestry plan as a whole.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Thank you, Councilor.
Colleagues, I put myself in the queue because Councilors Kanal and Novick are bumping this to each other.
And as the person who just said that I don't wanna bind us to anything, but I do want the plans, I will motion that we strike in action item 2/3 the word establish after by November 2027 and insert the language develop a plan that would, if implemented, Plan for the city to assume legal and financial responsibility.
I guess we're, we're crossing out establish a both there.
And replacing it with?
We're crossing out establish a in between November 2027 and plan and replacing it with develop a plan that would, comma, if implemented, comma, and then it continues, plan for the city to assume.
I believe that's what Councilor Kanal said before.
Jamie Dunphy
I actually said all but the last verb there, which was allow.
Develop a plan that would, comma, if implemented, comma, allow the city to assume.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Ah, allow the city to assume.
Okay.
Jamie Dunphy
I'll second that if that's what you're moving.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So colleagues, we have crossed out establish a plan for and replaced it with develop a plan that would, comma, if implemented, comma, allow.
Jamie Dunphy
And that was in both 2.3 and 2.4?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I was doing that just in 2.3.
Steve Novick
I'll second it anyway, but—.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Would you like it in 2.4 also?
I was just trying to move us along here.
Okay, in 2.3, seconded by Councilor Kanal.
Councilor Murillo, are you in the queue for debate?
Yep.
Go right ahead.
Okay, great.
Um, I feel like this is watering down what this proposal was meant to be for when we were talking about it during the climate committee, something that came up is that the city, we are obsessed with making plans to make plans to make plans, and I literally cannot take it anymore.
Are we gonna plant trees and protect our canopy?
And are we committing to that as a value and as a thing that East Portland needs and that all of our districts need?
Are we going to commit to being climate resilient or not?
Because the city has already done numerous studies on our tree canopy and what needs to be done.
So the only question is, are we going to actually put our money where our mouth is and commit to making this work?
And I feel like this amendment further waters it down again to a plan to create a plan.
And I just— unless I can be convinced otherwise that maybe I'm reading this wrong, I think I'm probably going to be a no on this.
Thank you.
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor Avalos?
I'm getting the same read as Councilor Morillo.
Jamie Dunphy
I appreciate the efforts.
I know the intentions, but I think that it is written well as is.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I would like to keep the language, so I will be voting no on this amendment.
Thank you, Councilor.
Colleagues, is there any other discussion on this amendment?
Seeing none, Keelan, could you please call the roll?
Clark.
Aye.
Green.
Olivia Clark
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Sorry, was that aye or nay?
Jamie Dunphy
What do you want it to be?
No, it's, it's aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Zimmerman.
Mitch Green
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Avalos.
Candace Avalos
Nay.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Dunphy.
Jamie Dunphy
No.
Loretta Smith
Smith.
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Loretta Smith
No.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
No.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The amendment is approved with 7 yes votes and 4 no votes.
Colleagues, is there any other discussion to the Urban Forest Plan?
I'm shocked, but— Councilor Ryan, are you raising your hand?
Jamie Dunphy
I just want to thank the Urban Forestry team.
You've been really patient with us.
Can we just acknowledge that?
So thank you for showing up late at night and again late into this meeting.
And I'm hangry, so I should stop right there.
Thanks.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
I think we would all echo the appreciation for our staff who have put this together and beared with us through a few different meetings here, and I think everybody up here has a lot they want to say, but we're trying to move quickly.
Keelan, seeing no one else in the queue, and with apologies to all of the advocates and staff who have put a lot of time in and aren't getting to hear all of the remarks that we prepared, could you please call the roll?
Clark.
Olivia Clark
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Green.
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Zimmerman.
Mitch Green
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Avalos.
Candace Avalos
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Dunphy.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Smith.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Kanal.
Jamie Dunphy
This is on the actual underlying, right?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Correct.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Jamie Dunphy
Yes.
Ryan.
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Koyama Lane.
Aye.
Morillo.
Aye.
Novick.
Angelita Morillo
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Pirtle-Guiney.
Steve Novick
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The resolution as amended is adopted with 11 yes votes.
Thank you, colleagues.
With nothing further on our agenda, we We actually made it by 1 o'clock, so Jonas, you get your full time.
We will be back here at 1:30 to begin our work session, and I will close today's City Council meeting.
Council adjourned.