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.
I am calling to order this meeting of the Civic Life Committee.
It is Tuesday, April 28th at 9:30 PM.
Could you please call the roll?
Good morning.
Keelan McClymont
Ryan?
Dan Ryan
Here.
Keelan McClymont
Murillo?
Angelita Morillo
Here.
Keelan McClymont
Zimmerman?
Eric Zimmerman
Here.
Keelan McClymont
Avalos?
Candace Avalos
Present.
Keelan McClymont
Pirtle-Guiney?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Here.
And Christopher, could we please have you read the statement of conduct?
Shabri Vickers
Welcome to the meeting of the City Life Committee.
Eben Hofer
To testify before this committee in person or virtually, you must sign up in advance on the committee agenda at www.portland.gov/citylife.
Shabri Vickers
Information on engaging with the committee can be found at this link.
Registration for virtual testimony closes 1 hour prior to the meeting.
In-person testifiers must sign up before the agenda item is heard.
Keelan McClymont
If public testimony will be taken on an item, individuals may testify for 3 minutes unless the chair states otherwise.
Your microphone will be muted when your time is over.
The chair preserves order.
Disruptive conduct such as shouting, refusing to conclude your testimony when your time is up, Or interrupting others' testimony or committee deliberations will not be allowed.
If you cause a disruption, a warning will be given.
Further disruption will result in ejection from the meeting.
Anyone who fails to leave once ejected is subject to arrest for trespass.
Additionally, the committee may take a short recess and reconvene virtually.
Your testimony should address the matter being considered.
When testifying, state your name for the record.
Dan Ryan
If you're a lobbyist, identify the organization you represent.
Virtual testifiers should unmute themselves when the clerk calls your name.
Shabri Vickers
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Colleagues, I want to take a moment before we jump into the agenda because today is an important day, a somber day for many members of the community.
April 28th is Workers Memorial Day.
It is a day when working people pause and reflect on lives that were lost at work, on the job over the past year.
And given that our committee's jurisdiction includes our workforce, our labor unions.
I think it's important to recognize that day here.
Over the past year, 37 Oregonians died on the job.
Let's think about that for a moment.
No child should go to bed thinking their parent is just going to work, only to wake up and find out that they are never coming home.
No job No work, no way to pay the bills should cost anyone in our community their life.
Workers Memorial Day is a somber day, but it's also a day where elected leaders like ourselves commit to making changes that ensure our policies keep workplaces safe in our community, and where we ask employers to make changes that ensure the jobs they provide in their workplaces are safe ones.
Thank you.
And it's easy in the 21st century with developed workers' compensation systems and protections in our most hazardous industries well enshrined in our code to assume that our work is done.
But for 37 Oregonians this last year, that work was not done.
And while I don't have the exact number of how many of those Oregonians were Portlanders, that number is not zero.
And as long as that number is not zero, the list is too long.
So today, across the river in our city, in Salem at the state capitol, people will read that list of names, recognize those individuals whose lives were lost.
And I hope that we can also take a moment to think about what we can do to make work safer in our community here.
Thank you.
Thank you for giving me that moment.
Okay, why don't we read the first item on the agenda?
Thank you.
Item number 1, document number 2026-145, public input on commu— on City Life Committee topics.
No one signed up.
Okay.
I want to remind anybody listening to our committee today that we will have this time set aside at every meeting.
If you have things you want to make sure our committee hears about, work related to the topics before this committee that you would like to bring up, things that have not been on our agenda, please take advantage of this time.
You are always welcome to sign up and bring items to our attention that we might not otherwise prioritize putting on the agenda.
Uh, why don't you go ahead and read item number 2?
Thank you.
Item number 2, document number 2026-146, Prosper Portland Overview.
Thank you, colleagues.
We have a presentation today from Prosper Portland.
There has been a lot of conversation on our council about the work that Prosper does, and we have had many opportunities to hear about individual programs or the budget, but we have not always heard holistically about how the work fits together.
Prosper Portland plays a significant role in how we deploy our tax increment financing tool, but also in how we as a city approach economic development more broadly.
And we've invited Prosper to be here today to share a little bit.
Um, you are, Cornell, what, 8 months into the job now?
8 months.
8 months into the job, to share a little bit, 8 months into having a new director at Prosper Portland, about their, uh, vision for economic development in our city, how that fits with the tools they have, how that fits with the work that we do on council and the vision that we are starting to present for economic development in our city, um, and what some of the changes are that have happened over the So welcome, Director and Chabri, and I will turn it over to the two of you.
We have a short presentation and then time for questions.
Is that right?
Cornel Westland
That's correct.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Perfect.
Go right ahead.
Cornel Westland
Well, as mentioned, my name is Cornel Westland.
I'm joined by my colleague, Director of Equity Policy and Communications Chabri Vickers.
Chair Pirtle-Guiney, Vice Chair Zimmerman, and committee members, my— once again, I proudly serve as the Executive Director of Prosper Portland.
I'm joined here by other colleagues in the audience as well, who are also experts in their lane.
So thank you for the invitation to share a high-level overview of Prosper Portland, including more detail on our governance structure and programs.
Now, because we have limited time, we welcome questions and any opportunity to return to share information in greater detail.
Now, before I turn it over to Chabri, I want to share a bit of my perspective on Prosper Portland and our work.
Thank you.
Now, as you all know, and as has already been mentioned, I'm still relatively new to Portland.
But since my arrival, I've spent my time meeting public, private, and nonprofit leaders across the city.
I've heard what people believe Prosper does right and what we can do better.
The comments I've heard again and again include how important it is to focus on economic development, to support local small businesses, and create opportunities for businesses large and small to thrive.
And I will say that this shared desire to support businesses throughout the city aligns with my vision for Prosper Portland and its work.
And so I commit to you and I submit to you that we will bring all the tools available to bear, meaning we will continue to provide a full range of loan and grant products we have in our portfolio.
And it means continue to work alongside our bureau partners.
Invest resources in key priority infrastructure and housing projects, and lead with our industry expertise.
We will also thrive and strive to be as nimble and responsive as possible.
And we know that business's success is a critical element of Portland's vitality and absolutely essential component to tax revenue stability and growth for the general fund.
And to that end, We will actively pursue opportunities and create an environment where business success, neighborhood vibrancy, and community resilience are aligned.
I'm committed— my committed team and I are eager to collaborate with each of you on behalf of the city.
Now I'll turn it over to Shabri.
Shabri Vickers
Good morning, councilors.
For the record, I'm Shabri Vickers, Director of Equity Policy and Communications at Prosper Portland, as has already been stated.
Chair Pirtle-Guiney, Vice Chair Zimmerman, and Thank you, Council Chair.
Good afternoon, committee members.
I will address the origins of the evolution of Prosper Portland, and for the sake of time, we will go very quickly through 50 years of history.
I do want to address this before we go into the history of the agency, though.
As a third-generation Portlander and as someone who's raised my daughter here in Portland, I am painfully and personally aware of the racist actions taken by public and private organizations to literally remove local Black families from the community, the and the organizations and opportunities they enjoyed in North and Northeast Portland in the '50s, '60s, and '70s.
So moving with purpose through this presentation is not in any way an attempt to minimize the harm done to hundreds and hundreds of families like mine.
We acknowledge the history, and in fact, the state— we state in our agency's equity statement that we hold ourselves accountable because we understand that we must continuously learn from our history.
Thank you.
So we must use this history, however, to inform how we create and support real opportunity and truly equitable outcomes.
So it's what we've done over the past 10-plus years that I'm proud of, and the steps that many of my colleagues have taken on this important journey.
So the history of Prosper Portland, like most development authorities in the United States, has its roots in FDR's administration and the Federal Housing Act of 1937.
In 1941, the Portland City Council Council created the Housing Authority of Portland, now known as Home Forward, to build public housing.
And the Housing Authority contracted with the Planning Commission to create an urban renewal sector.
This work was later codified by the state through ORS 457, which to this day still governs development work across our state.
And in 1958, Mayor Terry Schrunk and council referred a ballot measure to the voters to create the Portland Development Commission.
In an effort to address one of the slowest growing municipalities in the western US.
So the ballot measure passed and the Portland Development Commission was codified under Portland City Charter Chapter 15.
PDC's dual task was urban renewal under state law and civic promotion under the charter.
So hundreds of urban development authorities were created nationally around the same time.
And most use the term blight in their statutes to characterize urban renewal eligibility for federal funding, a term and concept that evokes devastating and absolutely outdated practices of large-scale neighborhood demolition and racist planning policies that impacted generations of Portlanders, particularly many Black Portlanders, Jewish Portlanders, and others across our city.
Like 49 other states in the district and the District of Columbia, in 1960, Oregon state voters granted development agencies with tax increment financing authority.
Nationally and locally, TIF was primarily used as a local match to majority federally financed development.
And in the 1980s, when the federal income tax began a long, steep decline, Portland began to rely more and more heavily on TIF to fund all major municipal projects.
Next slide.
So you'll notice that our timeline jumps from 1960 to the early 2000s.
And even though a variety of factors changed PDC's work, I'll note that there were no specific changes over that period of time to statute— to the statute or city charter changing PDC's governance.
Or authority.
In the early 2000s, the city and region began adopting policies emphasizing urban growth, primarily through infrastructure and transit-oriented development.
Now, following significant investments in infrastructure, for example, the MAX light rail, the Eastside Esplanade, the aerial tram, and the streetcar, City Council for the first time established an affordable housing set-aside policy in 2006 at 30%.
Recognizing affordable housing as a key feature of economic mobility and critical to preventing displacement.
In 2007, as a recommendation of the Charters Commission and their 10-year review, Portland voters changed Chapter 15 of the city charter granting Council Budget Committee approval over PDC's annual budget.
And as a response to the mortgage crisis and recession from 2008, Mayor Sam Adams and City Council established the Housing Bureau and transferred affordable housing functions to this new bureau.
Now, in 2015, City Council really increased the set-aside for affordable housing to 45% following a periodic review of this policy.
And in 2017, PDC changed its name to Prosper Portland.
This was done to reflect and align with the agency's shift towards more inclusive economic development.
And in 2018, we began our co-creation model, with Culley TIF being the first district with this shift in strategy.
Which brings us to where we are today, recently creating the 6 new TIF districts in 2024, which are now underway in their co-creation process.
Thank you.
We'll go to the next slide, please.
So a variety of structures exist for conducting economic and urban development in local governments across the United States, and they stem from needs of different communities as well as legislative history and unique revenue restrictions.
We can generalize these into 3 entity types, the first being city government offices, departments or bureaus, and many cities have an office or a full department dedicated to economic or community development work.
And these departments can range from a staff of 1 to 250.
Comparing city departments is challenging due to the vast differences, differences in functions and the ongoing reorganizing of these functions based on changing political leadership.
Another type is economic and/or development authorities that are legally separate City-created entities considered semi-autonomous in, in that they are often counted as a component unit for the sake of city financing, but are legally separate with separate board oversight.
The board is often appointed or confirmed by City Council.
And then last, there are independent organizations or families of organizations which serve as the city's economic and/or development agencies.
Typically public benefit 501s and are created to fulfill economic and redevelopment priorities on behalf of municipalities.
And sometimes those are done contractually.
So Prosper Portland's model is not unique, and a clearer legal separation from the city government is considered a best practice in many municipalities.
In Austin, one of our peer cities in Advance Portland, the city council created a separate entity in 2020.
The Austin Economic Development Corporation, doing business as Rally Austin, to augment the city's work based on national best practices in Atlanta, Philadelphia, and New York.
Next slide.
Candace Avalos
Oh.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
While you're changing slides, we've got a quick question.
Dan Ryan
Just a quick question.
Shabri Vickers
Certainly.
Dan Ryan
Hi, Shabri.
Could you go back to the last slide?
So did we— I can't remember the year now, the earlier slide.
Did we move from independent development organization to economic and/or development authority?
Shabri Vickers
So we're the Economic and Development Authority, and the history that I shared really moved us through that space.
The independent development organization is very different.
Dan Ryan
We never were that?
Cornel Westland
Nope.
Dan Ryan
Okay.
I thought by one of the votes that you mentioned, and when we got into the budget and such, we moved into that middle space.
Shabri Vickers
Yeah, so we are in that middle space, and that happened.
Candace Avalos
Yep.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay.
Dan Ryan
I know that we're in the middle space now, but we weren't always in the middle space?
That's what I'm trying to get at.
Or did we, when we took that action of the earlier slides, did we move from more of an independent entity, you all, to this?
Shabri Vickers
No, we've always been in the middle.
Thomas Lanham
Yep.
Dan Ryan
Okay, there's some urban legend that that's what happened.
And so that's why I wanted to clarify that.
Shabri Vickers
Oh, yes.
Dan Ryan
Thank you.
Yeah, thank you.
And I could see why people think that based on some of the actions that took place.
Shabri Vickers
Got it.
Candace Avalos
Yeah.
Shabri Vickers
Is there another question?
Okay, I'll continue and we look forward obviously to any other questions.
Dan Ryan
Yeah, thank you.
I needed to do that clarifying question.
Shabri Vickers
No problem.
Thank you.
Um, so when the legislature adopted ORS 457, it authorized urban renewal agencies in every city and county pending activation by each city or county.
ORS 457 says that the agency may be activated in only one of 3 ways.
The City of Portland chose to have its urban renewal agency governed by a separate volunteer board of commissioners each nominated by the mayor and confirmed by council.
In addition to confirming our commissioners, City Council may engage in partnership and oversight by providing policy direction to Prosper Portland by adopting legislation, by acting as Prosper Portland's budget committee during the annual budget process, and the city auditor manages annual financial audits and conducts other performance audits.
Candace Avalos
Next slide.
Shabri Vickers
So in the same way TIF is not unique to Oregon or the West Coast, having an arm's length between City Council and an economic development agency that the city helps fund is also not unique to Portland.
Cities historically have sought to create separation in an effort to enable more nimble organizations that work on a multi-year, long-run projects We hold specific expertise in financing, leveraging public and private resources, and we are able to maintain flexibility in operation.
And so Portland's model is intentional and foundational in its effectiveness.
It aligns with the established governance practices in complex urban economies and is a strategic asset to the city.
Now, across jurisdictions, structural separation enables faster transaction execution, typically access to specialized expertise, long-term redevelopment stability, credibility with private capital markets, and clear accountability frameworks without political intervention.
Maintaining the structure preserves Portland's ability to compete for investment and support small businesses and to deliver equitable economic outcomes while retaining appropriate public oversight and accountability.
What we also know, and I think what's most important and likely what you've heard us say here at the dais, is how we take this theory of change that takes TIF as a patient capital, long-term capital that, you know, can take up to 30 years, and our economic development programs that are available across the city.
What we know is TIF is only available in 15% of the city.
It can only take up up to 15% of the assessed value and the acreage in any city.
So the remaining the remaining 85% of the city is supported via our economic development programs.
And those in connection and in concert with TIF are what we call our theory of change.
So really being able to stabilize communities first, support small businesses, really look at ways to support them through TA or other mechanisms to then truly be able to take advantage of an additional economic or financial tool like TIF.
Thank you.
I'm going to transition here back to Cornell, and obviously we are open to any of your questions throughout this process.
Cornel Westland
So we can go to the next slide.
I believe we're ready for that.
So much of this information will be familiar to you since our team provided an overview of our business lines during the April 21st Prosper Portland budget hearing.
But we wanted to include this information here as well with a focus on governance and how we work closely with the City Council to sure we are delivering the best programs to Portland's businesses and communities.
Now, as a reminder, Prosper Portland primarily has 2 areas in which we provide business support.
Those 2 areas are development and investment.
This is our lending and real estate-focused work.
And economic development.
This is more focused towards business development and support for revenue-generating activities to help our city.
And at its core, All of our business lines have one focus: equitable economic development.
Whether that is supporting tenant improvements or perhaps helping folks with their first investment in their business or supporting the many great events and films coming to the city, our teams are focused on providing the best products to Portlanders to help everyone thrive.
All right, I believe we can go to the next slide.
So I'm going to take a little bit of point of I'm going to use my own personal privilege and describe this a little differently than what my notes would say.
So view development and investment and economic development as drivers.
All right.
And within that driver's seat, there's obviously seats as well as vehicle types.
And in the development and investment vehicle, there are— well, driver, there are several vehicles.
One of those vehicles is business retention and expansion.
And within business retention and expansion, there are seats, and those seats are the programs.
Like Portland Means Progress, like the Enterprise Zone abatement, like trade sector initiatives and film navigation, like regional economic development partnerships.
Those are the seats embedded in the vehicle of business retention and expansion.
Then you have small business support programs, and those seats consist of things like Mercatus and My People's Market, Inclusive Business Resource Network, the very popular program, Events, Navigation, and Activations.
Office of Small Business.
The Reimagine Oregon.
And so again, we have this driver of economic development.
We have this vehicle, vehicle of business retention, and it has its own seats.
We have the vehicle of small business programs.
It has its own seats.
And then of course, workforce development.
And our workforce partnership with Work Systems has resulted in about 1,700 annual participants and community-based navigation to connect Portlanders with job opportunities.
And the training.
Across program offers, PROSPER's unique agency structure allows it to benefit from a credible connecting role between the public and private sector, staffed with direct small business experience and legal and procurement processes that are geared to business and real estate development processes.
So again, repeating where we are from this one driver, economic development, we have the vehicles within it.
And then you have these appropriate seats that are the programs that accomplish the particular goals.
Next slide.
Was that the last slide?
Oh, I guess that's the last slide.
All right.
Well, happy to entertain questions.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Was there anything else you wanted to add without a slide first?
Cornel Westland
Yeah, well, we can touch a little bit on the development and investment vehicle as well.
Right.
Embedded in it are other vehicles like access to capital.
And access to capital is where you'll find the business finance loans.
You'll find commercial property loans.
You'll find the ever-popular PIP grant, Property Investment Program.
You'll find the CLG grant, Community Livability Grant.
You'll find the PSEF-funded grants embedded in the vehicle of access to capital under the driver of investment.
Second vehicle found there is equitable development.
Embedded there are going to be the TIF district action plans, the land acquisition and disposition, infrastructure investments, public and private partnerships are all within that vehicle.
And then finally, small business leasing and asset management is also extremely important.
That's where affordable commercial teneting presents itself.
That's where the leasing and asset management resources present themselves.
And I think that puts a button on both of the major lanes, the drivers, the vehicles, and the seats within those vehicles to accomplish those goals.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Great.
Thank you both very much for the overview and the history.
Councilor Avalos, would you like to start off questions?
Candace Avalos
Yeah, thank you for your time.
I have a couple of questions.
I'll start with some East Portland ones, and then I want to talk about governance.
And we'll— I'll have you go to slide 6 for that.
But let's start with this.
Can you talk to me a little bit about how Prosper is thinking about commercial corridor development in areas like East Portland versus the central city?
This is something I've talked a lot about over the last year, just feeling like the materials that get produced about the strategies, it always feels like, you know, East Portland isn't, in my opinion, viewed in a strategic way.
And so I kind of just want to hear how you all are seeing your, again, commercial corridor development in East Portland versus Central City?
Cornel Westland
Yeah, well, uniquely, we own assets in East Portland.
And so we're gonna start with what we can control first and foremost, because that's the, in my view, the lowest hanging fruit.
And so there's opportunities to partner with the developers and there's opportunities for us to incite a behavior that currently doesn't exist.
For example, we are engaged in conversations with a developer around the parking lot that we own next to the Oregon Clinic.
These are things that are being ideated from a development perspective.
And so our team has their hands in the dirt and are fielding calls daily around the assets that, quite candidly, we control and what can we influence.
So now let's talk about the influence piece.
We all know the big animal is—.
Eric Zimmerman
The state.
Cornel Westland
You know, the Fred Meyer, right?
And that massive of a site.
How we ideate in partnership with private enterprises is going to be extremely important to how we incite the behavior we want to see.
So here's a question, or rather a potential solution.
Like on that site, I've heard you say and your team say you want to see housing on that site.
Well, how do we spur housing to take place under its current zoning structure?
We can't.
So in order for us to do those sorts of things, That kind of presents the opportunity for us to work closer together because there's something you can do for us to support us in order to incite the behavior we want to see.
So when we talk about the strategy, again, globally speaking, the lowest hanging fruit is controlling what you have and then crafting resources and/or tools to incite the behavior you want, as evidenced by the grocery store recruitment fund that we're deploying there.
Those are the sorts of things that we're going to have to do more intentionally.
Shabri Vickers
And I'd add, when you think about the Neighborhood Prosperity Network work that has happened over the past decade, we've seen so much capacity growing within those communities well before these TIF districts even came.
And I think what we saw through the co-creation model was communities having recognized the benefit of what these dollars could do and the benefit of making the decisions themselves.
And how they wanted to see that come in next.
So when you think about J.R. Lilly and the folks who on the East Side kept— continued to say, please consider TIF here, they continued to bring the conversation to the council at the time, which then invested the million dollars towards the actual exploration process that we did.
And so when you think about what happened in the Jade District and what happens with DMA and Leisha and the folks who have been leading those efforts, our work with Rosewood Initiative and many others in these commercial corridors have aligned with the work that we're doing because they understand the tool so much better than they had in the past.
And so for us, it has been about first relationship building, building that trust and awareness of who the community members are, and having the small businesses understand what some of these programs and projects look like so that when we look at something like TIF, there is a deeper awareness of what that actual information— or excuse me, what that actual tool can be.
And so what I'm excited about when you talk about East Portland is the co-creation model that really is coming to a forefront there in a way that it didn't in North and Northeast Portland at the time.
We know what's happened in Cully.
We know, you know about some of that work as well because of your leadership and community.
And so what I'm excited about is our CLC models that are baked into the TIF plans and the expanded opportunity we have as well with our strategic investment fund that allows us to do exactly what Director Wesley just talked about, really take those dollars and be able to listen to community and invest in a way that is centered around what their goals are and what their efforts are already, because there are so many community organizations that have been established and have been doing this work amongst community members, and how can we amplify and support that work in alignment with the commercial corridor efforts that are already there?
Cornel Westland
I just want to add one thing because it's— I think as I've given you the illustration of driver, vehicle, seats, I'm going to stay in that vein and say it's important to note that the seating capacity of each vehicle can increase or decrease based upon the resources available to us.
And so if we want to be able to do more, we got to put more seats in the vehicle as well.
Otherwise, we're going to have to manage our expectations on what we are reasonably able to accomplish given the resources that are available to us.
But uniquely, East Portland has some great things going about it, some resources available to it, and we aim to be impactful with them.
Candace Avalos
Thank you.
Can you put up slide 6 real quick?
I have some questions on that.
Um, while that gets put up, so this, you know, you laid out several of the strengths of, um, Prosper's independent structure, including, you know, nimbleness and long-term planning capacity, flexibility across the different financing tools and partnerships.
At the same time, there's growing public conversation about accountability and alignment with council priorities.
So how does Prosper think about balancing these 2 realities?
And maybe just for time, I'll throw in one other thing for you to noodle on, which is, you know, as we are transitioning into this new form of government, what are some of the internal conversations that are happening at Prosper as it relates to your current governance structure and if that's still the right fit for this moment?
And just broadly, how you're seeing the relationship to council evolve under this new government in a way that preserves that flexibility and effectiveness that you talk about, but also strengthens public accountability and alignment?
Thank you.
Cornel Westland
Yes, that's a great question.
So accountability and alignment with this council under these new conditions, new form of government, new everything, right?
And new executive director and new city administrator and new mayor, all a lot of new things happening.
And so that just requires foundationally a level of intentionality and moving towards transparency, which is a word you've heard me say a lot.
So one of the first things we did was we put it all online.
Every dollar, everything that we— that touches Prosper via our financial compendium that has been shared with each and every one of you is to just put it all out there so there's no confusion on the work plan, how the work is accomplished, how the work is resourced.
So that's one of the first things we can do is be more transparent, not only with the council but with the public, which is why this resource is also publicly available.
And then, you know, this is first year, right?
And so it's going to require this— quite candidly, this is the relationship business— us to work closer with you, us to hear from you directly when things are going well and when things aren't.
Meaning we got to hear when things are going good as well and what you want to see more of.
Great example of that was one of the meetings we had together around the grocery store.
Those sorts of things are what Prosper Portland is best positioned to do because we can respond in real time to the concerns that you raise.
So I think that's one of the things that's additive about its nimbleness and this current structure is that its responsiveness is unlike the bureaucratic processes that often gets us bogged down in debate.
And so what I can submit to you and commit to you that we'll continue to be transparent, we'll continue to be intentional and, and, and wanting relationships with each councilor, we'll continue to support your efforts and leverage our resources in a way that allows you to go back to your constituencies and say that you've accomplished something, and Prosper did not stand in the way.
It was additive to that.
Shabri Vickers
And what I'd add to that is our recent INI report, our Insights and Indicator report, that we've actually just recently hand-delivered to you all last week.
Uh, this, uh, last year's report I actually handed to you all January when you first started, um, directly as we did our opening onboarding.
I know you all had like 90 onboarding meetings at the time, and so it was just another 160-page document that was handed to you.
But what I would submit is that, that, um, uh, that document, this, uh, production that our team has been putting together, is the first time that you've been able to see a literal list of who's getting the grants, who are getting the loans, where they are across the city.
This most recent iteration of it, because of our new council structure, actually delineates by council district.
Mm-hmm.
And so you are able to see where these grants and loans and programs and products are actually being deployed.
And you can ask questions about those things.
We can hone in on those things.
And of course, our board being a public board is yet another space where community has to come and offer public comment, ask questions of our board.
Again, they are volunteer experts in their fields who spend the time with us and we believe that that is an extended opportunity for community not only to come to you and share your priorities, but for you to continue to share your priorities with our board, which is why you saw them here with you all last week to both understand and take insight and perspective and guidance from you all and use that as we look at our overall structure around Advance Portland.
And I would just lift up Advance Portland obviously was put together after a year and a half of engagement across community.
It actually happened as I stepped out from community and came into Prosper Portland.
So as a business leader, I served in helping support what that plan should look like, the 5-year plan should look like.
And now my team helps to engage the community on an ongoing basis in what that looks like.
So you can go to advanceportland.com and look at every single meeting.
You can see the minutes, you can literally see what we've done and what we've reported, including all of our highlights and any of our actions that have actually taken place.
And the community and you all get to thank you.
Candace Avalos
I appreciate your time, and I'll just say I appreciate your partnership.
Definitely, you know, my questions are really around just trying to ensure that East Portlanders feel like they're part of your strategy, that they are included in developing that.
The CLCs are a really big step in creating more of a relationship with community and prospering the decisions we make with our investments.
So I appreciate that.
Thank you.
But I think I'm looking forward to some further discussion this year about the relationship between PROSPER and council, because I do think there are still some valid underlying questions that community has about how accountability looks and how your execution of city council's priorities looks.
So I'll leave it at that, but thank you for your time.
Eric Zimmerman
Thank you.
Shabri Vickers
And thank you for focusing on East Portland.
As someone who lives on 119th, I appreciate your efforts.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
And for folks who are in the room for the second item on the agenda, we are going to begin that item probably in about 20 minutes.
Councilor Ryan, go right ahead.
Dan Ryan
Thank you, Chair.
First of all, good morning.
Cornel Westland
Good morning.
Dan Ryan
Thanks for being here, Cornell and Shabri.
I really appreciate the history.
I think we all needed that.
I think it hasn't been shared too often that it started in 1958.
With a vote, an actual vote from the public.
I've never had that shared with me, and I've been on the council for 5 and a half years, so I appreciate that.
I also think that 2007, when the city council became involved in the budget, was a big milestone moment.
And that's what I was getting at, that I think you all were more independent prior to that.
And I've heard that just from being out there in the working world and now and then tracking what was going on at City Hall.
So that's what I was trying to make a point about.
Thank you.
So maybe we were always in that middle space, but we became more in that middle space perhaps after that vote.
And then the birth of the Housing Bureau.
A lot of people don't know it hasn't been around that long, and it started in 2009.
So thank you.
That's very grounding.
We needed that.
I thought your big picture— and just so you know, when you moved away from your notes and you looked up like this, my colleagues stopped doing this and we all did that with you.
So let's have more of that at meetings.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yes, sir.
Dan Ryan
Your vehicles and seats, that was, I'm gonna kind of go along with that.
I'll say that first of all, it takes energy and resources to move those vehicles, correct?
Cornel Westland
That's correct.
Dan Ryan
Yeah, otherwise they just kind of sit there.
Cornel Westland
That's right.
Dan Ryan
Okay.
And my, I think when you first got this position, I was, of course, I'm always trying to pick your brain about what it was like to do this.
I'm gonna screw up.
Cornel Westland
Birmingham.
Dan Ryan
All right, I was gonna say Birmingham.
I'm like, don't say Montgomery.
I think it's Birmingham.
So I always want to like understand what it was like to do this job there and how to do it here.
Mm-hmm.
From where I sit at a much higher elevation, therefore I don't have the details, sometimes it seems like there are a lot of vehicles and you're only so big and Portland's in an economic crisis right now.
Mm-hmm.
And I don't know if we're having the dialogue about the urgency of this economic crisis Mm-hmm.
And you're it.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Mm-hmm.
Cornel Westland
Yes, sir.
Dan Ryan
So are there certain vehicles that you think would be more beneficial at this time to start generating more funds for the revenue for the general fund, which come from business license taxes?
Cornel Westland
That list is long, sir.
Um, but let's start with—.
Dan Ryan
Traffic jam when we have too many vehicles.
Well, just thought I would add that on while you give this answer.
Cornel Westland
Traffic jam, too many vehicles.
So I'll start internal first, 'cause I think there's a moment that we are in as an organization that we had to look inward and had to think about efficiencies within the organization to improve upon our services.
To your point, do we have too many seats or too many vehicles or too many seats in said vehicle?
So over the last 8 months, what we've done is established a new CRM tool that should be fully implemented hopefully in the 3rd quarter of this year.
Dan Ryan
CRM?
Cornel Westland
Commercial relationship management tool, software tool that allows us allows us to communicate across the enterprise, track impact in real time, and be able to communicate to you per council district, per census tract, what is happening within the enterprise externally as well.
And so another transparency tool, but also an efficiency for our organization.
We also improved our HR tools as well.
You know, uniquely Prosper was doing performance reviews on paper.
That's going away.
Grants audit— we needed to understand how effective our grants are and we're excited about being able to, you know, purview those results in the short term.
We did a lending department assessment, which is currently underway.
Are we getting the return, whether that's measured by profit coming back to our strategic investment fund or community benefit going back to our community?
We're evaluating everything to best answer, do we have the right vehicles?
Do we need to change a vehicle?
Do we need to create something new?
One of the things that happened prior to my arrival was the acknowledgment that there was a missing vehicle in the Office of Small Business.
Now moves to the second part of this question is the first thing we have to do is do no harm, meaning we have some great things we need to invest in what we have before we can determine what, what's missing.
So what is working is Office of Small Business.
What is working is IBRN.
What is working are some of those other seats that I illuminated earlier in the conversation.
So I don't want those to go away.
There is space for more targeted efforts to challenge, or rather address, the unique conditions we're operating in.
Now, the real question is, is what's Prosper's role in that?
We're not a tax authority, right?
So do— we can't engage in that way.
We're not Business Oregon, so we can't engage in an incentive discussion in that way.
So our best effort around supercharging our local economy is going to be in partnership with you and in partnership with the county.
What can we do collaboratively to provide some day-one relief for small business owners?
And I can give you—.
Dan Ryan
Let's— can I ask a question?
Please.
You softballed me even though you didn't know it.
Cornel Westland
No, go ahead.
Dan Ryan
So I've been obviously a champion, I think, on this council that's been supported by all for the most part about the storefronts, which is the small business network.
And I want to thank I think that was a missing— is that a vehicle or a seat?
Cornel Westland
It's a seat.
Dan Ryan
In what vehicle?
Cornel Westland
In economic development.
Dan Ryan
All right, that makes sense.
So anyway, that seat, I'm really glad you have that seat.
I think it should be a really big seat.
And I think it is urgently responding to the fact that we have for lease signs all over the city.
We have flat business license taxes.
And although I support the mayor's initiative in this upcoming budget proposal, about incentives for new businesses.
If we don't listen to those businesses that have tried to survive, most of them not making any money, most of them going into almost bankruptcy to survive because they love the independence of being a small business owner.
They're innovators, they're creatives.
That's why I love my hometown is because we've always attracted ambitious innovators and creative people, and they want to do their own thing, which is to be a small business owner.
Yeah.
Small business owner, and a lot of them have barely been hanging on the last 10 years.
And so I hope to God that we give them support and that this— these supports aren't just for new.
Cornel Westland
That's correct.
Dan Ryan
Are you in those types of dialogues?
Cornel Westland
Absolutely.
It's not just about new.
The first— the first thing you have to do in recovery is protect what you have.
Dan Ryan
There you go.
Cornel Westland
Um, and so that's where our focus and our efforts are, is right-sizing all of our existing businesses before we even enter into the conversation of recruitment.
We are still in recovery, and that's something we have to consistently call out.
The strategy is maintain, protect, support, invest in what you have.
Shabri Vickers
And I'd also say we, we learn from them.
And so when you think about folks who serve on our CLC or folks who serve on many of our committees, even as we consider what lending products we have, what those lending products need to look like, and what efforts we have with those, Those small business owners are on those committees with us.
Those small business owners are on our board.
These people make decisions alongside us and we co-create alongside them.
Dan Ryan
Sorry, it sounds like the ice cream delivery is here.
Yeah, yeah, it's a phone alarm.
Probably everyone over there is looking.
It's like, why is everyone looking over that way?
Sorry, Chabri, you were interrupted by that beautiful jingle.
Shabri Vickers
It's okay.
I think it's probably my other phone, so I apologize.
Dan Ryan
All right.
That makes it funny.
We all could use some fun around here.
Shabri Vickers
I'm so sorry.
Dan Ryan
I want to tell you that in this budget process, I will be trying to make sure that I see that efficiency with Mitch and his really good team.
I've really been delighted.
It's been delightful to meet them.
It's great to see them with groups like Bricks Meet Mortar.
And I just have one more question, Chair, and that is about I think we all know I'm quite a big supporter of that.
Why am I a supporter?
Because it's a major contributor to our economy.
Yes, sir.
It's also something that's organic, literally, to Oregon.
But way before it was legal, everyone knew that.
Many people said it was our number one cash crop.
And when timber went away, it became weed, whether we like it or not.
That's what was happening here in Oregon.
Great soil for it.
And I'm telling you, I don't think government's done a very good job of figuring out how to take advantage of that.
Eben Hofer
And so I think that's something that we need to think about.
Dan Ryan
So locally we have the regional cannabis tax and the city has empowered Prosper to manage that.
Is that correct?
Like a lot of the revenues, we give you some energy resources to run that vehicle.
Shabri Vickers
The recreational cannabis tax.
Dan Ryan
Or that person in the vehicle.
Shabri Vickers
Yeah, we, so the recreational cannabis tax supports many of our programs, in particular in our economic development side.
And then we also have the grant, the Reimagine Oregon Economic Opportunity Investment Fund.
Candace Avalos
Yep.
Dan Ryan
And you know, they, they really have a tough business model because, because they're cash only.
Their amount of vandalism and crime is higher than other storefronts because of that, I think.
And whether it's a storefront or a warehouse, they've all shared really gut-wrenching stories about how difficult it's been to survive in Portland.
And they all complain about this tax because they want to understand— I see somebody out there It's a person in that vehicle that I had a meeting with at one of the warehouses.
That's you, right?
I can't remember your first name right now.
Anyway, so I know that you have some efforts going on, but I do need to ask, give some more examples of how that tax is going to them, but also explain to me when it doesn't go back to the cannabis industry, but it goes to things like the night market, how I can explain to the disgruntled storefronts and warehouses, that the night markets, which I think are lovely, how supporting that with cannabis funds benefits them.
They're asking.
And so I'm here as a liaison for them to ask that question.
Shabri Vickers
Yeah, so I'd start and then please, Director Wesley, anything that I've missed here.
So, you know, when we think about recreational cannabis tax, the fact that we've been able to— there are 3 ways that it can be used.
One is through drug and alcohol treatment.
The other is through fire and police efforts.
And then the third is through economic development.
And so Prosper Portland, long before the Reimagine Oregon investment grant started, has been able to use that with IBRN.
And so we have IBRN partners, specifically our new project partner, who has been able to work with and aligned in support of the industry, which is—.
Dan Ryan
Can you explain the acronym IBRA?
Shabri Vickers
Inclusive Business Resource Network.
Yeah, so it is one of our most popular, um, programs and seat in a vehicle that is economic development.
That's right.
Um, and the recreational cannabis tax, uh, dollars, again, with those, uh, kind of limitations around what they can be used for, uh, we've been able to, to really move them through our IBRN partners and those like new projects and, and others.
And when we think about Reimagine Oregon, Reimagine Oregon came out of the advocacy from communities who had been disproportionately impacted by cannabis prohibition writ large.
They asked to have those dollars invested into communities specifically to increase economic opportunity, recognizing that communities who don't have access to equitable economic opportunity have been impacted by the prohibition especially.
And so we've been able to take those dollars and turn them back into the community.
Thank you.
Right back around directly to small businesses and to nonprofits that help increase the economic opportunity across our city.
And they do that through— I'll lift up one program who has helped support small, what they call mom-and-pop providers, babysitters who move to— you can just turn that off.
Sorry, um, clearly it was important for me to be here today.
And so, um, uh, forgive me.
So we have, uh, many different grantees who have specifically, uh, moved to support small businesses who are, um, who consider themselves babysitters but who want to become providers so they can draw down on things like Preschool for All.
So we've been able to support small businesses who need to add sprinklers to their, uh, their space so that they can actually—.
Dan Ryan
Revenue from those who are working in our storefront cannabis and also our warehouses.
Shabri Vickers
Yes, and they go to support it.
Dan Ryan
You have this answer now?
If not, I'll take it offline and share with my colleagues.
What percentage goes back to directly to the cannabis industry in Portland who pays more taxes than the rest of the state?
Shabri Vickers
Yeah, so our partnership with New Project and our IBRN team, that is something I can get you those numbers directly.
Dan Ryan
And, and what Do you know roughly what percentage that is of the revenue they give?
Cornel Westland
Don't know the percentage offhand, but I'll get that, get that to you today.
Dan Ryan
Transparency on the—.
Cornel Westland
Yes, sir.
Dan Ryan
Absolutely.
Thank you so much.
Cornel Westland
My pleasure.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thanks, Councilor.
Councilor Zimmerman.
Eric Zimmerman
My question is, you, Cornell, to give a chance in case somebody needs to grab a— I've, I've been called a few times while presenting.
I know sometimes family has to get a hold of us.
So, Cornell, I'm going to talk to you just for a few seconds in case other things have to get dealt I want to talk a little bit and ask your thoughts on kind of our industrial land situation and as it relates to Prosper's role in the economic development, right?
Our Planning Commission right now is getting ready to, you know, it sounds like make some proposals for some reductions or perhaps saying things that we have enough.
Right.
And what I'm curious about is how does Prosper get engaged by our Planning Commission or by the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability on that type of discussion?
Because I feel like your agency would be a primary stakeholder in that.
And my hypothesis is that I would be surprised if Prosper had a position of reducing of industrial land.
So I'm just kind of curious how that has gone, either from your chair in your time here or from what you've learned from the staff since you've been here about whether or not you've been engaged, if you are engaged meaningfully, and if the Planning Commission gives a darn about what Prosper's perspective is in this, in this realm.
Cornel Westland
Without question they do.
All of our bureau leaders have, have been extremely I have nothing but the best experience with all of the directors that I've been working with.
And quite candidly, BPS and Prosper have— we have a consistent cadence of communication.
Even at the executive level, we have consistent calls with each other where we ideate and talk about these things.
But these things are not simple, right?
We're all playing on the same team and want the same things.
But we have to be intentional about how we do that.
If you're asking as a practitioner, understanding all of these things and the unique things, ingredients in the current conditions that we are operating in, is it a best move to reduce our land offerings?
I would defer to the leadership and the chief executives of this administration to make that determination because they are the ones who cast a vision and we will be in support of whatever that endeavor is.
Eric Zimmerman
Well, I wanna, let's hold on there because what's gonna happen is actually it won't be a leadership what we'll see is a Planning Commission decision come to us.
And actually recently at a climate committee, the Planning Commission chair even said, City Council shouldn't worry too much about us.
Let us as the Planning Commission do the work here.
So I would love it if I felt like it was from a leadership perspective and we kind of saw the vision.
What I'm worried about is perhaps that isn't actually the case.
And there's something else going on, 'cause I would like it if we were all playing from the same perspective.
And if reducing the available industrial land is the right thing for our economic growth, I can be all ears.
Dan Ryan
Absolutely.
Eric Zimmerman
But I have never heard Prosper say that.
And since you're the economic development agency for us, I am wondering where that gets built into now the planning commissioners are appointed members.
They're not staff.
Dan Ryan
Sure.
Eric Zimmerman
So I want to challenge that assumption that it is coming from on high because I'm not sure that it is.
And I don't know yet until we get that.
Sure.
If that is supported from the city administration's position, if it's supported at the PROSPER board's position, yours as a leader, because I am not an economic development expert.
I look to you.
Yeah.
And I want your best opinion about those types of things.
So maybe it's an invitation of like, maybe we gotta dig in here a little bit.
Cornel Westland
Well, what I can submit to you that any decision, as I've experienced, is never done in isolation.
And so I'll continue to submit that I've had a great working relationship with the leader who's been extremely inclusive and takes our opinions.
And so whatever the final result will be, I fully expect that our voice will be present in it and look forward to working with you offline about how we can ensure that that occurs.
Eric Zimmerman
Okay, thanks.
And then over the last several years, and just in terms of my work with PROSPER, first off, hats off to the efforts that have been made in our— I'll call it our tactical response to the issues on the ground.
And this precedes your time here, but, you know, you've got members of your team, Andrew Fitzpatrick, Amy, Lisa Chabrie, of course, that, that have helped us, you know, deliver tangible moments of crisis for an individual business.
And so that has been what I think spurred into the small business focus.
But now my— here's my bigger question though, all right?
We talked earlier and there was a little bit about here are the things small business needs support with, and We can talk about those things sometimes, but the other part that small business needs most above all else, I've always thought, was customers who can pay their prices.
So most of the conversations I'm in with Prosper, I can be in a housing conversation, I can be in a small business conversation, I can be in an events conversation, and I'm generally talking to the same couple of folks.
Yeah.
Cornel Westland
Right.
Eric Zimmerman
Key leaders who kind of have oversight over a lot.
Is Prosper positioned enough, and how do we, how do we have our parallel tracks of taking care of the small business and the event base while also being foot on the gas, full speed ahead in pursuing traded sector economic development?
Because I'm having a tough time speaking with the public And with the business community about what we do in that space.
And I'd like to know if Prosper needs additional guidance in that direction, additional authority in that direction, or what your take is now as the director who's been here for a while and what your assessment is of that.
Because I— my preface, or my— again, my hypothesis is the best thing a small business owner needs is a customer who can pay their price.
Shabri Vickers
Yeah.
Cornel Westland
Councilor Smith.
Yeah, so that one is— I'll take a step back and go back to one of the things I said earlier.
It is important to note that the seating capacity of each vehicle can increase or decrease based upon funding.
So today, when we talk about filming events, that is a powerful team of 3, and they are able to accomplish what they've been able to accomplish with 3 people.
So imagine if that was 6 people dedicated just to filming events.
The Office of Small Business that is serving the entire city, team of 4.
Imagine if that went to 6.
So it's really— the question really is, councilors, what is our priority in this moment?
And what are we going to invest in in this moment to address the concerns we have?
If we're going to remove seats, We've got to remove expectations.
If we're going to add seats, then they're going to come with accountability, transparency, and quite candidly, our commitment to excellence.
Shabri Vickers
And I'd add, I just got back from D.C., and I think the conversations that we've been able to have with EDA, with the Treasury and the Department of Commerce around what tools are available federally and what we can consider here and what will fit with our needs and our priorities are exactly the efforts that we're undertaking.
So the reason that I took the time to be there was so we could talk about jobs and inciting investment from the private sector and what are the federal tools that we can layer on with our local and state tools to also really amplify efforts to incite investment that brings the jobs that can pay the income that allow for either affordable housing at the array that's needed to be something where folks aren't so overly burdened with their rent that they can actually choose to go to a store and, you know, and shop and be those customers that you talk about.
And so I think we look at the whole picture, obviously the jobs and where people are living and are they able to afford those things.
And then what we're bringing into the market, to our market and to our region, and how are we taking, taking all of the opportunities that we can, both from the federal, state, and local spaces.
Eric Zimmerman
I guess my last piece is more of a statement than it is a question.
We're in the era, the first era of my lifetime, and probably even before, where Portland isn't considered investable, cool, et cetera.
We lived on some great vibes for a long time.
Mm-hmm.
And, and when you live in that space, the, the tactics and the strategies that are palatable to you are relative to that awesomeness.
Mm-hmm.
And I say that because we may not recognize what tactics and strategies we need to be palatable toward when we are 80 out of 81 markets for investment.
That's right.
Meaning, I will not be surprised if the recommendations that come out of the PROSPER staff or the board are things that I can barely interpret because it's not a thing Portland has ever had to do before.
Cornel Westland
Yes, sir.
Eric Zimmerman
And I am curious what some of those cities and towns who had very depressed '80s, '90s, and yeah.
That was the shock moment on the ER table that will scare the pants off you, but it was the right thing to do.
And it's an area where I'm not sure we collectively, Portland, are able to have that conversation because almost none of us have known a Portland in this way or during this type of vibe before.
So I say that as an invitation as we move forward and as you identify those those things, I want to be all ears for you.
So thanks for coming today.
Cornel Westland
Thank you very much.
Dan Ryan
I always remember the, the early '80s.
You have a great example when we were going out of the timber industry.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Yeah, colleagues, we need to wrap up this part of our conversation, but Director Wesley Chabre, I'd like to put just a couple of questions I had out into this I'd like to follow up with you at another time, but I want to make sure that folks who are listening have a sense of other directions the conversation may go.
I'd like to hear more at some point about what guides you in thinking about which seats you keep in the car and looking at best practices, what your experts know to be true, what your board is guiding you to do, What you hear from council, what you hear from the businesses you serve.
How do you weigh all of those things to determine which seats to keep in the car?
I'd like to hear more about the benefits and the downsides of the 3 models.
You said we have been and firmly continue to be in that middle bucket.
What are the benefits for our city of that?
And what are some downsides as we think about that compared to—.
The other 2.
I would like to hear more about how the different tools you have, the different seats in the car, support the growth of high-wage jobs.
Councilor Zimmerman touched on this a little bit.
We talk a lot about our small business community, which is a critical part of Portland's culture and of building assets and equity for many communities in our city.
I think that's a great question.
But there are plenty of other people, in fact, the vast majority of Portlanders who are never going to own a business.
They work for other people who own businesses.
And how do we make sure that those jobs are high-wage jobs that allow people to afford to live in our city?
And how can we use our economic development tools to support not just our entrepreneurs, but also working people in our city?
So I'd love to follow up on those 3 questions another time.
Thank you.
Cornel Westland
Thank you, thank you very much, Councilor.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you both for being here.
Thank you for the background and for allowing us to have a conversation outside of the budget about the tools Prosper has and the work that we can do to strengthen our city's economy together.
Cornel Westland
Thank you all, we appreciate you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Let's move on to the 3rd item on our agenda.
Item number 3, document number 2026-147, amend arts tax code to provide tax relief, promote sustainability of arts access fund, define critical terms, and respond to community and audit recommendations.
Amend city code chapter 6.10.
Thank you.
And colleagues, we are inviting up our council president, Councilor Dunphy, a few folks he is bringing with him to kick off this part of our presentation.
I think, Councilor, I will let you go over the proposal before us before I give my remarks as the committee chair.
I'll follow the presentation that you have, so go right ahead when you're ready.
Shabri Vickers
Okay, perfect.
Jamie Dunphy
Well, thank you very much.
Good morning, colleagues.
In 2012, voters approved the arts tax because thank you.
I think it's important to recognize that the tax was always flawed, and we knew that from the jump.
To date, those flaws have meant that we have never fully met the vision passed by the voters.
We've had multiple audits, incredible staff, multiple managers, and decades of good work that have led to good outcomes despite a rough system.
It's been an iterative process all along.
Thank you.
There have been many, many tweaks around the edges of this trying to protect the vision, but to make it work better.
But now we're at a crisis point.
Without action, this tax will not only fail to support artists, but in a few years it will stop paying enough to cover teachers.
So it's time to get in there and make some major moves.
This legislation is a huge swing to fix a lot of problems.
How hard it is on low-income folks, how complicated and annoying it is to pay, how little insight we've had into how these dollars are being thank you.
Now, nothing in this proposal is particularly innovative or new.
We're indexing things to inflation.
We're using existing tax structures, using the guidance of the ballot language that voters approved.
We're taking our Portland Weird Tax and making it a little bit more normal and providing— and we are providing tax relief to literally hundreds of thousands of neighbors.
When was the last time that this body can say that?
My policy director, Eben Hofer, is here and will do the intro to talk us through.
Revenue Director Thomas Landon will give us a deep dive on tax policy, and Darian Jones from the Office of Arts and Culture is available for questions.
Eben Hofer
All right, folks.
So I'll run us through this little presentation here.
Here's our roadmap for the day.
We're going to give you some background.
We're going to talk about programmatic improvements, which are kind of arts programming and education programming related items.
Then Director Lanham will talk you through the nitty-gritty of how the tax changes are proposed.
He'll also talk about the ending fund balance, which has been in the news and we've discussed, and how we're utilizing that to make this transition.
And then a quick summary of changes at the end.
So I don't wish to repeat everything that Councilor Dunphy just said, but this tax was passed in 2012, and it essentially pays for K-5 Arts teachers in the public schools, and it provides arts access for K through 12 grade students and underserved communities in Portland.
That is the goal of the tax.
Before the arts tax, we had 31 K-5 art and music teachers across the 6 Portland School District, and now we have 113.
I graduated from PPS in 2006 during that interregnum between Measure 550 and the arts tax, and I was really lucky to have what I have.
Thank you.
Very grateful.
And now we have more.
From inception through today, it's $140 million has come into the city, about 61% of that to school districts, 26% to arts organizations, and 13% to collection costs.
So we've accomplished a lot.
However, the tax is still widely viewed as a pain in the neck and flawed.
So here's what we're trying to do here, our approach.
We are trying to honor the structure and intent of the tax as approved by voters in 2012.
We're not trying to change a goose into a duck.
A goose will still be a goose.
We're trying to respond to issues raised in the audit and in the Arts Access Fund Oversight Committee's reports to council.
And we're asking to act by council ordinance, maximizing the positive changes that you can make as a body without fundamentally changing what voters approved.
We want to maintain continuity of funding and administration, but provide room for this to grow.
So here's our problem statement.
The biggest problem before us, one of the biggest problems, is its regressivity.
This is a flat $35 assessment for essentially everyone in Portland, everybody who makes more than $1,000 and whose family is underneath the federal poverty limit.
So if you're at that federal poverty line, you're paying 0.22% of your income.
In arts tax.
If you're making $100,000, you're paying 0.04% of your income.
And if you happen to be a kid who just makes $1,001 and your parents are not in poverty, you're paying 3.5% of your income.
So people with less money pay more of their income on the arts tax.
It's complex, onerous, and annoying.
If you don't pay— if you're not filing your state or federal taxes, you still might have to pay the arts tax.
If you're a qualified dependent, somebody claims you as a dependent on their 1040, you still might have to pay the arts tax.
And if you are in poverty, if you're under that federal poverty limit but make more than $1,000, you still have to affirmatively file with the city.
Hi, I'm in poverty.
I am under the federal poverty limit, but I have to prove that to you to say I don't need to pay $35 this year.
It's a big burden to put on the poorest people in town.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Another large problem we're facing is the Arts Access Fund is losing purchasing power to inflation.
Last year, there was a 44% cut to the arts organizations that were triggered.
Now, this council put that money back into the arts organizations' pockets in the spring TAO that was just passed.
Thanks to everyone for doing that.
However, the structural problems that we face moving forward are still there.
Finally, oversight and administration need tools for improvement.
They've been identified in a number of recent reports, and we're looking to address those here.
So solutions, we're looking to reduce regressivity, reduce the pure number of people who have to file and pay, end the practice of requiring affirmative application for poverty exemption.
End requiring the practice of having people who don't file their own state or federal taxes filing for this.
Address the erosion of purchasing power to inflation.
Make it easier for people to file and pay.
And improve the administration while maintaining continuity of current practices.
All right, so Arts Tax 101.
Here's how this tax works.
Everybody pays $35, throw it in the pot.
Then we pay in this following order.
There is a hierarchy of responsibilities.
First, we pay the administration costs, collections, banking fees, refunds.
Then we pay the salaries of public school K-5 arts teachers.
We have a ratio of 500 students to 1 teacher, and it can include various other things close to salary.
Finally, with the money that's left over, we pay for arts programs, up to 95% for professional arts orgs that serve the general public, And no less than 5% for other programs, improving access, et cetera.
This is how code is structured currently.
Historically, so let's just look at the data.
That's the 3 buckets that this money goes to.
So this is our inflationary issue.
Revenue is flat from 2017 to 2025.
It's been about $12 million for the last almost 10 years.
That's not true.
That means that there's been about a 2% decline in purchasing power every year.
In that far column, you can see what those dollars would be in 2025 dollars.
So we're losing cash as we go.
However, the expenses are going up.
So collection costs have been increasing above the rate of inflation every year.
As you see, it's about an 8% increase in collection costs per year given external services and also the cost of internal staff.
Yet we're still getting a really good deal on that staff.
We have about 8.5 people collecting the entire arts tax at a ratio of 1 collector to 56,000 Portlanders.
So even at this cost, we're really doing a good lift with what we have.
Now we look at the actual program expenses here, target costs, right?
So school district costs are steadily moving up as the median cost of an arts teacher moves up in the districts, which means that that last bucket, the what's left over for arts organizations, is slowly dwindling.
And last year we hit this crisis point where a pretty major cut thank you.
So that's the canary in the coal mine.
Because we're slowly running out of money, first it hits the arts orgs, and then later it hits the schools.
The Arts Tax started running out of money for artists last year.
We intervened to fix that.
But without council action to fix this inflationary problem, we're going to start running out of money for schools in about 5 years.
Okay.
So that's the big view here.
Thank you.
Thomas is going to talk about the tax a little bit more soon.
But let's talk about some programmatic improvements first that are addressed in this legislation.
So we had 2 big reports in the last year.
First, Arts Access Fund Oversight Committee report from '24-'25.
So this is the report that looks at the first year that the city totally managed the Arts Access Fund.
It used to be partially managed by RACC.
Right.
And then we brought it back in-house.
So in that first year, the committee looked at what had happened and said, all right, we need to consider indexing this tax.
We are running out of money for the things we're trying to pay for here.
We also think that the city needs to consider a better definition for high-quality arts education.
What is the standard for that?
The city had started to build something called the Arts Education Framework, and the report said, please lean in and do more with that.
They also asked for improved definition of high-quality arts access and the definition of an underserved community to which that arts access is supposed to be available.
Very similar things came out of the auditor's report last year.
The city had only recently started looking at what high-quality arts education is.
That RACC and the city could do better in doing oversight over the contracts with school districts to ensure that it wasn't losing money.
And that definitions for underserved communities, high-quality arts education, and oversight needed improvement.
So we are going through a checklist of those things in this legislation.
Introduce a more robust definition of high-quality arts education in this legislation, pointing to the new arts education framework.
Essentially, the legislation says high-quality arts education as seen by this law is things that are compliant with or moving towards compliance with this framework tool.
And it puts a couple controls on what that framework can be.
It's the conditions necessary for kids to learn about the arts.
It can't include content of a complete curriculum, can't be do Shakespeare, don't do Marlowe, whatever.
So we do that here.
It also introduces a definition for underserved communities for the purposes of this tax.
What we've had in code thus far is a definition that says folks who are underserved by the current professional arts yes.
And that has not been particularly well-defined.
What is that kind of underservice?
What is the current arts organization landscape, et cetera?
So we worked with the folks in the mayor's executive order compliance team to come up with a definition that centers people facing barriers accessing arts experiences and gives a number of possible ways that you can look at that and that the Office of Arts and Culture could operationalize it over time.
Again, we're giving the office some data points, some ways to approach it, but not necessarily mandating it.
The auditor's report also asked for clarity on the composition and role of the Arts Access Fund Oversight Committee.
So there's a number— there's been a number of issues over the last decade of failing to hold quorum from that committee.
It is larger than most.
Thank you.
So this legislation reduces the minimum size to address quorum issues, asks for seats for the key recipients of these funds, parents of kids in school-age— school-age children in public schools and arts organizations to be seated, and makes a requirement that the Office of Arts and Culture provide adequate staff support for that committee.
Thank you.
There is a— we are addressing also the definition of a Portland arts organization.
When coming back into the city, it became clear that it may be impossible for local arts organizations to hold PO boxes in town and still qualify for funds.
So we just offer a more robust definition that allows people who are operating in Portland to still apply for grants.
Finally, we realigned the grant criteria language to more closely follow the ballot measure expectations of service to the target populations.
And we asked for some reports back from the Office of Arts and Culture.
Actions taken to restore service for underserved communities, which was removed in the transition to city management of the fund.
Actions taken to implement the Portland Arts Education Framework and future goals for ensuring that midsize yes.
And my— yes.
And then finally, and this is something that I imagine this committee may want to think about and talk about, we're proposing retiring the term arts tax.
We've had a lot of feedback from constituents that there is a poor understanding that more than 65% of the arts tax yes.
Goes towards public school teachers and not towards arts organizations.
Why should I donate to your organization?
I pay my arts tax.
Why am I paying for the arts when I can't afford a ticket to the ballet?
I'm an artist.
Why do I have to pay the arts tax?
And so we're suggesting more accurate terminology, the arts education tax, and what we already use, the arts access fund, if we are not using the full real term, which is the arts education and access fund.
Those are the programmatic proposals herein.
It's a lot of things, of course, but you could kind of read the audit report and put these next to each other and check down the list.
Now passing it off to Director Lanham to talk about the changes to the revenue side.
Thomas Lanham
Good morning.
I'm Thomas Lanham.
I'm the Revenue Division Director.
And before I make any remarks, I want to thank Councilor Dunphy and Eben and thank you, Mr. Mayor.
I want to thank the council and his staff for bringing this forward.
There have been, by my count, 6 generations of city council, you know, every 2 years a new council, and there's been much discussion about making some needed adjustments to this tax, but by hook, by crook, and for whatever reason, they never really happened.
So what I think we have before you today on the tax administration I think the important thing to note from the council side is the North Star that we're looking to is to just make this tax a normal tax in the sense that it conforms to what other local, state, and federal income taxes look like.
Because the arts taxes passed by voters in 2012 is anything but normal in terms of a tax.
So first and foremost, I guess I would say there's been a lot of discussion about the administration of the tax and that it's complex.
We in the Revenue Division have done our level best from day one to make this tax as easy to pay as possible and as straightforward as possible of an experience.
But the bottom line is that, you know, when 500,000-plus people are each expected to pay $35 once per year, That really puts a lot of limitations around what you can do to make it easier to pay.
So it was been it's been administered based on the language that was passed by voters in 2012, and so there are some very unique definitions, for example, of income that are included in there.
And so the arts tax definition of income is essentially gross income.
It's all legally taxable income in the state of Oregon.
So there are very few sources of income that are not taxable in Oregon.
And then it's got this second level of income that is looked at for poverty-level exemptions.
So there are 2 definitions of income in this tax which make it unnecessarily complex.
The tax also calls for individuals to So as has been mentioned before, a college student earning as little as $1,001 who otherwise has no filing requirement at all under federal or state law and who may even be a dependent on their parents' return is still expected to file and pay a local income tax for $35.
And so the changes that we're proposing would certainly do away with that.
Thank you.
And, and so let's go to the next slide, Evan, please.
So as I mentioned a moment ago, who's currently paying?
We've got high school and college students with de minimis levels of income that are expected to file and pay.
We have seniors on limited and fixed income generally must pay unless they're below the federal poverty guideline.
And just to give you a sense of how low, low that guideline is, here's, here's the guideline on the slide.
1, 2, 3, And 4-person households.
Even a 4-person household at that $33,000 level, that's below Oregon minimum wage of $16.30 an hour.
So the annualized $16.30 an hour is $33,904.
These are people that should just not be expected to pay, never should have had to pay the arts tax.
And so the changes before you would move to, first of all, scrap the 2 definitions of income and go to the standard Oregon taxable income definition, which is used in the state of Oregon.
It's used in the administration of our other local personal income taxes, the supportive housing services tax and preschool for all tax.
It's widely understood.
It's implemented in tax software.
So there's just a whole host of reasons why linking to these standard definitions makes sense.
Let's go to the next slide, please.
So this is a rather busy slide.
I apologize.
I hope you can see the numbers.
The real takeaway here is just the vast number of people that will no longer have to pay or file this tax.
The difference between filing and paying— a filer is a person who has to send in paper or go online or use TurboTax to file something.
That filing could be an exemption— I don't owe you anything— listing their dependents and going through this whole poverty exemption analysis.
Or it could be in connection with a payment.
So filers is sort of the universe of Portlanders 18 and older, whether they're in poverty or not.
So there are over 500,000 of those— 532,000 people that are expected to do that.
Under these changes, we would reduce the number of expected filers by 40%.
So 214,000 people would no longer be expected to file and pay.
So the new number of expected filers and payers would be the second table shows just the payers.
So that first table is, is the filers.
The second table is the payers.
Again, big reduction.
The 147,000 people would no longer be expected to pay the tax.
And so the 147, just to be clear, is a subset of the 214.
Keelan McClymont
Councilmember Herbold.
Thomas Lanham
Let's go to the next slide.
Another busy slide, I do apologize, but I did want to highlight for you kind of 3 instances of taxpayers who would have paid under the previous arts tax but no longer pay under this current iteration.
And the reason why is there's really a big difference in Oregon taxable income as opposed to this current arts tax definition of Oregon taxable income is net of deductions and subtractions and non-taxable income.
So you could have, in the first example, a single individual 65 and older has $40,000 of Oregon taxable income, and every bit of that would be counted for purposes of the arts tax.
But as you trace the exclusions and deductions down that first line, Thank you.
So if you look at the first table, you can see that that taxpayer ends up with only, in this example, about $13,000 of Oregon taxable income because of those deductions for nontaxable items like Social Security or senior deduction, mortgage interest if they file a Schedule A, and so forth.
And so that gets them to a place where they would not pay with only $13,000 and some change the second example, the second table shows an individual with 3 dependents and how their income flows.
So again, starting at $38,000, and that whole amount would be taxable under the arts tax, but after some standard deductions and exemptions, they get down to about $19,900 in this example, are no longer taxable.
Councilor Smith.
And then the final example, a couple of joint filers, one over 65.
This is an example with almost $64,000 of income that would not actually pay because, again, on the joint filer, the joint filer threshold is $40,000.
And so that $38,500 bottom line net would not be a payer.
Let's go then to item number 2, which is the Next slide, please, Evan.
So this action before you would also direct the Revenue Division to take some actions.
First would be to, to take a second look at how we notify taxpayers about their obligations.
We have for many years sent a full mailer to each and every household, including a return envelope and a tax return.
Yes.
A letter explaining what it is and maybe a stuffer from RACC or the Arts and Culture Office laying out what the benefits of the tax are.
We learned early on that we needed to do that because if we failed to do that, people simply wouldn't remember to file and pay because this is just a— it's a very small amount, a dollar amount, and it's not a tax that people typically think of when they file On April 15th.
We think with these changes and, and the greatly reduced number of payers, in addition to the fact that the most impoverished in our community will no longer be required to file or pay, we may be able to pivot to just a postcard with a QR code and make it much easier for people to file and pay like that.
So we're going to look at that, and we're going to look at other— it's kind of a top-to-bottom review of How people file and pay the arts tax to try to make it easier.
The second directive is, and this is embedded in the code language itself, is to work with the Office of Arts and Culture to create a reserve policy.
We'll talk more about that in a couple slides.
And then finally, to report back to council by February 15th, 2028 about how that first year went.
And you're probably thinking, why so distant in the future?
Tax year 2026 would be the effective tax year for this change, so the tax year we're in now, which is due in April of 2027.
But we won't have all the data that we need from the Oregon Department of Revenue and other data sources that we use to enforce the tax until later in 2027.
So we won't have really all the information we need about how that first year went until early So that's why we would want to come back by then to really be able to fine-tune and make any adjustments that this body may choose to make at that time.
There are some risks to this forecast.
So what we are projecting— I didn't get into the detail of the forecast, but we're basically projecting that the amount of revenue that we collect now would continue for next year.
And then because of the changes, the reduced number of payers, But the increase in the rate nets out to about what we're collecting now.
But there are some risks to the forecast.
And so when you change the rate, the number of payers, the filing status change, all those 3, they bring some risk to the forecast.
But the one that brings probably the most risk is the change in the notification process.
So pivoting again from that full mailer to a postcard, it could trigger a lower payment rate.
On the other hand, since we're no longer asking people that have the least means in our community to file and pay, we could see an increase in compliance.
So whether those 2 things offset each other or not is an open question.
And so that is one of the pieces that we want to report back on in February of 2024.
And so getting into the arts tax fund balance, there's been some discussion about this in the community and in the media.
I think there's a narrative that got set up that there's this sort of stagnant pile of cash that never got spent.
Not really true.
As you can see from this chart, I'll just sort of orient you to it.
The red dashed line at the bottom is a zero fund balance.
So this is a graphical representation and model of what the arts tax fund looks like over a 5-year cycle.
The black stars on the orange graph are the moment in time when the city's annual comprehensive financial report is produced.
It's a snapshot in time, and that just happens to be only a couple months after We've refilled the coffers with all of the money that we collected in April and May and June.
So it always looks like there's a lot of money sitting in the fund when that picture is taken, but the reality is, as you can see, we do disbursements in the fall and the winter.
And so those disbursements draw the balance down to around $2 million, and then it gets replenished in April.
So what we're really doing under the current accounting treatment for the the arts tax is we're spending the previous tax year's receipts in the current fiscal year.
So we're always one year behind in terms of using the cash and budgeting that for the schools, for the city's costs of collection, and for arts organizations.
So let's go to the possible future approach.
If we do a one-time drawdown of the arts tax, and we target a new ending fund balance of approximately $5 million a year.
You can see, like an iceberg, we're starting to sink under that red dashed line, that zero line, briefly for a period of time before we come back up to the line.
To meet our legal obligations at year-end, each fund in the city must be in a positive cash position.
We feel like this is a reasonable balance to strike in terms of— we're pretty confident that $5 million is the right target to try to hit for that ending fund balance at fiscal year end.
So that frees up some one-time bridge funding to kind of see us through these lean years as we transition to a tax that is actually indexed for inflation.
So we're using temporary negative balances as a and that's that slide.
Go ahead.
Eben Hofer
All right.
So coming back to a conclusion after this great journey that you've gone on with us.
So what are we doing here?
Essentially, on the financial side, we raised the rate from $35 to $50.
$50 Is what is basically $35.
$35 In 2012 dollars indexed to inflation, as if we had done that all along.
In exchange for that, we cut a huge number of low-income people who are currently paying the tax out.
They no longer have to pay.
At the end of that process, we have about the same amount of money last year— next year as we had this year.
We make an inflationary adjustment.
We're going to do that for the first year, and then that threshold for filing and that assessment will start slowly creeping up to keep track of inflation.
So in the future, we won't have a sudden gap here where we have to make a huge cut to one of our commitments.
We're going to conform the arts tax to standard tax practices found around the region in Oregon, increasing the filing threshold and decreasing the number of people who have to pay.
It's box 19 on your Oregon 1040.
Should be fairly straightforward.
Thank you.
An individual who is filing is no longer going to have to file an arts tax return for every member of their household.
If you file jointly, it's one return for you, your spouse, your kids, your elderly parent, et cetera, et cetera.
That's the summary of changes on the tax side.
On the programmatic side, essentially we're trying to give the Office of Arts and Culture the tools that they need to be successful with what we've tasked them with doing.
Let's give them adequate definitions to move forward.
Let's give them the power to engage with their arts education framework.
Let's give them a definition of who's supposed to be on this oversight body and make sure it has a quorum that can actually be met over the next decade, et cetera, et cetera.
And then we're going to use some of those extra resources to make sure that the transition goes smoothly, the revenue division has what it needs to build the new system, that we report back, and that we can revisit some of these changes over the course of the next 2 years to make sure we got it right and make changes if we didn't.
However, for this year, we do have a little bit of a time limit.
Revenue has told us that to—.
2024.
To get this going by next year, we do have to pass it no later than May 13th.
So ideally this would pass out of committee today, could make amendments for council next week, and pass it by the 13th.
And I'm sure there's a lot here, but we're committed to doing the work to making it possible.
Thank you.
Shabri Vickers
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you very much for the really thorough overview.
As we look at tax code changes, it's important that we really understand exactly what it is that we're doing, um, and I appreciate you going deep for us.
Colleagues, we are going to move to public testimony.
It's 11:07.
At 11— actually, wait, pause.
We'll take technical questions first.
I apologize.
We'll take technical questions and then move to public testimony.
We will take public testimony until 11:30, but at that point, 2 hours in, we'll need to give our staff a quick break.
After the break, we'll come back and finish public testimony and then move into council discussion and deliberation.
In order to get us to testimony quickly, I will save my co-sponsor remarks until our committee deliberation.
Candace Avalos
Councilor Avalos, are you in the queue with the technical Well, I can ask it after testimony, but I guess I have a question on timing.
Am I reading incorrectly?
Are we not going into 11:30?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
We—.
Candace Avalos
Our meeting is longer?
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Our meeting got extended to 12:30 today.
Candace Avalos
Oh, okay.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I hope that was reflected on all of your calendars.
It sounds like that was not for some of you, so we'll make sure that that doesn't happen in the future.
Candace Avalos
Okay, I'll wait until after testimony to ask my questions.
Okay.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Are there any technical questions?
Councilor Murillo, Councilors Ryan or Zimmerman?
Ryan, go right ahead.
Dan Ryan
I just want to know who was at the table to get this proposal to this point outside of the 3 of you.
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, we've been working on this for a little bit over a year, iteratively meeting with arts groups, with PPS, with different school districts, with the folks who are administering it.
We had one oversight I would say that we did not go and confer with the Arts Oversight Committee.
We met with members of it, but actually somehow forgot to meet with the chair.
So that is my fault and I will take the blame for that.
But otherwise, we've been iteratively talking to both awardees of this, both in the arts organizations and the teachers on the ground.
Eric Zimmerman
Okay.
Dan Ryan
Would you say all of those that received recipients were included in those conversations?
I'm looking at the room and I'm just trying to— I can see most of the people that you mentioned are—.
Jamie Dunphy
We certainly did not talk to everybody who receives general operating support through this.
We've met with a lot of groups and asked them to help us extend the outreach and talk to their networks.
Dan Ryan
Including the pioneers that got this all started before 2012, the art museum and the opera.
Jamie Dunphy
To the maximum extent possible, yes, absolutely.
Eben Hofer
Councilor Ryan, the sense that there's, you know, maybe some division between large and small organizations, We've worked very diligently to ensure we had a proposal that was supported by both groups.
Dan Ryan
And Tom, you know, we've had many conversations in my one year of oversight.
I was always frustrated at how hard it was to pay that.
Most people complain about that.
Um, and you said your solution is this postcard?
Thomas Lanham
Well, no, not just the postcard.
Uh, there are a number of things that we think we may be able to do to make it easier to pay.
I think it's very important to understand that filing and paying the arts tax is actually pretty much identical to filing and paying your federal, state, and other local taxes.
The process is the same.
What was different was you were getting this piece of mail every year that had a paper tax return, and we did that historically because nobody remembered to file and pay but now we're in third-party tax preparation software products like TurboTax and others, and so there's a built-in reminder for those that use those products.
I would emphasize we also have people that can file and pay on Portland Revenue online for free.
We have a website that you can do that, and we hope to be able to explore ways to make it even easier.
Dan Ryan
I think you're getting—.
Thomas Lanham
Councilor, it's not lost on us.
Believe me when I say If we weren't otherwise motivated just because it's the right thing to do as government to make it easier for people to file and pay, we're also motivated because if it's not easy to file and pay, guess whose phones light up?
Our phones.
So with only 8.5 people, we can't afford to get it wrong.
We very much want to make it as easy as possible.
Dan Ryan
Tom, I'm well aware we have this conversation 2023, and I think You just hit it when you said like Turbo, because most people complain that they pay all their taxes and then they get a note from the person they worked with, the professional, said don't forget to pay the ART tax.
I have nothing to do with that.
They're not connected to the regular systems.
Thomas Lanham
Yeah, and I can't speak to, you know, what tax preparers are doing, but I do know that many tax preparers that are paid to prepare their clients' taxes do in fact take care of that for them.
Dan Ryan
So there is a That's just the number one as we have this conversation, 2023.
So thanks.
Thomas Lanham
Yes, sir.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Councilor Zimmerman, technical changes before testimony?
Eric Zimmerman
So on that note, you've mentioned that the postcard and the QR code— I guess my, my question here is, and I wrote it down when you were briefing, is why does that take this change to implement the change you're talking about?
Thomas Lanham
Is that not possible in our current system to send a postcard with the QR So we tried a postcard in 2014, and I will tell you bluntly, it was a miserable failure.
Many people take a postcard and discard that versus treating them with a little more respect and care, kind of an envelope from the City of Portland with the logo on it.
And so we had not taken that step basically for that reason.
We were several million dollars behind.
I think the postcard was a great idea.
In 2014 when we made that effort.
So coupled with the, the massive reduction in the number of payers and the fact that we are now linking to normal tax practices, we think we can now make this leap where we can try the postcard again, especially with QR code technology, uh, and see if that works.
So we may have been able to experiment with that before this, this, uh, change but that innovation is—.
Eric Zimmerman
I'm hearing is not tied actually to there's something that gets unlocked or allowable under this current change.
That's just also happening at the same time.
Thomas Lanham
Right.
That, and we're going to take a top-to-bottom review of all of our practices around this tax and see what else we can do.
Eric Zimmerman
Okay.
Thanks.
Shabri Vickers
Okay.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, thank you all for the presentation.
Thank you, colleagues.
Why don't we try to get partway through our testimony before we take a short break?
Diana?
Thank you.
Uh, for those who are signed up to testify, just a reminder that each testifier will receive 3 minutes.
I'm going to be calling folks up in groups of 3.
If you are testifying in person, you'll see the timer countdown displayed on the monitor in front of the testimony table.
And for those testifying virtually, the timer will be displayed in Zoom.
You're going to hear the timer ding twice.
The first is just a warning that you have 30 seconds left, and the second time will be when your time is up.
And finally, before you begin your testimony, please state your name for the record.
Thank you.
First up, I would like to call Evan Lewis, Jennifer Falco, and Hillary Butler.
And you can start whenever you get to the table.
Thank you so much.
Go right ahead.
Jamie Dunphy
Hi, uh, my name is Evan Lewis, uh, he/him, and I am the executive director of Third Angle New Music and a co-leader of PACE, Portland Arts and Culture for Equity.
Dan Ryan
I'm testifying today in support of Council President Jamie Dunphy's proposed amendment to the Arts Tax Code, Code Chapter 6.10.
Jamie Dunphy
Everyone who works in the arts in Portland will tell you that we all frequently hear from taxpayers who care deeply about the arts and believe in the importance of arts funding, who nevertheless have very negative feelings about the arts tax.
Despite a philosophical agreement with the purpose of the tax and what it funds, these very taxpayers have negative feelings about a tax that feels like a burden to pay.
This is heightened when it does not appear to taxpayers that the fund is achieving its the city audit from March 18th titled Arts Tax: City Needs to Make Improvements to Deliver on Voter-Approved Arts Education and Grants Commitments identified many issues that need to be addressed immediately.
In its current form, the arts tax is a regressive flat tax with an inefficient collection method.
The tax already started running out of funds for artists last year, and as it is not an index tax, it will run out of money for schools in the next 5 years.
Thank you.
Now is the time to act to ensure this does not happen, and Councilor Dunphy's plan to address these issues has my full support.
Through my work with PACE, arts leaders have been pushing for arts funding reforms, including an overhaul of the arts tax.
Dan Ryan
We have presented to the Arts Access Fund Oversight Committee before but saw little forward motion, so we're excited to see the energy behind this push for needed change.
Jamie Dunphy
There has been messaging in the press about how this amendment would almost double the amount of tax owed which is true, but in reality, that is an increase of $15 per year.
Coupled with correctly increasing the filing threshold to remove the obligation from those who should not be paying it, this will bring in more funds to support work that Portlanders care about.
The arts are in a funding crisis, including news last week that individual artist grants are severely reduced in the mayor's proposed budget.
We believe it is imperative to shore up the mechanisms for funding we already have in place.
Thank you.
We strongly support the plan to bring back equity funding.
The arts in this city need funding, not cuts.
If we want to return to the vibrant and creative Portland from pre-2020, the arts are a vital piece of that revitalization.
Dan Ryan
And without funding, that progress is slow at best and impossible at worst.
Please implement these updates to this needed fund.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I believe Jennifer is online.
Jennifer, you can unmute and begin your testimony.
Thank you for your testimony.
Good morning, folks.
My name is Jennifer Falco.
Candace Avalos
I am the mother of a Portland Public Schools senior and the chair of the Arts Access Fund Oversight Committee.
I'm also a business leader with 25 years of experience, including fiscal management, and I'm here to testify as a member of the public in support of the changes to the Arts Access Fund.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
The changes build on our annual report, which noted, as you've heard several times today, that inflation between 2012 and 2026 dampened the fund's ability to deliver the level of service that Portlanders voted for when they passed this ballot measure.
Candace Avalos
They also make the tax more progressive.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I personally support these changes because this fund does 2 important things for our community.
It helps keep arts education in our elementary schools, providing support to hire certified arts educators who keep almost 29,000— just take a moment, imagine if we had 29,000 little kids here today with whatever art they'd done in school— engaged, learning, and creating.
Not only do the results of these activities make things like our family fridges fun, and I could tell you a story about Cornfish, which is a senior— my son is more of, but as this 3rd grade art project I still love.
But early arts education translates to positive social engagement, positive life outcomes for kids, fewer disciplinary challenges, higher graduation rates.
These are positive real-world impacts that matter to Portland.
This fund also helps to keep our arts ecosystem vibrant.
Each year it provides millions of dollars to local arts organizations that deliver programs in and for our communities, including our K-12 students and members of underserved groups.
These arts organizations make Portland Portland.
Candace Avalos
We have a great city, and arts is one of the pillars of our community.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Our committee meets regularly with city partners to ensure the effective administration of this fund.
We don't make funding decisions, but what we do is report on expenditures and impact annually to the public.
We and the city have been working hard to ensure the fund does what voters intended, and these changes will help it continue to do so for the foreseeable future.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Hello, my name is Hillary Butler.
I'm the executive director of Portland Baroque Orchestra, and I also convene the Portland Arts Leaders A coalition— excuse me— a coalition of nearly 70 arts organizations across the Portland metro area, ranging from small neighborhood ensembles to the largest cultural institutions, including the opera, symphony, and art museum.
I'm here in support of the proposed updates to the Portland Arts Tax.
The arts tax was a bold civic commitment when voters passed it, but that commitment has eroded quietly because the flat tax has never been adjusted arts organizations receive what remains after crucial arts education expenses are paid.
So what remains for those arts organizations shrinks year after year with no floor.
We are not an afterthought.
Many of our member organizations are spending down their reserves just to stay open.
We are beginning to see closures here in Portland and across the country because the funding math has stopped working.
Arts and cultural organizations are economic engines for this city.
According to the most recent Arts and Economic Prosperity Study, arts and cultural organizations and their audiences generate $405 million in economic activity in Portland annually, and that figure excludes the cost of admissions.
Every time someone comes to a concert, a gallery opening, or a theater performance, they're also parking, eating at a restaurant, shopping at a local business.
The arts bring people into the public sphere.
They are a reason people choose to live here, visit here, and invest here.
When organizations close, that economic activity doesn't just shift elsewhere.
Much of it disappears.
PBO and many of our PAL member organizations are operating on margins that leave almost no room for error.
When our funding erodes year after year, the cumulative effect, effect is real on programming, on staffing, on our ability to serve Portland audiences.
The arts are not just an amenity.
They are part of what makes Portland worth coming to.
We want people from across the metro area, from the suburbs, from out of state, to have a reason to come experience what makes this city distinctive.
That only works if the organizations creating those experiences are still here.
We are grateful that the proposed updates include releasing additional funds from the arts tax reserves in the coming year to help bridge the gap while structural changes take effect.
That kind of intentional stewardship matters to organizations that are planning seasons, signing contracts, and making staffing decisions right now.
Portland's arts and cultural sector holds this city together We ask you to update the arts tax in a way that honors the original promise that voters made and in a way that makes it durable for the future.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Next up we have Charlene Hannibal, Brianna Linden, and Jill, uh, Guide.
Welcome.
Thank you all for being here.
Go right ahead.
Uh, good morning, councilors.
My name is Charlene Hannibal, and I am the executive director and co-founder of Open Space, a professional contemporary dance company and school located in District 2 in the Kenton neighborhood of North Portland.
I'm also a member of Portland Arts and Culture for Equity and firstly, I want to express my gratitude.
We are encouraged to see movement on the Arts Education and Access Tax, and we are especially grateful for the release of additional funding, including the $20,000 allocations to the 79 organizations that have historically received general operating support.
Releasing more funds and continuing in this direction is a meaningful step forward.
I'm in strong support of amending Code Chapter 6.10 to be more equitable and to better fund the broader arts ecosystem.
We know that the arts are a powerful economic driver in Portland, supporting jobs, activating neighborhoods, and drawing audiences into our city.
Continued investment in the arts will be essential to the revitalization of downtown Portland and the overall health of our local economy.
However, I'm here on behalf of Open Space and many other Portland arts organizations who have not been eligible for general operating support, first through RACC and now through the Office of Arts and Culture, and who did not receive any of the recently received funds— released funds.
Open Space was founded in 2020 during the pandemic and intentionally located in North Portland, where access to Western concert dance has been limited.
In just 5 and a half years, we have grown rapidly, quadrupling our budget, budget, producing multiple productions each year, serving well over 200 students, and providing scholarships, discounted tickets, and free outreach classes and performances.
And we've done all of this without any government funding.
And our story is not unique.
Open Space is like so many newer nonprofits in Portland, growing quickly through grassroots support, navigating the challenges of building sustainable organizations without early public investment.
At the same time, grant funding is often highly competitive or inaccessible due to structural barriers.
Across Portland, many organizations are actively contributing to the cultural economy yet remain excluded.
I respectfully urge you to ensure that there are accessible pathways to operating support for nonprofit organizations demonstrating artistic excellence and cultural impact.
Thank you.
If Portland is committed to a sustainable arts ecosystem, we must ensure that emerging organizations are not locked out during their most critical years.
They are the future of Portland's arts community.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Shabri Vickers
Hello, I'm Brianna Linden.
I'm the executive director for Arts for Learning Northwest.
I'm here today on behalf of Portland's youngest citizens, school kids that are in school today and couldn't be here to be heard.
Thomas Lanham
I'm asking for your support for the emergency ordinance that would allow thank you.
Shabri Vickers
I wanna thank the committee for its support for these updates and a comprehensive arts education in our public schools.
And I wanna be specific about what comprehensive means.
I graduated from Portland Public Schools in 1992.
That was the last year that students received a comprehensive arts education before Measure 5, which changed the way we funded schools and ultimately led us to where we are now, drastically underfunded classrooms.
When I was a painfully shy 4th grader at Boise Elliott, my teacher had arts integration training and allowed me to draw my responses rather than speak them.
Them, and that really changed how I saw myself as a learner.
Later, I ran for the arts, which brought Oboe Adi and his ensemble to our school to perform, and I still feel the power of those drums in my body.
In middle school at Harriet Tubman, in drama classes with Madonna Ducey and Adele White, they taught me public speaking skills that I could actually learn, and that's why I can be here speaking with you today.
In arts education, we talk about the 3-legged school and that every every school and that every child deserves all 3: sequential arts learning from trained art teachers, arts integration woven daily into classrooms, and time with teaching and cultural artists.
I experienced all 3, but most Portland children do not.
I'm wearing a shirt that was designed and made by my child at Arts for Learning Northwest.
We serve 40,000 students each year.
Each circle on my shirt represents 100 kids.
Alongside our friends at IDLPDX, Northwest Children's Theater, Play It Forward, and many others, we work to connect artists with students across the city.
When a child works alongside a Black ballet dancer, a Ghanaian drummer, or an Indigenous storyteller, something profound happens.
For many students, this may be the only moment in their school week where their culture, their family's traditions, their community's ways of knowing are treated as worthy of celebration.
Equally important are the artistic experiences that are entirely new, that open children to new ways of thinking and expressing.
Those are foundational experiences.
Research confirms that arts education improves academic engagement, social-emotional development, and long-term outcomes.
But data alone doesn't capture what I've witnessed when a child who has been silent or squirrely all year finds their voice through a drumbeat or a brushstroke.
The arts give children a language when they cannot yet say words.
Access to these experiences should not be determined by a family's income or zip code.
For many children, the only place they will ever encounter a live performance, hands-on creation, or working artists is in school.
This ordinance takes important steps and it opens a door I'm asking you to walk through fully.
The report on granting priorities is an opportunity to ensure that arts education organizations, the ones that are putting teaching artists and cultural artists directly in front of children receive dedicated, meaningful support.
The children I'm speaking to about today will grow up to be Portland's artists, leaders, teachers, engineers.
What we give them right now, the experience of being seen and having their voice and culture matter, sorry, of discovering they have something to say, will give them forever.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Hi, my name is Jill Geet.
I'm a teaching thank you.
I'm representing Arts for Northwest Learning.
I'm expressing the importance of seeing a teacher artist in the school.
From my personal experience, I saw a Black ballerina for the first time, and that literally changed the course of my life.
I founded Ballet the Black Way, which goes into the schools and really teaches the I just— they don't always have the opportunity like I did growing up to see my face, to see my feet, to see who I am as a ballerina.
So these help support the artists in the school and represent just everybody that has that experience.
Thank you.
And these arts are so important, not just the basics of like teaching something ballet, it just opens the broader conversation of a shared experience in the arts.
Sometimes kids don't know, especially I'll just say ballet, don't have that experience of that broad stroke.
So having representation seeing someone that represents themselves is so important.
Um, it just adds and enriches.
So many teachers have come up to me and thanked me personally just for being in their school and just broadening what that can look like, how it's changed their students.
And other artists in the organization that I work for, they have masks they've built, they've kept for years.
So the impact of just having an artist come into the school changed my life, and I know I'm changing others' lives.
The impact that they can have, just like that short amount of time when they're not just doing the math, the read— the drills of school, and sometimes the teacher can't get to every kid.
So it gives an opportunity to really find those kids, those different learners, and really speak to them and open thank you.
Eben Hofer
And I think that's what we're doing here.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
We're helping open up arts to them that they never even saw in themselves.
It's just a healing— personally, it's healed my life, and I know that my work does that.
So thank you so much, and I'm just proud to represent that.
Thank you all for being here.
Colleagues, we are going to hear one more panel before we break because I I learned that we have some students who are hoping to testify, and I'd like to make sure that they can get back to their learning.
So why don't we call up the next panel, and then we're going to take a quick break.
Next up, we have Mary Emerson, followed by Evan Williams and Flynn Fitzgerald.
Hello, my name is Mary Emerson.
Shabri Vickers
I live in District 3.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I've been a volunteer tax preparer with VITA in the metro area for 10 years, during which time I have helped prepare and file over 1,000 tax returns for low to moderate income taxpayers.
Shabri Vickers
As a courtesy, I do remind Portland residents about the Portland Arts Tax.
Many have never heard of it.
For lower income I also check if they're exempt and will help them apply for the exemption if appropriate.
I do believe in the fundamental goals of art tax, and I'm— so my comments as I reviewed the ordinance and Exhibit A were through the lens of tax justice and equity together with ease of compliance for the taxpayers.
So I do appreciate a number of the changes that have been made.
Thank you.
I think we can go a little further.
My first concern is related to low-income exemptions.
They need to be automatic.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
It's really cruel when low-income taxpayers are fined and sometimes sent to collections for failure to file when they should be exempt.
Shabri Vickers
The current determination of low-income household exemptions is cumbersome and counterintuitive as it includes non-taxable income such as Social Security.
So the current proposed Council is great.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
It moves more towards information which is readily available in the Oregon tax return, moving to the Oregon taxable income as well as the tax—.
Shabri Vickers
That tax household size.
I think it can be taken a step further.
I think it's really important for Portland Revenue to proactively exempt people so that there is no question, there is no need to file.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
I heard those words today.
Shabri Vickers
I did not see those in the ordinance or in So I just wanna make sure that happens.
Arts tax is regressive.
Not only is it important to exempt really low-income people, but I think we actually should be looking at progressive income tax in this, a progressive tax in this situation.
However, in the interest of simplicity, I'd like to think about what people are doing today and the fact that this is an also-ran issue.
Thank you.
So linking higher tax brackets to other known local taxes such as SHS and PFA makes it a little more easier for people to comply.
They already know they need to consider going to Portland Revenue Online or their favorite tax— paid tax preparer to do those taxes.
So it takes away that concern.
Candace Avalos
Fines.
Shabri Vickers
The fines are really draconian for late and for paying late.
I really want to see that addressed.
People are being— have their tax doubled within 6 months.
These are people who really are just stressed on being able to make the rent.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So that needs to go further.
Shabri Vickers
On a personal level, not as a tax preparer, I am concerned that the proposed tax rates are going to yield significantly lower revenue than you're receiving now.
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
So I'd like that to be reconsidered, and I'm happy to work with revenue on any of these.
Thank you.
Eben Hofer
Thank you.
Shabri Vickers
Good morning, Chair Pirtle-Guiney and Vice Chair Zimmerman, members of the committee.
My name is Evan Williams, and I'm a Portland Public Schools elementary music teacher serving Riggler Elementary in District 2 and Vestal Elementary in District 3.
I'm here to share what I see every day in my classroom and how arts education impacts thank you.
I believe the arts support creativity, critical thinking, and cultural literacy, skills essential for our students, our communities, and our future.
Just as importantly, the arts create space for people to belong, to be seen, and to discover who they are.
I discovered the arts at a very difficult time of my life when I was a high school student, and what I told myself was that the beauty I found in it would be the one that I share with my students.
When their world is far beyond what they can control, they can still create beautiful things.
One student I met during my first year teaching here in Portland stands out to me.
At the time, they were shy and reserved, often needing patience and encouragement to find their voice.
Later that year, when we began learning the Black National Anthem during Black History Month, I noticed a change.
They sat a little straighter.
They sang a little stronger.
When we recorded our music to share with families, they were proud and excited.
Thank you.
Telling me that they could not wait for their parents to see it.
Over time, I've watched this student grow into a confident and dedicated young musician, joining after-school chorus, sharing music from their Latin heritage and music class, and just a couple weeks ago, performing in this year's District Elementary Honor Choir at the Heart of Portland event.
It was incredibly humbling and beautiful to see them using their voice with confidence and joy.
Testimonies like this are not uncommon.
Thank you.
They are the result of a coordinated effort to ensure every student, regardless of background, has access to the arts.
In PPS, our visual and performing arts programs use this funding alongside district resources to provide consistent instruction, dedicated teachers, and meaningful experiences for students.
Every year, I take my 4th grade students to the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall to play in the Link of Concert with the Oregon Symphony Orchestra.
Often this is their first experience with live music.
Last year we had a student join us from Venezuela a little bit late in the year, and he loved this experience.
The last day of school he came up to me with tears in his eyes and told me, Maestro, I loved to learn how to play the recorder, which is a surprise for me because it's a loud instrument.
In these moments of wonder and discovery, I am reminded that they are possible because of our city's commitment.
Commitment and sustained investment in arts education through the arts tax.
I urge you to support Councilman Dunphy's amendments to the arts tax and continue supporting the powerful and life-changing impact of the arts.
Thank you for your time.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Good morning, Chair Pirtle-Guiney, Vice Chair Zimmerman, and members of the committee.
My name is Flynn Fitzgerald, and I am a 12th grade student at Lincoln High School in Portland.
I'm the chair of the Portland Public Schools Student Voice Committee for the Arts, and I am here today to share my experience of arts education in PPS and to represent the thousands of students who have been the beneficiaries of the arts tax investments over the last 13 years.
My cohort of seniors will be the first graduating class of the arts tax, as we were kindergartners the first year it was implemented.
As a student involved in music throughout my school's art program, I have had the opportunity to perform, create, and collaborate on music daily.
One moment that stands out to me is when I recorded my first song in my second-year audio engineering class.
I worked long and hard with some friends to create the perfect lyrics and beats that we felt would connect with people on a deeper level.
From then on, I have had many opportunities to collaborate with other artists and record music at real recording studios thanks to my background in audio engineering.
For me, the arts are more than just a class.
It's an outlet where I can express and process my emotions in a way that can connect to other people.
I know that opportunities like this exist because our city invests in arts education.
Not every student has access to the arts outside of school, so having it during the school day makes a real difference.
I believe that arts access should be a fundamental part of every student's experience, not a privilege.
I have seen how the arts help students find their communities, their passions, their voice, and a place where they feel included and safe to express themselves.
Without programs like this, students miss out on the unique resources our schools can provide to grow and develop as artists, advocates, innovators, and leaders.
I want future students to have the same opportunities I have had, and I hope you will continue to support and build on the decade-long strength of arts education in Portland.
Thank you so much for your time and for listening.
Thank you all for being here, for sharing your experiences, all of you with the program.
We will take a 10-minute break.
We will be back here at 11:50.
We will finish out testimony and then move into council deliberations.
Um, we are now in recess.
Councilor Murillo, are you with us still, or are you still on break?
Hi, I'm here, and I'm sorry sorry to be camera off today, just dealing with some chronic pain today, but have been listening intently.
No, that's okay.
I'm just making sure we have quorum to get started again.
So if we have you with us, we will count you as 3 for quorum, and I will reconvene our meeting.
Um, our other colleagues will be back in shortly.
Sometimes these breaks run a little long, but I want to get us started again.
Diana, could you please call up our next panel for testimony?
Happy to.
Uh, next up we have Marissa Wolf, Paul Schneider, and Derek Trust.
Great, should I jump in?
Go right ahead.
Hi, I'm Marissa Wolf.
I'm the artistic director at Portland Center Stage, and we are right in the Pearl District in District 4.
I want to thank Councilor Dunphy and his staff for this incredible work.
I was just sharing with him that I've been in this seat for 8 years following Chris Coleman, who was one of the original arts tax supporters and initiators, and in these 8 years the conversation in the theater community from large to small-scale organizations has been really sort of sense of suffering with this, with the arts tax as it currently is.
So this is an exciting and thrilling moment that we want to support and lift up the opportunity and possibility of bringing it into the 21st— well, it was in the 21st century, but bringing it into just to share from our experience as a large— as a major arts org here in Portland, Oregon, a year ago we launched a Save Us campaign.
And though we are one of— we are the largest theater in the region and the second largest in the state, we are not immune to the challenges that we're seeing.
State, we were really suffering, just as the opera has just launched a Save Us campaign, just as the Oregon Children's Theater launched a Save Us campaign as well.
It's a very difficult time to be a nonprofit, and we desperately need the support of the city.
And in fact, this city and members of the city council have stepped in to support us, and we are turning it around.
And I'm really happy to share that we're able to welcome over 100,000 people into our theater every year, 9,000 kids, as well as 8,000 people who come to 100 free community programs every year.
So that's been really an important part of the way we show up and why I continue to sit in my job and serve this community with theater and theater education and arts.
Thank you.
So a thank you and a huge green light in support of this increase in the arts tax.
Thank you very much.
Right ahead.
Thomas Lanham
Good morning.
Jamie Dunphy
My name is Paul Snyder and I'm the president and CEO of the Oregon Symphony.
And I come today in support of the proposed ordinance amending City Code 610.
The proposed changes are thoughtful and necessary, not just for large institutions like ourselves, but for all of our arts organizations.
Thank you.
These are important votes for not just ourselves, but for the full breadth of Portland's creative community.
We hope they're the beginning of a larger discussion about this tax and overall funding for our arts and our community.
At its heart, the arts tax is a statement of civic values.
Culture is not a luxury, it is infrastructure.
Since 2012, the tax has supported hundreds of artistic experiences in every corner of our city.
For the Oregon Symphony alone, last year we gave away over 24,000 free tickets.
Yes.
We also provided free movie tickets to our residents and welcomed over 27,000 people to free community events and educational events.
75% Of those educational events were oriented towards children in Title I schools.
The proposed increase to $50 with an annual CPI indexing is meaningful and necessary.
For small—.
For arts organizations in general, funds are thin, but for small arts organizations in particular, from community theaters, dance collectives, individual muralists, and classical chamber groups Thank you.
For many arts groups, inflation-adjusted grants could mean the difference between sustainability and closure.
In our view, the only other thing required is transparent and compelling storytelling back to those who pay this tax about the vitality and the arts in our community that those dollars make possible.
Another fix addresses the fact that the current tax threshold is so low that it's regressive, as others have observed.
A tax that asks the least affluent Portlanders to subsidize arts institutions contradicts the very premise of the arts tax to increase access to the arts for those for whom it is most difficult to get.
The proposed reform substantially addressed this, realigning the framework with the original intent.
Also, the proposed amendments address directly the gaps in the law's basic definitions.
Those gaps have real impacts.
Without shared definitions, organizations serving marginalized communities have been disadvantaged in competing for funds explicitly intended for those communities.
The new high-quality arts education definition grounded in the Portland Arts Education Framework similarly creates accountability where ambiguity previously existed.
Finally, the explicit inclusion of representatives for arts organizations at different budget scales is particularly welcome.
While the interests of a $75,000 community arts nonprofit and a multimillion-dollar institution are inherently and symbolically connected, they're not always identical.
And this committee composition acknowledges that.
Thank you.
Cornel Westland
Councilmember Smith.
Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
Thomas Lanham
This amendment to the arts tax ordinance does just that.
Jamie Dunphy
Portland is a city with an extraordinary creative identity.
Our arts and cultural sector is a driver of economic vitality, a source of community cohesion, and helps the city and its citizens understand and appreciate themselves.
The arts tax honors that identity with real investments.
These amendments make the existing mechanism fair, more effective, and more durable— exactly the modernization our sector needs, but not the last modernization needed overall.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you.
Thank you.
Go right ahead.
Shabri Vickers
Good afternoon.
Thomas Lanham
My name is Derek Trost.
Jamie Dunphy
Thanks for this opportunity to speak to the committee.
I'm an active professional musician, and I design recording studios and live music venues.
Thomas Lanham
I serve as a professional in acoustics on the Portland Noise Review Board, and I'm testifying here today as co-chair of Music Oregon's Music Advocacy Council.
Jamie Dunphy
We focus our energies on the commercial sector of the music community, i.e., indie thank you.
To clarify, as an organization, we have not been recipients of arts tax funds, but we are enthusiastic supporters of our many sibling organizations doing important work in the community that have directly benefited from this particular funding stream.
I want to emphasize today 2 things central to the wisdom of this program: arts education and the economy.
And I'll keep this brief.
Investment in arts education are certainly a long game in economic terms, but essential to the ongoing vitality of our independent commercial music economy.
The economic impact study we produced in partnership with the State of Oregon and PSU identifies the regional Portland music economy as responsible for roughly one-third of an over $7 billion per year economic engine, bigger than fishing, at a time when we in Portland are looking for opportunities to confidently bolster a struggling economy, we cannot miss when we're considering improving the music economy.
It's very simple, of course.
Active musicians emerge from a healthy arts or education environment in a community context that values and supports them as professionals.
Our unique Art Stacks program is an essential part of that dynamic, and we are pleased to it is imperfect, and we are proposing changes today that I think are excellent improvements, but its short and long-term effects are real and substantial.
Shabri Vickers
Thank you for your consideration and support.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you all for sharing your interest in the legislation before us today.
Thank you.
And that completes testimony.
Okay, colleagues, we now have an opportunity for discussion.
Councilor Avalos, you are in the queue.
Go right ahead.
Candace Avalos
All right, thank you.
Uh, and I assume the folks who are on the panel are still in the room.
Yes.
Hi, Council President.
Okay, well, um, I do have some questions.
Let me just give some comments to start.
Um, first, I want to acknowledge the importance of the Arts Education Access Fund, as we're hearing in the testimony and just from community over the last few months, and just the impact it's had over the last decade.
So supporting arts education in our schools and helping connect Portlanders to arts and Councilor Smith.
Thank you, Mayor.
I think that the arts tax is a great tool for supporting arts and culture across the city is really key.
So thank you for working on this.
At the same time, it's clear that the current structure of the arts tax has had real challenges.
It's been confusing for many residents, particularly those with low incomes.
And we've seen how rising costs and flat revenue have started to erode funding, especially for arts organizations and community-based programs.
So what I appreciate about this proposal is that I see it as a meaningful step in the right direction and an important effort to I see that it helps reduce the burden on many low-income Portlanders by raising the income threshold, and I do have some questions about that, but simplifying how the tax works is good, and it matters because we've seen the real impact of rising costs, right?
People are struggling with, you know, even these relatively small expenses add up when you consider they've got rent and groceries and utilities and transportation and everything else.
Councilmember thank you.
So I think it's important that we're just honest about the equity issues embedded in the current structure.
And for too long, people who were already struggling financially were expected to navigate and pay into a system that didn't account for their ability to pay.
And that's a lot of where my kind of— some of my thoughts and questions are around.
But again, this moves us in a good direction.
I think lastly, it does raise a broader conversation for council about thank you.
I just want to echo what Councilor Smith said about why our systems so often continue asking those with the least financial flexibility to contribute more while we hesitate to ask more from those with the greatest ability to absorb these costs.
So that's just something that I want us to continue to talk about as we're— if we're serious about building a more equitable system, that we need to keep moving towards models that better align contribution with people's actual ability to pay.
And then I appreciate the focus on strengthening the definitions because improving the oversight, making sure the investments are reaching underserved communities thank you.
And lastly, I want to personally say to Council President, I know that I— our lovely constituent, Miss Aura from Russellville, she sat me down at the retirement home and gave me a big old talk on the arts tax in my first couple months, and I totally just bunted it to you.
So I'm really grateful.
I was like, you know, let me get you in touch with Council President, and I'm really glad that you took it up because it is something in particular her thank you.
I heard from her perspective as an older Portlander who just felt like didn't understand how her investments were worth it considering her financial constraints as somebody on a fixed income.
So I appreciate that you're addressing that and you're addressing a lot of the concerns I heard from her.
With all of that, I want to ask, you know, as it relates to the threshold changes, I appreciate the increase to the exemption thresholds, but as we know, many Portlanders, as I said, are just struggling with these affordability constraints even with these thresholds.
So can you just talk us a little bit more, talk us through a little bit more about how staff landed on specifically those $20,000 and $40,000 numbers and what analysis informed where those lines were drawn?
Eben Hofer
Absolutely, Councilor.
I'll take the first shot at this.
The question is, how far can you raise the assessment?
And if you're looking to keep the same amount of money in the fund year over yes.
You can raise the assessment and you can raise the threshold.
And then those 2 things essentially balance each other out and you end up with continuity in the fund moving forward.
So we've viewed as, if you're talking about council action, how far council can go without potentially referring a new or a different total structure of this tax back to voters, how far should council go?
And we chose that that $50 number, is what $35 would be if it had been indexed to inflation this whole time, as a relatively fair and transparent limit for how far that assessment should reach.
So if you take that up to $50, we said, all right, given that, how high can we raise the floor without bankrupting the fund?
And that's how you got these numbers.
Candace Avalos
Thank you.
And, you know, I'll just note that, so so in the proposal, right, it says that 44% of Portlanders are no longer going to pay under the system.
First, let me just say, tragic to hear that 44% of Portlanders are making such a low amount of money.
I think we need to just call that out.
Um, and so, you know, talk to me about— um, it sounds— I appreciate that it sounds like you're kind of supplanting it, right, like by increasing it and reducing the amount of people.
But can you just talk a little about how that— how does that shift the effective burden across the remaining tax base?
And do we have projections for what different income groups will actually experience under the updated structure?
Jamie Dunphy
You know, I'll say that I think that maybe not answering the question exactly how I— you say it, but, you know, I think one area for improvement that I'd like to look at is tiering this, seeing if, as you know, we said we have an intentional comeback date to council to see if things are working.
And I think that there's, you know, one of the scenarios we had looked at early basically was creating, if you make below this threshold, you pay— you don't pay anything.
If you make between that threshold and X number, you pay this.
And if you pay above that, you pay another amount.
For now, for the sake of complexity, we think that this is the best way to set ourselves up for success for the first year and see how things are going.
If the fund does not create the amount of money, if the— if we find that the voters are still overly burdened by it at the lower end of the spectrum, and we need to supplement that.
I think that is a solution specifically that I'd like to bring back.
More to that?
I didn't really fully answer your question, but okay.
Candace Avalos
A good enough answer, unless Steve, you want to say, add something.
Thomas Lanham
No, I think you answered it actually quite well for not a tax person.
Jamie Dunphy
Not a tax person.
Candace Avalos
Gold star.
Wonderful.
Lastly, just as it relates to like continued oversight of this, I'm curious, you know, one of the stated goals here is long-term financial sustainability of the Arts, Education, and Access Fund, right?
And so if revenues significantly underperform or overperform projections over time, what mechanisms do you expect the council will have for future review or adjustment of those thresholds and rates?
Eben Hofer
I'm happy to answer that to the best of my ability, which is when we get that report back from the Revenue Division in 2028, we'll be able to get a decent view of what has happened with what the changes that we've made here.
At that point, the 2 major tools we have to change are the assessment and the threshold for filing.
And we could adjust those to get back to, you know, whether we need more money in the fund or whether we've overshot where we wanted to be.
And want to provide some more tax relief for low-income Portlanders, those would be options that could potentially be available to council at that time.
Also available to council at that time could be to rethink the tax in a more thorough way.
It could move to a percentage-based or a graduated system.
However, again, that's not what we're proposing today.
It's something with more continuity.
Jamie Dunphy
The other part of it is that with the improved definitions and the improved bookends around the oversight committee.
We think that there's gonna be a better opportunity for that body to be empowered in a way that actually meaningfully gets information to us right now.
We've done a lot of work as a body on our appointed boards and commissions, and a lot of that work will benefit this oversight body as well.
And we hope that that will be a continued benefit and that those members' time will be well respected.
Thank you.
Candace Avalos
And do you think that committee, just as it relates to the oversight role, I'm wondering, because this proposal does include automatic inflation adjustments, are there any guardrails in place if future CPI increases begin creating affordability concerns for residents?
Do you see that conversation happening in that oversight board?
Like, what is your— what do you believe is their relationship to those kinds of issues?
Problems that we are asking them to solve versus when they bring them to council.
Does that make sense?
Jamie Dunphy
It would certainly be my hope that that would be one of the big areas that the oversight committee continues to look at.
Not only how are the dollars being spent and are we getting the values that, you know, the value that we are asking for where we're spending them, but also what is the experience of the taxpayer and how is it being felt in the community?
You're right, if we randomly had an inflation year where we had 10% inflation, it doesn't, make a lot of sense for us to raise the tax necessarily by 10%.
But, um, so we need those built-in checkpoints, and I believe, um, there will be a formal process for approving our rates, uh, with a lot of— as with most things.
Is that right?
Thomas Lanham
We didn't build that in, in this iteration, and the reason is normally that's not something that would come to an elected body every year to review.
Obviously, there are multiple touch points as far as council's authority to check any, any typically those rates are indexed, both the threshold, so the Oregon taxable income threshold is indexed as well as the rate.
So 2 years from now it won't be $20,000 and $40,000, it might be $22,500 and $45,000.
So that in and of itself should take care of the inflationary component.
So the and to the extent that it doesn't, you know, anyone in the room can, can throw a flag on that for review or a change.
Eben Hofer
We are also in an audit cycle on, on this tax.
So the auditor is going to be getting feedback from the Office of Arts and Culture every year and publishing updates.
There's a number of different people who have their fingers in the pot making sure this is working right, including council members.
Candace Avalos
Well, thank you.
I appreciate that.
I definitely plan to support it.
And as we've discussed, I think there are some ongoing questions and continued efforts to make it more affordable and accessible.
So I'd love to work with you on that.
But I think this is a good step and I plan to support it.
Thank you.
Eben Hofer
Thank you.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Colleagues, I put myself in the queue.
Before I move to my comments though, I just want to thank you, Councilor Avalos, for raising the concern around the number of Portlanders who are now going to be exempt from this tax.
When I first saw these numbers, I actually reached out to my staff and said, are you sure this is correct?
Because we clearly have work to do if that many Portlanders are making under $20,000 or under $40,000 for couples filing jointly dollars a year.
And I think as we look at some of the challenges our city faces, And we look at those numbers, it's very clear that they're connected.
So colleagues, before I talk about the arts education tax itself, I want to ground us a little bit in what arts funding actually buys, because our work here is often dry.
Um, this is a walrus.
Yeah.
It is a walrus that my kindergartner made there we go.
Now it's in the camera.
Councilor Murillo can see it too.
Um, and she is very proud of this walrus, but I want to use this as a way to talk about the importance of arts education.
We hear often about how it catches kids who are not engaged in other ways, how it's good for our mental health, our creativity.
Um, but it's also teaching discrete skills that are really important.
So my kindergartner, who by the way is really into sharks and polar bears— and understandably they don't dive deep on marine animals in kindergarten— but when she found out she got to make a walrus, which is at least another marine animal, she was very excited.
Um, this project was a multi-week project.
They painted these pieces of paper, they cut them out, they shared them with each other, they built the they made the painting.
It took multiple classes.
And learning that stamina of a multi-step process— for anybody who's a parent, you know that is something that is learned.
It takes time.
And along with learning about the arts, she got to learn how to do a multi-step project like that in school.
My older child is in 5th grade.
He, in true 10-year-old attitude, would not let me bring a of his art.
But I remember a couple of years ago when he learned to draw in perspective, and he's a kid who has never felt like he's a good artist, has never really liked arts education.
He doesn't connect that he's very musical.
He thinks about arts education as the fine arts, as drawing.
But he hangs out with a lot of kids who are very into the sciences, and when they learned to draw in perspective and connected that to engineering and connected that to drawing molecules and connected that to the other things they enjoy, it was a shift for many of them.
And the arts education does all of the amazing things that we hear about to connect kids to school, but it also is a fundamental building block for the other learning that our kids are doing in school.
And I want to make sure we don't lose that when we talk about arts education.
Thank you.
So here we are at a time when school districts across the country are cutting critical arts programs, courses, instructors, because the funding is not there.
And when our schools in Portland are cutting critical programs and services.
And because Portlanders made a built-in commitment to the arts, our schools continue to have and this commitment funds not just arts education, but also, as we heard today, many arts organizations in our communities.
Those are things that I think many Portlanders value.
And yet I don't meet anyone in this job who likes the arts tax as it currently stands.
I don't.
The arts tax as it exists today is cumbersome for Portlanders who pay it.
Candace Avalos
I agree.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Frustrating for filers who have exemptions.
Structurally as regressive as one could get.
Eminently insolvent, and enforcement is questionable in its possibility even.
The legislation makes meaningful improvements to each of these problems within the confines that are set on us.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And I think most importantly, it raises the threshold from an absurd $1,000— that is working a few events as a gig, that is babysitting, that is mowing lawn money— to $20,045.
And it lines up this tax with how people already think about how they file their taxes.
It reduces, as we heard, by almost 150,000 Portlanders the number of people who pay this tax.
Let me say that again.
This is a tax break for almost 150,000 Portlanders.
And for the rest of us, it restores the tax So it essentially retroactively indexes it and keeps that indexing moving forward.
And for that, almost 150,000 Portlanders get a tax break, and our kids continue to get arts education at a time when our schools can barely keep other programs going.
Thank you.
We have a commitment to this one.
I want to be clear, I am not— I, I am sponsoring this legislation.
I am not sponsoring it because it is perfect.
Nope.
It does not fix all of the issues.
This tax remains somewhat, though much less so, regressive.
It does not fix all of our schools' problems.
We do not have the power to do that.
But it does take a huge step in beginning the work.
It does restore our previous commitment to the arts by returning us to the buying power of when it was originated and indexing it moving forward.
And I think most importantly, as important as those 2 things are, most importantly, it creates clear direction for us to continue the evaluation and the work so that we can have the conversations that Councilor Avalos raised, so that we can have conversations about what this needs to look like over the next year, make adjustments if need be, get it right, and in the meantime, make sure that we continue the commitment that Portlanders asked for.
This came on the ballot.
That Portlanders asked for, for arts in our community.
I don't know how I could not support that.
So thank you, Councilor Dunphy, for not only doing the heavy lifting on this but asking for my support as well.
And colleagues, I hope that this can earn your support today too.
Councilor Zimmerman, go right ahead.
Eric Zimmerman
Thanks.
While it's an elimination of a tax for approximately 142,000, it is a 42% increase on the remaining of our 650,000 population.
So it's worth big questions, and I am a little troubled by the amount of items today that are, we don't know, we'll figure it out after the first year.
I am just— that is challenging me that this is any sort of meaningful reform today.
The idea that— all right, we complain about Measure 50 and we complain about Measure 5.
One of the reasons we complain about those, or one of the reasons they exist, is because taxes were not predictable from one year to the next in the '80s, right?
Governments would say, here's the number we need, and then they'd stick it out there and it would fluctuate.
Predictability is important, and we're asking to make a change that then there's no commitment that it won't continue to change with a, we're not sure if this is going to work.
And so it almost seems like we're going into We're failing to acknowledge what led to a really bad tax structure to start with.
And so I'm challenged by this proposal.
I do very much appreciate some of the definition changes, the code changes.
I think that there is something about the statements that you provided in your presentation about people not understanding the impact.
I was at a fundraising gala for Profile Theater, what, last week or a week before, and people there were complaining about the ARCS tax.
People who are dedicated and opening their wallets to the ARCS.
So I'm cautious with some of the advocacy that's going on because it's almost getting framed as that you're either for the arts or you're against the arts, and I don't think that's what Portlanders are saying when they say, I don't like the arts tax.
So I have a few questions because I think there's some parts of this I can be supportive of, and I want to just kind of get to the function a little bit here.
When it comes to teachers in classrooms, do you know why— and I recognize none of us were here in 2012— Do you know why that is a major part of the funding versus the children's levy that taxpayers pay in Portland, which already puts education programs forward directly related to school?
Do you know why that part of it is included in the arts tax?
Jamie Dunphy
You know, my understanding is that the original coalition that came to try and pass this as a campaign pivoted partway through the campaign.
And largely this was supposed to be originally a funding source to permanently support all arts organizations.
But my understanding is that the leadership of that committee, including City Council leadership at the time, pivoted to focus on schools.
Dan Ryan
Okay.
Eric Zimmerman
Because it seems like Portlanders have said, we understand we're gonna pay the children's levy and that's a direct relation to the lack of education funding in the Oregon system, um, and it seems like such a likely place for the teacher aspect of this to take place.
Uh, I, I'm curious, you know, there's— do you have an idea of what the average award is to arts organizations?
Not to the classrooms, but actually just to our, our very various groups that do, that have, or that fall in the category of Portland arts organization?
Eben Hofer
Yeah, the tiers are changing this year, but maybe—.
Shabri Vickers
Darian Jones.
Eric Zimmerman
Do you have a rough number?
Like, are we talking—.
Eben Hofer
We're starting at, so they're larger than small grants, so $25,000 and up.
Okay.
Hi, Darian.
Shabri Vickers
Good morning, Council.
Darian Jones, Assistant Director for the Office of Arts and Culture.
Sure.
Grants in the Office of Culture currently range from $5,000 to $175,000 for different arts organizations.
Thank you.
Eric Zimmerman
Okay, that is very helpful.
So I am wondering, given that, right, $5,000 is perhaps like project-based, it's certainly not the money that keeps an organization afloat for a year versus hundreds of thousands is like a I'm wondering what kinds of things are being funded in that.
That's a broad range.
What types of things are being funded?
Because we did hear some testimony, and I don't understand it fully, about some groups aren't eligible.
And what does that mean?
Because the question I have in the back of my head is, what groups are sustainable based on their ticket prices or other grant money, and what groups are not?
I think that's a great question.
What groups must receive arts tax funds in order to exist in our community?
And that's been unclear to me.
Shabri Vickers
Thanks for the question, Councilor Zimmerman.
There's 2 programs that we have.
The primary one that we're talking about today is the General Operating Support Program, which provides up to 5% of funds collected from the Arts Access Fund to organizations that are nonprofits in the city that are performing work that serves underserved communities, K through 12 Portlanders, and provides so what that looks like are programs in some of our local cultural institutions like the Portland Art Museum, which works to allow students who live in Multnomah County free access to the museum.
They just need to show their ID that they live here or provide information.
Additionally, we work with the Regional Arts and Culture Council to provide reduced tickets to those arts organizations and events that happen in the city.
We have about 79 of the city's large arts organizations that are funded through the Arts Access Fund as well.
Dan Ryan
Okay.
Eric Zimmerman
You said Multnomah County.
So does this tax paid by Portlanders benefit kids in Gresham?
Shabri Vickers
This tax goes directly to the 6 school districts that are in Portland and hires certified arts teachers, and it funds Portland-based arts organizations that serve Portlanders in the city.
The program I mentioned is a program that is supported through the arts tax, That's a bigger program at the museum as well.
Eric Zimmerman
Okay, um, not so much speaking about the, the teachers in classroom part, uh, but in terms of when we hear testimony about groups who don't get access, what are the types of things, if you're an arts organization in Portland, that keep you from getting chosen?
And there was some talk about emerging groups, and I, and I I listened to that intently because my career and life here has certainly told me there is certainly a way in which there becomes an inner circle about who gets funded from the specialty pots.
And I don't know enough about that to know if that is the case with the arts tax or not.
So what do you think that they're referring to with those like emerging groups of art groups, or is it just the who knows who group?
Shabri Vickers
I believe people may be historically referring to some of the tiered systems that the city imported through the Regional Arts and Culture Council, which, you know, there were cycles in which different organizations were admitted to the General Operating Support Program based on their eligible budget sizes and activities that happened in Portland.
An example is there is an organization that's in our program that was recently awarded additional dollars through the $1.6 million that council provided, but that organization moved locations into Hillsboro, so they were not eligible for the entire budget, but we recognized so those are organizations who would be eligible.
Organizations who are not eligible likely don't meet the budget requirements or don't perform the majority of their services in the city.
Dan Ryan
Okay.
Eric Zimmerman
Councilor Dunphy, I'm just wondering, you know, like I mentioned, there are some, I think, important code changes that you've nominated here from the City Budget Office.
You know, the definition of a teacher, which as the son of a teacher, I care a lot about, right?
Those are certified, actual licensed positions.
So I think some of that has been helpful in clarifying.
And I am— I'd ask your interest, or what was the idea between grouping those code changes together with a number change?
Meaning, and I say that because—.
Sure.
I'm probably quite supportive of the number of the code changes today while I am trying to see if I'm feeling palatable to the number change.
But you've grouped them together.
Can you talk a little bit about your motivation there?
Jamie Dunphy
Yeah, you know, as Director Lanham mentioned, there's been 14 years now of city councils talking about how this tax is not working.
I worked under a previous city commissioner who also talked about how it thank you.
The tax was not working and we made some small incremental changes at the time.
This, we're at a, as I said in my remarks, we're at a crisis point.
This tax is no longer feasible after a certain point.
And if we don't get our act together and not only change the underlying code to ensure that, you know, the underlying code is really about not only ensuring that we are spending our money appropriately, but demonstrating it to the public in a really meaningful way.
And then we also need to make sure that we are meeting the economic reality those 2 things have been talked about for 14 years.
No one has taken action on them.
And I honestly view this as having one bite of the apple, that if I'm gonna get something across the finish line, we should do it all at once.
Eric Zimmerman
Okay, I know the chair is gonna cut me off here in a second, so I'll just— I appreciate that.
I think I'm taking a different perspective, and I'd like to see the changes implemented to see how we can make sure that it's delivering exactly the way we think, and then let voters take a vote on it.
I think we should take a look at whether or not they're ready for a 42% increase.
I will also just— I appreciated you mentioned a tiered system, and I'll tell you, I'm much more in favor of moving that direction.
This seems wild to say, but I frankly don't see a whole lot of a difference between having to pay $50 at $1,000 of income and $50 at below, uh, At minimum wage, which is $33,000, I think, in your documents, which is below the federal poverty line, asking an increase there, I'm not there, right?
So to increase that for that group of population seems like a very big lift, all things considered with the lack of indexing since 2012.
But there's something about I think there's a lot that's coming out that I think is positive, which is all hands are in.
But this is a big number, and starting it at below minimum or at the minimum wage level is concerning for me.
And that's just not a group that I'm going to be prepared to raise taxes on right now.
And most of what I've been trying to do has been reduce taxes on folks.
And I put this with the fact that I'm almost certain that the City Council will pass the transportation utility fee, which will go on the bill of every single door as well.
Yes.
And so these things combined are going to make for an expensive '26 and '27 and '28.
And so I'm not prepared to support this at this time, Chair.
And I am open to different or tiered systems, and I am open to separating the question with respect to the other code changes, definitional changes, et cetera.
So your presentation was thorough.
I appreciate it.
I hope that the changes to the code So that the collection doesn't have to wait for changes to this ordinance, because that sounds like it doesn't, and I hope that it can happen.
And I'll leave it at that.
Thanks, Chair.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor.
Colleagues, we need to wrap because staff need time to turn over this room.
But Council President, my plan had been to move this today.
One of our colleagues just spoke to potential changes.
Jamie Dunphy
I'm still prepared to ask for a vote today unless you would like If at all possible, I would love to have this passed through committee today, and I would be very open to discussing other possible changes at the full council.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Okay, then I would like to move us to a vote.
We do have 2 colleagues who are remote and online right now.
Could you please call the roll, Diana?
Could I please get a motion and a second?
Candace Avalos
So moved.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Second.
Okay, so just to confirm, moved by Avalos and seconded by Pirtle-Guiney?
Dan Ryan
Correct.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
All right, Ryan.
Thomas Lanham
I see—.
Eben Hofer
Okay.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
We're going to come back to him, but mark him as absent for the moment.
Eric Zimmerman
Morillo.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Thank you, Councilor Dunphy, for bringing this forward.
It's a really delicate and difficult issue to tackle, and I admire you guys a lot for doing that hard work.
I think I would love to see these changes happen before the next tax cycle, and I also firmly believe that we can't let perfect be the enemy of the good when we're trying to make improvements, because or else we will be waiting forever for all things at all times.
So I'm proudly voting aye.
Zimmerman.
Eric Zimmerman
I'm disappointed that once again our committee is not being used to work through something.
Instead, it's just being used as a gate to pass through.
Uh, I vote no.
Aye.
Candace Avalos
Aye.
Elana Pirtle-Guiney
Uh, let's see, with a vote of 3 ayes, 1 no, and 1 absent, the motion to refer ordinance document number 2026-147 to City Council with the recommendation thank you all.
Thank you.
And with that, I will adjourn our meeting.
Thank you.