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.
Olivia Clark
Good morning, everyone.
It's a thin crowd out there today.
Um, I'd like to—.
Hannah Morrison
Where are our fans?
Mitch Green
Where are our fans?
Olivia Clark
Rideshare.
Or a parking space.
Or let's see, or the, or the door.
Which door are we using?
Uh, I'm going to call the meeting of the Public Works Committee to order.
It is Tuesday, October 13th, at 9:32.
Diana, can you please call the roll?
Unidentified speaker
Good morning.
Green?
Mitch Green
Here.
Unidentified speaker
Smith?
Loretta Smith
Here.
Unidentified speaker
Here.
Olivia Clark
Here.
And Christopher, can you please read the statement of conduct?
And good morning, nice to have you here.
Unidentified speaker
Good morning, uh, welcome to the meeting of the Public Works Committee.
To testify before this committee in person or virtually, you must sign up in advance on the committee agenda at www.portland.gov/council/agenda/public-works-committee or by calling 311.
Registration for virtual testimony closes 1 hour prior to the meeting.
In-person testifiers must sign up before the agenda item is heard.
If public testimony will be taken on an item, individuals may testify for 3 minutes unless the Chair states otherwise.
Your microphone will be muted when your time is over.
Olivia Clark
The Chair preserves order.
Unidentified speaker
Disruptive conduct such as shouting, refusing to conclude your testimony when your time is up, or interrupting others' testimony or committee deliberations will not be allowed.
If you cause disruption, a warning will be given.
Further disruption results 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.
If you're a lobbyist, identify the organization you represent.
Virtual testifiers should unmute themselves when the clerk calls your name.
Thank you.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, Christopher.
Colleagues, today we have a very full, meaty agenda, very meaty topics.
We're going to spend the first part of our meeting discussing the citywide asset management strategy.
And then move to policy concepts for regulating autonomous vehicles.
We'll take a break, and we have 2 ordinances from PBOT.
First is an ordinance to address parking issues in the Lloyd District, Lloyd Event District, and the second ordinance is a real property transfer and an MOU between ODOT and PBOT.
So with that, um, Diana, could you please call the first item?
Unidentified speaker
Item number 1, document number 2026-358, Citywide Asset Management Strategy.
Olivia Clark
Colleagues, you know this is our long-anticipated citywide asset management strategy.
It's here, uh, almost complete.
Um, I'm delighted to welcome our city's first-ever Chief Asset Management Officer, Emily I know there are some people that want to call your last name Trench, which we think would be very appropriate for Public Works.
And Emily is here along with Tate White, who's been shepherding this work for the last couple of years.
And we're going to talk about the initial strategy, keeping in mind that we're anticipating the funding strategy, more information to come to us in December.
But what I'd first like to do is to invite our City Administrator Raymond Lee to make some opening comments about this topic.
Thank you so much for being here with us.
Unidentified speaker
Thank you, Vice President Clark, and just thank the committee for having me this morning to talk about this topic.
When we look at some of the core things that are impacting not where we are today only, but where we will be in the future, assets is at the top of that conversation.
How we are maintaining what we have today to build a prosperous future is really decisions that are going to be made today.
Now, I know this elected body did not put us in the position that we are in today, and I know this elected body, though, will have to make some very hard decisions as it relates to how do we move forward as a city that is investing in its infrastructure and its assets overall, and what are we saying is important to us as a city, and what are our priorities in this.
This work that we're doing right now is much bigger than just providing a report to the City Council as it relates to what our assets are, what are the condition that they're in currently.
It's really talking about how are we building towards our future as a city.
This will be a building block in that larger system of really investing in our infrastructure and our assets overall As a city.
There will be future conversations as it relates to potential bond programs.
There will be future conversations as it relates to what are we prioritizing within a bond program, because we're so far behind on our assets today.
There's no other avenue for us to really explore financially outside of looking at those financial tools to bring us back into a condition that we all see as sufficient for our city of our size and scope and the services that we're delivering to a vast community and really region.
'Cause we know we talk about the city of Portland's population roughly around 650,000, but our region population is 2.4 million.
And that region still uses this city as a hub for resources and services, and that has a tremendous amount of impact on our resources as a city.
One of the biggest things that concerned me when coming into the city and getting a tour— Tate at that time was a part of that tour— and looking at our assets as a whole, it's very concerning, uh, the condition that we're in as a city.
Uh, and I can say right now we're not at the position that I would say, from my professional expertise, We need to be as a city as it relates to the investments that we're making in the assets and infrastructure that we have as a city.
So I welcome this conversation.
I want to be at the forefront of this conversation.
This is a part of the reason that we're dedicated, and thank you, Council, for approving the budget to upgrade, uh, this position in the city, uh, so it can have the, uh, the level of expertise but also the hierarchy within the organization to truly have guidance in where we're heading as a city and be able to influence that and be intentional about how that influence happens.
So I know this is a commitment from this council as we went through the budgeting process, as we continue to have these conversations.
I want you to know it's at the top of my list as well as a city administrator to ensure that we're setting the city up not for only current success but long-term success as well.
And I'm sorry, Councilor, I won't be able to run because it is budget season and we got some budget meetings starting off.
It seemed like we just ended, but we're back in the mix again.
Olivia Clark
Well, thank you so much for being here and really providing us a context for this discussion.
I appreciate the— your look at the region and the state and really put it in context.
I'm sure that in your experience, we don't stack up very well against other cities of our size.
We are so far behind.
And this is the first issue that this committee took up 2 years ago.
We knew the gravity of it.
We had read the auditor's reports about how bad off we are.
And some of us talk about it all the time in the community because I don't think the community, the people who live in Portland, understand that we own over $80 billion worth of assets and so many of them are on the verge of failure.
So this is critical.
So much appreciate your leadership in this.
So let's call up our 2 folks, Emily and Tate.
Do you want to come on up and walk us through this, give us a little status report?
And welcome.
Good to see you again, Tate.
And Emily, welcome.
First time, I think, before a committee.
Emily Trish
Thank you very much.
Tate White
Good morning.
Thank you, Chair Clark, Vice Chair Smith, good morning, Councilor Smith and Councilors Koyama Lane, Kanal, and Green.
My name is Tate White.
I use she/they pronouns, and I'm the Deputy Director of the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability.
While I get us set up, I am really thrilled to introduce, um, Chief Asset Management Officer Emily Trish, our first one.
Do you want to say a few opening remarks, Emily?
Emily Trish
Sure, thank you.
Good morning, Council.
My name is Emily Trish, and I am your Chief Asset Management Officer.
I'm very happy to be here joining you in this important mission for infrastructure and for Portland.
I want to thank you for your vision recognizing infrastructure asset management as foundational to Portland's future.
The infrastructure we plan, build, operate, and maintain is more than just a collection of physical assets.
It underpins our economy, it's key to public safety, and it supports the quality of life of every Portlander.
Going forward, we will create a shared approach to managing our assets supporting better-informed decisions, directing resources where they provide the greatest value, and strengthening our ability to deliver for Portland's needs today and for the long term.
So the strategy you'll be receiving this morning is an important step in this process.
I'm looking forward to working with partners across the city to align our efforts, making the best use of our resources, and delivering better outcomes for the people we serve.
Now I'll turn it back over to Deputy Director White to present the asset management strategy.
Tate White
All right, thank you, Officer Trish.
So I'm really proud to present you all the first iteration of the citywide asset management strategy.
It's Portland's first, and I want to thank the many colleagues who have worked with me on this strategy.
Before we get into the strategy's vision and objectives, we will review a current state of infrastructure and asset management in Portland.
We'll review that over— overall, and we'll talk about the many benefits that we can achieve from good practices in asset management.
We'll then end by talking about governance and implementation, and we really welcome your questions.
So in short, asset management is a system of tools that allow us to maintain, expand, and improve infrastructure to deliver outcomes to the community, including services and achieving equitable outcomes.
Assets are physical items that provide a value or a service.
Our focus is on the built and natural assets gray and green infrastructure that provide important services to our community and the organization.
When we talk about infrastructure asset management, we are talking about how we take care of roads, parks, bridges, natural systems, community facilities, and the massive urban framework that forms the backbone of public services to our community, because that's really what it's about.
So the City Asset Managers Group, also known as CAMG for short, has been producing an annual report on the status and condition of the city's infrastructure for over 20 years.
That's actually in city policy.
In the June presentation, I mentioned that we are working on this report in tandem with the strategy, and it is provided as an attachment.
Dozens of professionals and data systems contribute to this annual report.
And it provides good information on overall portfolio trends and context.
However, I do want to note that there are inconsistent methods and reliability that underpin the data collection, processing, and reporting.
The strategy aims to address this variability with stronger data governance and the development of citywide standards and frameworks.
These will promote accountability and consistency while retaining flexibility for specific asset class differences.
The Chief Asset Management Officer will be accountable for this reporting going forward in coordination with the many professionals who contribute to it.
So the City of Portland, as we've been discussing, manages an estimated $82 billion in public infrastructure spanning water, sewer, transportation, parks and natural areas, civic facilities, emergency response equipment, technology systems, cultural venues, and economic development properties.
The value shown is known as replacement value, which means the capital cost of rebuilding something in today's monetary value.
$82 billion is a lot of money.
So even the smaller percentages on here are really significant values.
We are providing some citywide highlights from the report today, but it is— there's more service area and program-specific information in that report that you can dig into for reference.
So the chart on this slide shows current asset condition for each program weighted for replacement value.
Each bar is a bureau or a program, and the colors within that bar represent the percentage of their assets in the condition shown in the legend.
Without reading it, you can get a good sense of condition profiles by looking at the color distribution.
Blue and green are good, yellow fair, and orange and red poor and very poor.
While many asset portfolios are in fair to good condition, Which is of note.
Others, particularly transportation pavement, parks facilities, public safety facilities, and older cultural venues, have a growing— have growing shares of assets in poor to very poor condition.
In some instances, a level of poor condition is both expected and strategically managed with a run-to-failure approach.
We talked about this last time, and I used the example of tires on a car.
You wouldn't necessarily replace them all when they're in fair condition.
You'd sort of to wait for them to get to the end of their life cycle because it makes sense from a cost standpoint.
So across all bureaus, annual and forecasted 10-year capital gaps continue to grow as aging assets meet inflation, stricter regulatory requirements, seismic vulnerability, and accelerating climate impacts.
Most of these gaps are related to maintenance or replacement needs, and gaps from the less mature groups are likely underestimated compared to the more mature utility bureaus.
The graph on this slide shows each bureau's 10-year capital funding gap as a percentage of that group's overall asset value.
This perspective is important because it shows the significance of each bureau's reported funding gap relative to the size of their portfolio.
Resulting, resulting failures of assets from lack of investment can challenge service reliability, safety, access, and livability for Portlanders.
If we don't invest in asset management, we are likely to see exponentially increasing closures and decreases in services to to the community.
We risk catastrophic failures of major assets like bridges, with escalating negative impacts to public safety and economic development.
Failures of some assets could lead to major service disruptions and threats to public health and environmental quality, and continued deterioration of amenities will have cumulative negative impacts on community experience and quality of life.
Issues will continue to be pushed off on future generations and become more and more costly.
Early intervention in an asset's deterioration cycle helps prevent these more significant and costly failures.
Asset management can be used to achieve efficiencies and cost savings.
For example, every $1 of planned maintenance can avoid roughly $5 to $10 of reactive repair.
Higher upfront costs can produce substantially lower lifetime costs.
The figures on the slide are intended to provide a sense of relative scale, and actual values depend on asset class, maintenance, maintenance strategy, and failure mode.
The key point is that addressing the investment gap is not simply a revenue problem.
It is a systems problem as well.
But we can do something about it.
Managing for risk, focusing on infrastructure services and outcomes, prioritizing care for what we own over building new, funding maintenance, and so on are all opportunities to chip away at a challenge that's compounded over time.
Implementing the objectives and actions of the strategy will provide improved systems and tools to better understand the risk and value trade-offs of prioritizing one gap over another.
And so I'm going to pass it to Emily for this slide.
Emily Trish
Great.
Well, uh, Council, as part of our annual asset status and condition reporting, we like to share some accomplishments.
And also relevant to the work products before you, uh, we want to share, uh, some initiatives going on across the organization, and these are aligned directly with City's financial— City Financial Policy 2.19 on asset management.
Solutions, efficiencies, and innovations like these will be amplified and extended through implementation of the strategy that we'll be discussing in a moment.
This list is, of course, not exhaustive, but merely representative of the great work that asset managers across the organization are doing all the time.
So clockwise from the upper left, I wanted to highlight the Water Bureau's efforts to predict future water main failures by developing renewal rate recommendations, managing future service levels.
The data in this chart is based on failure rates and replacement rates of Portland pipes.
In the innovation category, BES is rolling out this Fall, AI pipe defect grading.
And so this is utilizing technology to identify some defects that we can address before they become larger failures.
The facilities team is currently working to implement the capital planning module in FacilityForce.
And so this will help to optimize their capital portfolio.
On the bottom right, you're familiar with some of the financial tools recently rolled out and approved through council.
Thank you.
Through the passage of the Transportation Utility Fee and the Street Damage Restoration Fee.
This includes funding also to help with the sidewalk improvements as part of the Sidewalk Improvement and Paving Program, the SIP.
And then finally, I want to call out the, the work with both PBOT and Parks and Rec in partnership with the Bureau of Transportation implementing the same updated cloud version of Maximo, which is an enterprise asset management tool.
Thank you.
And this will improve the interoperability and provide lower long-term support costs over alternatives.
So we're making progress all the time, and we hope to ramp it up as part of the strategy implementation.
Back to you, Tate.
Tate White
Thank you, Officer Trish.
So this slide serves as a reminder of the work dozens of people across the city engaged in to develop the citywide asset management strategy that we're presenting today.
I'm going to read out the vision to give you all time to absorb it, but I first want to note that this is really forward-looking.
It's more long-term.
The objectives and the actions of the strategy we envision will be implemented sooner, and we see this as a living document that will be revisited and updated over time.
So getting back to the vision, it's 2035.
And what, what do we want to see?
Portland at that time will deliver reliable, equitable services promoted or supported by mature integrated asset management systems where decisions are data-informed and transparent, reduce risk, and deliver value for community over an asset's life cycle.
Portlanders will enjoy dependable services that meet community expectations and support positive social, economic, and environmental outcomes.
So the first paragraph of this vision is rather internally focused, and that's because the strategy is really focused on getting the organization better equipped to manage assets more effectively across bureaus.
However, the strategy also considers how we would better integrate equity and community impacts and level of service planning, analysis, and decision-making.
So that second sentence connects asset management practices to responsibly providing services to the community.
So here's a collection of the strategy's 6 objectives.
We will be walking through a slide for each one.
So Objective 1 focuses on establishing asset management governance.
And organizational capacity, which is considered a critical immediate action to serve as a catalyst for the other objectives.
We will talk about governance later in the presentation, but we have had a big win already with a Chief Asset Management Officer.
This objective also includes actions to build organizational capacity, asset management culture, and competence through training and defining a citywide level of service framework.
Supporting strategy language asserts that level of service should be connected to community outcomes, cost of service, and budget decisions so that the city commits to deliver— what the city commits to delivering is matched by the resources required to sustain it.
Objective 2 is about supporting decisions through the identification of common asset data elements.
Intentional data governance, governance, data standards, system design, and integration, aligning these to strategic and operation needs as well as risk priorities.
Critical to this work is developing and maintaining a citywide asset register to have a single source of truth for tracking, managing, and accounting for physical assets throughout their life cycle.
The Chief Asset Management Officer is envisioned to lead this work, with asset owners being responsible for organizing their data into the standards created.
The second action of defining data stewards will help with effective implementation and maintaining this register over time.
Objective 3 focuses on implementing objective citywide frameworks for investment prioritization.
The first action, to develop a simple shared method for evaluating risk, values, and long-term needs that every service area can use regardless of staff expertise, has been identified as a critical immediate action.
Additional actions include creating guidance for asset onboarding, decommissioning, evaluating renewal and return on investment, Establishing value-based decision criteria around levels of service, funding, and decision trade-offs, and developing a citywide investment prioritization model to help prioritize citywide resources.
Olivia Clark
Excuse me.
Tate White
The strategy goes into more detail about actionable next steps to achieve these objectives.
Critical to this one is recognizing the various factors that should be considered to define trade-offs and assess risk so informed decisions can be made.
Decision-making criteria is a recommended tool to provide guidance for these critical choices.
Objective 4 states that decisions should be grounded in life cycle reality, equity, and community need.
As discussed in Objective 1, it's important to connect service commitments to life cycle costs and maintenance funding.
Adopting a common citywide equity framework for asset and service decisions at a citywide level is another action.
And finally, integrating this framework into the previous objective's investment prioritization model.
Objective 5 calls for incorporating seismic and climate mitigation and adaptation into decision-making.
Actions include adopting resilience screening and an evaluation framework that allows bureaus to assess seismic and climate risks across infrastructure assets.
This will promote consistency and inform decision criteria.
Establishing a scalable citywide method for applying seismic and climate change information to prioritization is also included and should be incorporated into the previous with various initiatives like the climate change risk assessment and action plan happening right now, we have the opportunity to integrate a resilience lens into all city assessments and plans.
Okay, the final objective— we're almost there— is focused on earning public trust through meaningful engagement, performance management, and reporting.
A key action to help guide this is the establishment of citywide community engagement expectations, which include defining minimum standards for engagement on asset and service decisions, applying best practices to promote inclusive, representative, and transparent engagement, utilizing tools like effective communication and language access to define levels of service.
And closing the feedback loop through continuous engagement that explains trade-offs.
The other actions to achieve this objective focus on developing systems to track performance and be transparent with the community about service outcomes.
So we will start to close by looking back to the first objective on asset management governance.
This chart shows a recommendation for what that could look like moving forward to successfully implement the strategy.
The Chief Asset Management Officer will hold authority and accountability for developing and implementing citywide asset management standards, processes, and system decisions.
The Executive Steering Committee that was made up of DCAs for strategy development would shift to being made up of directors of asset-owning and enabling bureaus to have critical seats to advise on and make key decisions for how to implement the objectives and actions of the strategy.
Everyone has a role to play in infrastructure management for the city, and we look forward to working together to deliver on this work.
And I'm going to pass it to Officer Trish to close.
Emily Trish
Great.
So looking forward, some next steps for you.
Vice President Clark already indicated that there's a financial strategy that will be coming before you targeting winter of 2026, uh, with CFO Berry.
Um, I, uh, plan to come before the larger council, uh, in the spring to offer some refinements and some details of implementation activities, uh, related to this strategy.
Um, and part of that, uh, will be, um, working on risk framework, uh, service level targets, and evaluating for infrastructure performance.
And so those were some of the objectives you heard about a moment ago.
Looking at our decision framework and where our greatest areas of risk are.
And so we look forward to continuing that conversation with you and answering any questions you have today.
Thank you very much.
Loretta Smith
Great.
Olivia Clark
Thank you both for the presentation.
I know we have some questions.
We've got about 10, 15 minutes available for a discussion here.
And, you know, I'm very anxious to get what I call the list.
Right.
I want the list.
I want to know what's at greatest risk.
Uh, by each bureau.
But this has got some great information, and I really appreciate it.
Uh, Councilor Smith, you want to kick off the discussion?
Loretta Smith
Uh, yes, thank you.
Welcome, Trish.
I, um, appreciate you, and you got a big job ahead of you.
Uh, a couple things.
I'm, I'm like the, um, the chair.
I was fully expecting, with the time that it took to get to this vision, I was fully expecting to see a registry I was expecting to see a spreadsheet that equaled the $82 billion, that had a headline of each bureau and how much they had and what it was specifically.
And I guess it is, it is the style of the city because the budget office, when they talk to us about things, they talk in percentages.
And I don't want to know what 82% is.
I want to know what 82% is.
And what the dollar value is.
If you can say only 20% of your assets are, are workable, I want to know what 20% is in condition, in great condition and operational.
So for me, this is— this was kind of underwhelming to me because I was— I had a big expectation of having a, a list, a registry with, with Um, and I'm not so wedded to spreadsheets, but I, I expected to see something that would look like an $82 billion book that I would be able to include the status of each, of each of the, um, assets and how much would it take to get operational in the, in the, in the good, to the good.
Mm-hmm.
For better than good.
And so for me, I still don't know any more than I know now.
I don't know what you all are considering an asset.
You haven't identified it.
I don't know what street our asset is on.
I wanted to see, this is Asset 3 in PBOT.
We have 10, uh, trucks, 5 that are operational, and then they're going to go away.
And I, I, I just had a different expectation since this— and I know you just got here, Trish, But it— I, I see, um, DCA, uh, Williams has come to the table, but I— this is just a long list of visions that I have about a whole lot of stuff.
I was expecting more.
Olivia Clark
Thank you.
Millicent Williams
If I may, uh, good morning.
Millicent Williams, Interim Deputy City Administrator for Public Works.
Thank you very much for your question, Councilor Smith.
Uh, we anticipated that, uh, this committee would have concerns along the lines that you've mentioned.
And Emily Trich, her first name is Emily.
Yeah.
So she and I have talked extensively, as well as had conversations with Tate about the expectations for today.
We can assure you that when Emily comes before this body in January, you will have a collection of data.
It will come in many forms.
Some of it will be lists, some of it will be maps, some of it will be dashboarded information that she will be able to provide for this body so that there's a level of comfort about not just the list of assets, the general condition of the assets, but where those assets are.
Absolutely.
That will help to inform what the city administrator was discussing regarding how we will get to the request of a potential bond in the future.
We can't do that unless we have integrity in the information and data that we have.
And so the commitment from the administration is to ensure that we have that information.
And frankly, a lot of that already exists.
It's just in various and sundry forms that make it a little challenging to bring together.
Yeah, it's decentralized.
So, you know, we have We have over 1,000 capital projects that we could provide, but that doesn't tell you— that doesn't provide the narrative that you're wanting to know.
I can tell you right now, PBOT has 225 capital projects.
I can tell you where they are.
That doesn't speak to the general condition of those assets.
And so that's the work that we anticipate will begin in earnest.
The asset managers from across the city have been working very hard.
But again, without having that central point of coordination that is tasked with and charged with ensuring that there is that strategy.
We have not been able to show up in ways that I think not just you councilors are expecting, but also that the public would expect.
And so I know that the next several months will be spent working on that.
Loretta Smith
And I think it would be helpful, because we've been in cut exercises, to see, do we have multiple vans?
I know every Every month or however they take it out, money is taken out of my account for facilities for cars.
I have not— I have yet to use one.
I don't know what kind of cars you all have.
I sometimes— I see those— I used to see those cars that say the City That Works or something like that.
I have no idea.
I do know I've been in one of PBOT's trucks, but I'm trying to figure out if we can also, as you're looking at this, Create an equity lens so that our assets, where they are, so that we know.
And, and, and I expect to see something like, you know, we have 25 parks in District 1, and here, here are the things that need to be updated in these parks.
And those are the kind of things that I, I need to see.
And if we're going to do public-private partnerships like they did over at Sellwood House, You know, what looks to be as an opportunity to do a public-private— I don't want to privatize the city, but I just want to see if there are ways in which, if there are assets that we need to, that are not being used, that maybe we should consider either selling them, putting them so that we can upgrade other assets that we really need to keep in play, those kind of things.
That's That's what I'm thinking about.
But at any rate, um, I will also be talking to you and setting up a time to talk to you, uh, Interim DCA Williams, in regards to, um, how we, uh— there's— we have a place setter bill in the, in the legislature that would, um, identify— that would allow cities who have surplus properties to, uh, rezone them For other things, particularly housing.
And I think that we can't create any more land, but we have to repurpose the land that we do have.
It's not being used.
If it needs it, if it's a brownfield.
And that's the other thing I want to know.
How many of these assets are brownfields?
And by district and those kinds of things.
So that is where my head is at.
I appreciate you all coming up with the vision.
Thank you.
And that gives you the starting point so that you But the registry, a spreadsheet, I guess I am just a spreadsheet girl.
Olivia Clark
Councilor Smith, I appreciate your channeling my frustration as well.
So I appreciate that.
And I think it's good that we give folks feedback, but we only have about 10 more minutes left on this.
So if it's okay with you, I'd like to move on to Councilor Green.
Mitch Green
Thank you, Chair Clark.
Thank you.
Welcome, Emily.
We're excited to have you on board.
Tate, thank you for your ongoing service to this project.
I just have one question.
So at the very last slide, you mentioned a risk framework that's forthcoming.
I'd like to hear a little bit more about that.
And specifically, are you going to be engaging in the ISO 31000 standard to guide that?
Emily Trish
Thank you very much for that question.
And you're speaking my language, right?
So the International Standards Organization has several standards relevant to infrastructure asset management.
And yes, we will be working off of the standards of ISO.
We'll also be looking at GASB 33, for those keeping score at home, and also looking at the commitments, the policy and standards we have here within the City of Portland.
My intention is to engage stakeholders inside and outside of the city because the way people are interacting with our infrastructure and how that helps them create that, uh, the safety, the new business, the affordable housing and development is so critical to what I understand, uh, the city is wanting to, um, become.
Uh, so you'll be hearing about that.
That will tie in nicely to the prioritization framework or the investment framework, uh, and, um, uh, as well as the, uh, equity, uh, resilience and the other goals we have of the organization that you will help, um, determine and dictate how we Pour the projects into the machine and what comes out the other side.
Mitch Green
I appreciate that.
Thank you.
And, you know, for folks watching along, I'm so obsessed with this because we can't do all of the projects.
Like, even if we're to go out and float a bond, it's— the scale of it is so large that we have to figure out which ones to do first.
And the way you do that is applying sort of a risk lens to be like, what would be the impact of failure?
So it's not just like, will this— is this old?
Is it— does it need help?
But it's like, if this fails, does this then create cascading conditions?
So sounds like that's exactly the, the lens and frame that you're taking.
I'm—.
I'll, I'll look forward to seeing that in January.
And, um, thanks for, uh, uh, thanks for the work on it.
Olivia Clark
Thanks.
Thank you.
I think we're all, we're all itching to get there.
Uh, Councilor Kanal.
Sameer Kanal
Thank you, Chair Clark.
Uh, thanks and welcome to the city, Emily.
Um, Thanks as well for being here, DCA Williams and Tate.
I think if there's some behind-the-scenes thing that has not been worked on for a long time at the level that it needs to be, and now someone's working on it, 9 times outta 10, I see your name attached to it, Tate.
And I really appreciate that about your time here.
I have a couple questions about 2 slides.
Can we go to the slide with all the bar charts?
And first, just verifying that the PP in the, In the header there is Prosper Portland.
Okay.
Yes.
So at some point we should have that, that one.
Yeah.
So I had a question here.
So PF&R's got its own column.
Fleet and Facilities manages PPB precincts, right?
So they'd be included in that.
I know North Precinct is in dire need of some work.
Tate White
Correct.
Correct.
Sameer Kanal
Okay.
So I guess this highlights a question.
Is there a long-term plan of splitting up this sort of data by the type of asset instead of bureau ownership as we simultaneously move to having everything owned by a city instead of 27 bureaus in a trench coat?
Emily Trish
Yes, so very much so by strategic priority and by some of the thematic areas that we're seeing.
I'm already starting to get a sense from folks about what that might look like, and that could inform a future bond.
Sameer Kanal
Great, that makes sense.
And I'd love to talk about FYRE uniquely and separately at some point.
That probably cannot be now because there's also the broader conversation about where our assets are located.
Obviously, we talk about East Portland and that's a huge part of it, but also CEI Hub and some other locations there and west of the railroad cut in North Portland as well.
So that's one piece.
I also would like to go to the slides about Objective 6 and engagement.
And I just wanted to kind of understand if you're breaking this apart, because I think it's a little different if we're talking about engaging with people about upkeep versus actual change.
So if a, you know, it's a short-term inconvenience if your road's being repaved, right?
But it will go back to normal after that.
Right.
I think that's different.
And the engagement standard is probably different as well.
Than if you're taking a 2-lane road and making it 1 lane in either direction as part of this.
And that can be something you do at the same time.
So I just, I wanted to just get an understanding of sort of how are you working through that and how are you establishing the standards on that?
Because I think PBOT has been criticized over time, in particular on engagement, for being deep but narrow.
Yeah.
So like the people who live on the road, but not the people who drive on the road every day.
And I think that's, you know, a unique problem because there are other bureaus that aren't even getting the acknowledgement of the depth of their engagement.
Olivia Clark
Do you mind if I intervene at this point?
Those are great questions.
I really appreciate them.
Can we take those offline as well since we're running out of time?
And I don't know that Emily is going to have deep answers to that.
At this point on engagement, but you raise some really important issues.
Unless there's a quick response, I, I think it's pretty complicated.
Tate White
I can follow up really briefly.
Thank you.
Um, I did want to highlight there's a long-range public safety facilities master plan that I think you would all be interested in that I'll share with you.
And Emily is going to integrate all these wonderful pieces together.
And I think we do have a citywide engagement officer that will need to be replaced, or that work will go forward.
And I think That's the kind of direction we're going in, and the strategy talks about the importance of having sort of those citywide standards.
And we have the opportunity to do engagement more as a— as one city, and I think we could go in that direction.
Sameer Kanal
Yeah, I'm fine taking this off of today's agenda.
I just— my concern is that we're going to end up with a chief engagement officer who tries to do it out of the administration again.
And so I'm hoping that as we work through this, that there— when we talk about one city, that was this side of the dais too.
And so I think we do need to discuss it because as long as this position is housed under the administrator, which I've, you know, raised issues with, but as long as it's there, we have to make sure we're giving clear guidance on it or we're going to keep replicating decades of bad engagement at the city.
Olivia Clark
Well, I hope Emily will put a pin in that and we'll come back to that.
Councilor Koyama Lane.
Tiffany Koyama Lane
Thank you, all of you.
Thank you for the presentation, but thank you even more for the report.
I think that's where I found the most helpful information.
And, um, kind of my colleagues started the conversation around equity, and I want to point us to page 17 of the strategy document, um, which talks about adopting a citywide equity framework.
And I really appreciate that.
I think that's incredibly important.
I also appreciate that there was language around targeted universalism.
Um, And I was just wondering if we— if anyone could speak to where we're at in developing or adopting a framework like this.
Tate White
Thank you.
I'm, I'm glad you're focusing in on that and reviewing the report.
We had a lot of great equity practitioners take part in this work, and, um, Officer Tillman, our equity officer, has been really involved, and I would have to defer to her probably on how we're approaching that.
But I really appreciated— not everyone loves asset management, is, is really keen to review our, our work on it, and she really was, and she really dug into it.
So I think that Officer Trish and Officer Tillman will continue to work together on that.
Tiffany Koyama Lane
What an amazing answer.
I love that you're going to be doing that together, and I just can't help but underscore part of that conversation.
Just want to As we're talking about our assets being accessible, just want to make sure we're making sure we're also focusing on age-friendly and thinking about how we're meeting Portlanders' needs at critical ages and stages.
And then on page 8 of that report talks about the governance charter, um, which I'm really excited to just— I'm a big fan of cross-bureau coordination and just, I'm wondering if there are any details that can be shared about how that governance charter would be used to help with that coordination across bureaus, like for assets like when we're replacing curb cuts or other projects where different bureaus' service areas are going to be crossing, coordinating?
Tate White
Yes, definitely.
I think we're already seeing this in the Unified Public Works capital program work that they're doing.
I know Carrie Rubin's with us today, and they're already like— the governance work will really help everyone come together and sort of identify joint projects.
And opportunities to really combine forces and find efficiencies and savings and partnering together.
And I think that will spill over to the engagement aspect as well.
So we're again engaging more as one city and not doing all these projects in separate silos.
And then as we get down to implementing things like citywide prioritization and thinking about having more of a citywide capital plan, I think that governance will be really important to work through that and make decisions about which projects to prioritize.
Tiffany Koyama Lane
Thank you.
So glad you're here.
Excited to see next steps.
Emily Trish
Thank you very much.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, Councilor.
Councilor, we're really out of time.
I'm going to forego, uh, asking any questions at this point, but I'm going to encourage Emily to reach out to each member of this committee to schedule some time because we haven't had really adequate time today to but I think if you sit down with each of us, it'll be a much more robust conversation.
But we appreciate your work.
We're glad you're here.
Thank you, Tate, for everything that you've done up to this point.
Uh, thank you, DCA, and we will see you again.
Thank you so much for today.
In the interest of time, let's move right ahead.
Diana, can you please call the next item?
Unidentified speaker
Item number 2, document number 2026-357.
Local regulation of automated vehicles.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, Diana.
Colleagues, we're returning to our discussion on regulating the commercial operation of for-hire autonomous vehicles on Portland streets.
Uh, I don't think that as a city we're really ready for these vehicles, um, and I'm afraid they're coming.
Um, I believe we need to get ahead of this and have a framework ready to regulate this industry.
Uh, not to mention, it's important that we send a signal to the state legislature that we are invested in ensuring the safe operations of these vehicles in our city.
Autonomous vehicle companies have thus far managed to avoid any city regulations across the country by working on state-level preemption, and I'm afraid that might happen here.
It's important that we move quickly on regulation to make it clear that as a city we care about safety, accountability, and our private-for-hire workers.
I've asked PBOT to bring forward policy concepts.
I think hopefully they've met with most of you, um, and we will discuss this today and then get our feedback and then bring back a potential ordinance and resolution at our October 27th meeting for, for a hearing.
PBOT shared draft code language as well as policy concepts for committee members to consider.
I hope you've had time to review it.
We have time for questions today after we get a PBOT presentation.
So I think— welcome, great to see you.
Shoshana, do you want to kick it off?
Shoshana Cohen
Uh, yes, good morning.
Thank you, Council Vice President Clark and members of the committee.
For the record, my name is Shoshana Cohen.
I'm the Chief of Staff at the Portland Bureau of Transportation.
As was just noted, we're here again today to talk about automated vehicles.
And as we've discussed with you all before, this is a quickly evolving new technology.
It's already having a big impact on multiple cities across the country.
You last heard from us specifically in July when we brought some policy concepts to this committee for discussion.
And since then, we've continued to learn about the impacts of AVs from peer cities, And have continued to think about what a regulatory framework could look like here.
We have further refined the policy concepts that we discussed with you then, and as Chair Clark just said, we're beginning to prepare a package of potential code updates that could be implemented along with administrative rule updates.
Next slide, please.
So here's our agenda.
We'll start with a little bit of refresh of some background and updates on policy development, both here and in the state.
Thank you.
And the state of the industry in Oregon.
We'll then discuss the proposed code and administrative rules with a focus on some of the most significant policy areas, and then finally close out with a summary of next steps.
So I'd like to begin again with a quick recap of what's been going on in Portland and Oregon and the work to date.
Back in 2017, a previous Portland City Council passed the Safe Automated Vehicle Initiative, SAVI, which charged PBOT with developing initial AV regulations to ensure based on that directive, PBOT adopted administrative rules the following year that allowed for the testing of AVs with a permit and prohibited commercial deployment.
However, no testing permits under that administrative rule were ever issued.
That same year, the state of Oregon created a task force on automated vehicles, and the city of Portland and many other stakeholders participated in that task force.
Thank you.
The task force which issued 2 reports, one in 2018 and one in 2019, before being disbanded, dissolved.
It then became clear that automated vehicles were actually some years away from commercial operations, and while staff continued to track the topic, we paused significant staff work on the topic.
Last fall then, we became aware of a bill in the state legislature that would have enabled the commercial operations of AV statewide and preempted Portland as well as other local jurisdictions' regulatory authority around AVs.
Next slide, please.
At—.
Oh, sorry, I think I did next slide too quickly.
But at that same time, we became aware that Waymo was interested in commercial operations in Portland.
And we also saw AV operators preparing to launch operations in greater number of cities around the US.
And this caused us to realize that it really was necessary to sort of dive back into this work.
That's when we began processing the process of updating our administrative rules and to think about code updates.
And at that time, importantly, we also made it clear, even though we had the existing AV testing rules, we wouldn't offer any testing permits until rules had been updated.
Now, next slide.
So in early 2026, the city and others submitted testimony against that state AV bill, and it didn't move forward.
We also— that's when we began presenting at what was then the City Council's Transportation Infrastructure Committee about the first draft of the administrative rules in February.
And then we held an extended public comment period for the draft rules.
We engaged a variety of stakeholders, private-for-hire drivers, all of our modal committees, Oregon Disabilities Commission, as well as others.
And we published a summary of the over 200 comments we received during that feedback period on our website.
And spoke to you one of the times we were here.
And during this time, we've also been connecting with colleagues around the country who have been experiencing AVs firsthand to learn about the impacts they're seeing.
The next milestone was that in April, Waymo began mapping in Portland.
And while they are mapping, they have a licensed human driver operating, so they don't need a permit from us at this stage.
We also know they're mapping in some of the other cities around the region.
And then as we already said, we brought 7 key policy concepts to this committee in July for discussion and we've continued to refine since then.
The last note is that we're also now getting ready again for the 2027 state legislative session where we do expect at this point to see more AV legislation.
Already during the recent September legislative days in Salem, Waymo presented at the House Committee on Transportation.
The presentation was focused on safety and the Waymo public policy manager said that he looked forward to building on the legislation yes.
—Presented in the past.
And Representative McClain, the chair of the committee, stated that she wanted to avoid the piecemeal regulation scenario that happened with transportation network companies.
At the same time, our neighbors to the north in Washington State are also facing pressure to enable automated vehicles statewide.
We've just recently been given a copy of draft legislation that we've heard is a collaboration between 2 robotaxi companies, Zoox and Waymo.
And we haven't had a chance yet to sort of dig in closely enough, but we will, and we expect it may all of this has been happening here and in Oregon, um, and at the same time is happening within the context of a national conversation about the potential challenges, uh, that robotaxi operations may introduce to our cities, as well as the potential benefits.
I want to pause and acknowledge sometimes we're saying robotaxi companies and sometimes we're saying automated vehicles.
It's, I think, um, Jargon of the industry that has made its way into our talking points, but it's the same thing.
And like our discussions here, many others are grappling with concerns such as negative impacts to traffic safety and other right-of-way users, the loss of jobs, privacy concerns, potential to grow vehicle miles traveled, add congestion, and impact land use, as well as other things.
And, and these potential challenges have been driving the regulatory policy proposals that we're bringing to you today for consideration.
At the same time, not all the national discourse has been negative.
We all know our transportation system around the country has real traffic safety problems, so the potential for AVs to bring safety benefits is part of the national conversation.
The first major third-party study looking at Waymo safety data was recently conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.
And while we definitely want to still dig in and better understand this study, so far we've heard that it found that per mile, Waymo vehicles were involved in 68% fewer crashes than human drivers.
And then there's also the potential for AVs to provide personal safety benefits and to feel safer and more comfortable for some users.
While some of us are just considering potential challenges or benefits, other cities, on the other hand, are already experiencing them.
There are at least 15 other cities where AVs are already operating.
Next slide.
And in these 15 cities, they're all operating where they have been preempted by state legislation, and without— and so they don't have the local regulatory oversight.
So without this regulatory oversight, these cities are experiencing challenges.
They don't know how many for-hire AVs are operating in their cities.
They don't receive data on where pickups and drop-offs are happening, so they can't work to manage curb space or thoughtfully prioritize different users.
We're seeing cities struggle with managing how robotaxis interact with large events or even regular events like farmers markets.
And perhaps most importantly, these cities have no way to suspend or revoke AV company permits.
If these cities have issues or complaints, they have to raise them to state regulators who may not understand the local context or take any action.
On the other hand, the AV companies want to see regulation at the state level rather than the city level, and they— and we've heard them say that without statewide consistency, there'll be a patchwork of regulations they can't operate in.
This is the same argument that we heard for many years from transportation network companies.
However, the City of Portland has worked very hard over the years to maintain our local authority to regulate transportation network companies, and we're one of the few cities across the country that has maintained this authority.
And it's allowed us to do all sorts of things, to collect trip-level data, to understand the impacts of TNCs on our system, to set our own trip fees, and to do things like create the recently passed Drivers Resource Center.
And we have not seen a patchwork of regulations develop.
Portland's regulations serve as the region's regulations, so drivers can go seamlessly between Portland, Beaverton, Gresham, wherever else they need to drive So we're here today again to share, just to share some options for what regulations could potentially look like here.
This is a complex area.
No other city in the country, as Chair Clark said, has passed regulations for commercial robotaxi service yet.
Minneapolis and Washington, D.C. are sort of like us and close in thinking about it, developing a regulatory framework.
And the Minneapolis City Council recently passed a proposal, but it was later vetoed by the mayor.
So we're here today to talk about So while there's no complete city model we can look to, the ideas we've shared with you today have very much been informed by the experiences of other cities, both those who have them and who are considering what might happen.
And the options we're presenting are also designed to be aligned with Portland safety, climate, equity, and mobility goals.
And in addition to looking and talking to peer cities, we've spoken with subject matter expert staff from across city bureaus.
Thank you.
And the final thing before I hand it over is that the current proposals are intended to go slow with the rollout to verify that companies are meeting our standards and to ensure that we can continue to evaluate the program and update our regulations as needed.
And with that, I'll hand it over to Jacob Sherman to dive in more.
Jacob Sherman
Great, thanks so much, Shoshana.
Good morning, Council Vice President Clark, members of the committee.
For the record, my name is Jacob Sherman.
I lead the city's work on emerging technology at the Bureau of Transportation.
Transportation.
My team and I work on policy and projects including electric vehicle car charging, goods movement, zero-emission freight, the private-for-hire industry, shared micromobility, and automated vehicles.
Next slide.
I'd like to give a quick overview of the code package and administrative rules that kind of shape up our regulatory approach.
I'm going to go through this at a really high level to help you get kind of the complete picture, and then I'm going to hand it over to my colleague Hannah, who's going to dive in on some of I think in many ways, kind of presenting this complete picture as a puzzle and not focusing so much on the individual pieces, but the big picture, so you can understand that again before diving in.
First, want to note that the draft administrative rules that we're proposing will not go into effect until at least July 1st, 2027 at the earliest.
Anything that you pass will take time to implement.
Thank you.
Time for us to build the systems and processes to actually implement.
And so we'll need— we would need any time and would not be issuing any permits in the meantime.
Next slide.
So this is the set of regulations that together we think will manage the operation of for-hire vehicles.
I'd like to highlight a few things.
First, all AV companies would be required to submit a map of the area of the city that they intend to operate, as well as a description of what time, what roads, what speed limits, what weather, And what other kind of conditions they would be operating in.
Before they could begin those operations, city staff and the city administrator would have to review and approve these materials known as an operational design domain.
If the companies wanted to change those at any aspect in the future, then they would have to resubmit and get reapproved operational design domains.
This is something that happens in the state of California currently.
Second, our proposal requires that for-hire AVs be fully battery electric and registered in Oregon.
This would automatically require them to be enrolled in the ORIGO program, which is Oregon's road usage charge program that results in a per-mile vehicle mile traveled fee to help offset the state's lack of gas tax that comes from AVs or from EVs.
We think this is a really kind of important approach and wanted to highlight that for you all.
Next slide.
We also have a set of different regulations that together focus on safety and reporting in Vision Zero.
To better understand any company's safety record, all companies would be required to provide a description of their experience, including all reported crashes, injuries, and incidents that negatively impacted the traffic system.
Companies would also be required to share any crash records that they must file with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration with PBOT, as well as with the State of Oregon.
All companies would be required to submit and review and receive approval for that operations plan detailing how they'll handle Portland-specific elements of the transportation system, such as some of our bike buses or our unique bicycle infrastructure that we have.
We're also working with the city's attorney's office on a set of insurance and liability levels to protect all Portlanders, both passengers inside the AVs as well as everyone else in the public right-of-way.
Next slide.
While there's many promises to some of this new technology, They're going to have to be— require coordination with the city to really be realized.
So for example, we think AV companies must comply with city-issued geofences to ensure that their vehicles are not disrupting events in the street, such as a Sunday Parkways event, a crash that could occur, the Portland Marathon, or other kinds of first responder events.
Additionally, we'd like AV companies to share trip data with the city so we can fully understand the impact of this new technology and use that data to help inform policy and, and changes in the future.
By sharing where pickup and drop-offs occur, we can add pickup and drop-off spaces to the curb.
We currently have some of these known as fast stops to help ensure that we're doing safe pickup and drop-off and not doing pickup and drop-off in things like the bicycle lane.
We have a set of data privacy requirements that Hannah will dive— Hannah will dive deeper into in a moment.
Next slide.
The final kind of big picture overview set of regulations is to use our local authority to actively manage the pace of change.
As Shoshana said earlier, our proposed strategy is to go slow and verify compliance and safe operations of AVs and to evaluate change as needed.
To this end, PBOT is proposing we'd conduct an annual review of operations and We develop a report that would help inform changes to fleet caps, which Hannah will talk about next, as well as any other changes that may be needed.
We'll also require companies to conduct training and demonstration events with first responders to help ensure that police, fire, and other first responders know how to manage AVs in an emergency situation.
Next slide.
So together, kind of big picture, we think this package of thank you.
This package of policy proposals is designed to set a high bar for AV operations.
Some of the policies we're discussing will be advanced through city code, while other would be advanced through administrative rules.
And this is because there's a few different factors that we think about when determining whether we recommend something be in city code or admin rule.
City code, as you might know, is generally reserved for policies that are bigger picture and more foundational and durable rather than kind fine-grained, um, uh, fine-grained implementation things that might need to change in the future, such as administrative rules, which is the place where we really define how policies are implemented and can be dynamic and updated more regularly.
Administrative rules, though, it's important to note, have a public process.
They're shared with City Council before any review, uh, or before any approval happens, and they're also subject to public scrutiny.
So given the nature of trying to regulate a brand new technology that's rapidly evolving, we're proposing putting some policy in code and other policy in administrative rules so that we can manage change as we go forward.
I'm going to hand it over to Hannah now, who's going to dig in on some of those specific policy proposals.
Hannah Morrison
Thanks, Jacob.
Good morning, Vice President Clark and councilors.
For the record, my name is Hannah Morrison, and I'm a planner on the Mobility Innovation Section at PBOT.
As you may remember, we brought a set of policy concepts to you all this summer to get feedback and direction, and based on those conversations we've had with you all, we've refined those policies, and I'm going to dig in a little deeper.
The first policy proposal is the one that sets the stage really for everything else.
The city has regulated private-for-hire transportation for over 100 years, and we need to add definitions of automated vehicles into our private-for-hire code to make it clear that the companies using AVs to offer a private-for-hire service are regulated like others in the industry.
This proposal has not changed substantially since July.
In addition to adding a definition for automated vehicles, we have added a few other AV-specific definitions, as you see on the slide, and added some AV-specific language to a few other definitions.
And all of these are based on language from the Society of Automobile Engineers, which really sets the national standard.
The second policy concept is to establish the authority to set fleet caps for AVs in city code.
These fleet caps would apply to both AVs with testing permits and for-hire permits.
And setting these caps on AVs will help us safely manage this change to our streets and the for-hire industry.
This proposal sets the expectation that based on the annual evaluation of operational impacts of AVs that Jacob just talked about, The city administrator would propose updates to both the per-company fleet cap and the citywide for-hire AV fleet cap.
Since we are proposing the actual fleet cap numbers to be set in administrative rule, any update to the fleet cap numbers would then go through the administrative rule public process with a 30-day public comment period and option for a public hearing.
This public engagement process would help ensure that any changes to AV fleet caps occur through transparent conversation with the public and with City Council.
With that in mind, I do want to share an initial proposal of per-company and citywide AV fleet caps for the first year.
We considered a few things while developing this proposal.
First, there are currently over 15,000 permitted Uber and Lyft drivers in the city.
While they're not all driving full-time, so it's not a one-to-one comparison, we tried to keep the number of AVs in the city small in line with the number of drivers.
Compared to the number of human-for-hire drivers.
We also looked at fleet caps or fleet sizes in other cities, which is admittedly challenging since no other cities have regulations that require companies to tell them just how many AVs are operating in their city.
But third parties have estimated over 1,000 AVs in San Francisco, which is likely the largest for-hire market.
So these proposed year 1 fleet caps would limit the AV fleet to roughly 1.5% of Portland's total private for-hire fleet, Allowing for a small rollout of this new technology while the rest of our regulations that Jacob shared work in concert with each other to manage daily operations.
The next policy proposal is to clearly define testing permit metrics.
So under this proposal, every AV company would be required to begin local operations with a testing permit to ensure that they prove their technology can navigate the unique aspects of Portland streets.
This testing permit is a required first step before AV companies could offer any paid rides.
Thank you.
Before with a for-hire permit.
All companies' AV driver, or that software system that is their AV driver, would be required to log 50,000 miles cumulatively across their fleet with a testing permit before becoming eligible to apply for that for-hire AV permit.
This 50,000-mile requirement is based off of best practices from California state-level regulations, but we also believe it's the right balance, or could be the right balance, between proving that the AV driver can safely navigate our city while not being too many miles that we're encouraging, uh, empty vehicle miles traveled on our streets.
And while the same AV driver would be completing the entire 50,000-mile requirement, this proposal does split testing into 2 phases.
Again, this is something based off of best practices in California.
The first 25,000 miles of a testing permit must be completed with a licensed human driver in the vehicle, while the second 25,000 miles could be completed with no human driver in the vehicle.
Uh, next is the proposal around metrics for permit suspension for that AV driver.
And these metrics were really informed by the many claims from AV companies that their AV drivers are much safer than human drivers.
These metrics were informed— um, we have a standard for human private-for-hire drivers, uh, to ensure that we're permitting safe drivers.
And in Portland, we suspend a human taxi, Uber, or Lyft driver if they get 2 traffic violations in a single year or a total of 3 violations in 5 years.
And here we're really proposing holding the robotaxis to a similar standard.
One key difference is that since AV drivers— AV companies treat their software as a singular driver, we would be considering violations by any car within a company's fleet as accumulating to that same AV driver.
So if 2 separate vehicles within one company's fleet each get a traffic violation or are otherwise found to be operating in an unsafe manner, that would count as 2 violations for that company's AV driver and would be grounds for suspending the company's permit.
This permit would be suspended until the company can certify to the city that the issue or issues for which their AV driver received the violations are resolved.
And this process would repeat for subsequent violations.
So additionally, if the AV driver continues to repeat that same unsafe behavior that the company has already certified that they've resolved, This could become grounds for additional action like fines or permit revocation.
We believe this is a much higher standard for any potential permit suspension than anything else we've seen proposed in the states, and then it could help address some of the challenges we've seen in other cities.
This next policy concept is also safety-focused.
We have had many conversations about the safety hazard of AVs and vehicles in general stopping in bicycle lanes to wait to pick yes.
So there is existing city code that currently states that all drivers are limited to stopping in any street, bicycle lane, or transit lane for no more than 30 seconds to load or unload passengers.
So our suggestion here is that we would reaffirm the maximum stop time of 30 seconds for all private-for-hire drivers in city code.
Given that AVs sometimes wait for 2 minutes, if not more, for passengers to enter the AV and start their ride, this this should prohibit them from waiting in bicycle lanes to pick up passengers.
I do want to note that there is another option for this policy concept, and that would be to fully ban pickup and drop-offs in bicycle lanes or transit lanes.
This policy move would probably make more sense to implement across the entire private-for-hire industry, not just AVs.
This could lead to more stopping in travel lanes and potentially have unintended safety or mobility consequences, but we just wanted to acknowledge that this is another policy option to consider should you all want to go further.
Olivia Clark
Thank you.
Hannah Morrison
This next policy proposal focuses on limitations on the sale, sharing, or transferring of data collected by AVs, and we've proposed adding this to the administrative rules so that we can dynamically respond to any changes in data collected or new privacy best practices that may emerge.
We know that AVs collect data both inside and outside of their vehicles.
Most AVs use a combination of LiDAR, radar, 360-degree video and audio data collected from their vehicles.
And while some of this data is used for safe operations of AVs, we do know it will be critical to put strong safeguards around the use of this data.
So we have consulted with the City Data and Privacy Office to ensure that these regulations would be consistent with related city policy on surveillance and privacy and are considered best practices.
The first proposal is to prohibit AV companies from selling any data collected by their AVs on City of Portland streets.
Companies should not get to profit off of the data that they collect in our city.
The second proposal is to require city administrator approval before sharing or transferring any data.
We don't anticipate many use cases for this, but we could potentially be interested in sharing data with a third party to help us analyze trip location data and operations.
Finally, we would require a warrant signed by a judge before any data collected on our streets is shared with or transferred to another governmental together, we think that these policies will allow companies to operate while also enacting strong, strong regulations that protect Portlanders from unnecessary surveillance.
Next, I'd like to introduce a new policy proposal, which is to define remote operators in city code.
Remote operators refer to humans who intervene in AV operations if the AV encounters an unknown situation or is uncertain on how to proceed.
Thank you.
It has been really difficult to get a complete picture of how often remote operators intervene in AV operations, but a Senate investigation earlier this year found that remote operators could be located overseas and that many do not hold U.S. driver's licenses.
With the current lack of federal guidance on remote operations, we feel it's really important here to set minimum requirements that all remote operators must hold a U.S.-based driver's license and be based in the United States.
Thank you.
California has also recently taken steps to define remote operators, and new regulations from the California DMV, which will become active in July 2028, state the same requirements we have proposed here, that all remote operators for fleets active in California have a U.S.-based driver's license and be based in the U.S. and then this is the final policy proposal.
First, AVs would be subject to the same fees as TNCs, including all permit and per-trip In addition is the establishment of a per-trip driver support fee to support workers due to this unprecedented change.
A driver support fee could provide funds for things like job training, job placement, or other support.
We know council just passed the Driver Resource Center ordinance, and there may be a way to connect these workforce transition activities to that new center.
The driver support fee would be included in the fee schedule, which is the same as the TNC per-trip fee and permit fees.
Thank you.
The fee schedule is updated on an annual basis each fiscal year and has City Council oversight, and we propose to follow that existing annual process here with this new fee.
And finally, we do want to acknowledge that there may be a need for other impact fees due to the continued growth and impacts of the entire private-for-hire industry on our streets.
However, we do think that any additional impact fees should be considered after we've had a chance to evaluate the actual impact of AVs on our streets.
And that these impact fees should be considered for the private hire— private-for-hire industry as a whole, not just for AVs.
Thank you, and I'd now like to hand it back to Shoshana for next steps.
Shoshana Cohen
Uh, thank you, Hannah.
I think next slide.
So just briefly to recap again, uh, we know there's additional proposals that could be considered, but the entire package of proposed code and administrative rules that we've just heard is designed to protect the public interest and allow the city to actively manage this change.
We've also integrated evaluation and review to our proposed regulations, acknowledging that policies may need to change as this quickly evolving industry changes and we see more about the impacts on our streets.
And then finally, of course, none of us can know what will happen in the 2020 state legislative session around this topic.
We have some hope that a local regulatory package may help to reduce pressure to move forward with state Preemptory.
Preemptory.
I don't know how to say that word.
Legislation.
And then before we dive into discussion, just briefly, as was already said, the current plan is that we would return to this committee in 2 weeks with an ordinance with specific code.
And the ordinance could actually also offer sort of direction on the administrative rules.
And then, and I believe Derek Bradley's in the room, we're continuing to coordinate really really closely with the Office of Government Relations and other partners around the state as we get ready for the state session.
And that's all we have today, and welcome questions.
Olivia Clark
Thank you so much, Shoshana, Hannah, and Jacob.
That was an excellent overview.
I'm very impressed by the research that you've done across the country, all the work that you put into this.
I know that we've been pushing you pretty hard to get this done because I was really hoping that we could do this before the end of the year, or at least before the state legislature meets.
So I appreciate all the work that you've put into this.
It's, it's really, um, terrific.
So, um, I know we have about half an hour for discussion of this, and I know that, um, you've also met with some of the— my colleagues individually, um, and gotten their feedback, and I'm sure you'll continue to do that before we finally draft something.
Let me first turn it over to my vice thank you, Chairwoman Clark.
Loretta Smith
Thank you all for the presentation, and I'll get right to it.
What protections or transition opportunities could be available for workers displaced by this new technology?
Jacob Sherman
Yeah, um, thanks, uh, Councilor Smith.
Uh, you know, one of the primary things that we're thinking about in this proposal is that driver support fee and using that fee in order to invest in resources that could support driver activities.
That could be retraining, that could be scholarships, that could be other small business support.
I mean, there's a variety of different activities that we could look to stand up.
This is, I think, something we'd be looking very closely to you all to give us some guidance and some direction on.
Just as you gave us guidance and direction on the Driver Resource Center, this is something that is, pun intended, very much outside of our lane as a transportation agency.
And we'd be looking to you to help us understand how to best program those resources.
It is also the kind of thing we could go out to RFP with a variety of different potential providers in order to deliver those resources.
Loretta Smith
We've started some kind of preliminary modeling and forecasting on what those and to the interim PBOT director, I, I appreciate that, but have you all evaluated the potential economic impact on Portland residents who currently work as a rideshare taxi or professional driver?
Because I am concerned that we're going to put a lot of folks out of work in this transportation industry?
Shoshana Cohen
Thank you for the question.
And I'm not sure if you were directing that to the interim director who is in the room, although still getting up to speed on this.
So if it's okay, I'll answer.
Yes.
Well, I just wanted to add one of the other things is really the limit on, you know, we're proposing a very small fleet size and that could stay very small.
And, you know, fundamentally, yes, this cars without drivers will replace cars with drivers.
That will have an economic impact.
I think the reason to bring this is not to replace drivers.
Obviously it is because it is— it may be coming.
And so how can we set up as thoughtfully as possible?
But there's no way around a significant economic impact to drivers who are replaced.
Thank you.
And as Jacob already said, to some degree, some of that is outside of our policy lane.
So we're trying to propose thoughtful regulations within that context.
But yes, there will be an impact.
Loretta Smith
But the City of Portland does have a policy lane to make sure that certain industries and industries in the city are not impacted by the policies that we create.
And for, you know, I'll tell you a couple of things, and this is just my bias.
I am concerned about the safety issues.
I'm concerned that the elderly who, uh, who need transportation, that they will not get that extra push in an ice storm of don't walk on this sidewalk, or I can try to get you closer, and you can actually identify potential problems for, for riders who, um, who may use this, uh, new technology.
But I am really concerned about that.
I'm concerned that, you know, we're trying to create Some sort of tax to do a driver's education piece, but that's not good enough because people are going to be losing their jobs.
And I think it's going to— this will have some sort of impact.
And Elon Musk put out a— there were— there's a whole fleet of new autonomous drivers, and he's, you know, these folks can work because you don't have those limits.
Yeah.
These, these, this technology allows the cars to be used 24 hours a day.
So if you're a human, you cannot compete with that kind of, of work product.
So I, I would like us to at least be a little— I mean, I'm— I was listening to your presentations, but it didn't seem like you all really cared about that to me.
Shoshana Cohen
Yeah, I guess thank you for that feedback.
Yeah, we, we are very much aware of it and don't disagree with any of those things.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, Councilor Smith.
I think we all have those concerns.
I think though, if we don't do something and we're preempted by the state, then those drivers are SOL anyway.
You know, I think that we're trying to get a handle on it so that we might provide some protection and some resources for those people that may be So that's part of the goal here.
Um, Councilor Koyama, are you done?
Councilor Koyama Lane.
Tiffany Koyama Lane
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you, Vice Chair, for that.
I do want to say I see that all of you are doing your jobs and you're approaching this thoughtfully and you're trying really hard to do that.
And I understand that we have concerns about being preempted at the state.
Um, we also don't want to like restart policy timeline if new councilors are taking positions in January.
Um, and I also am more aligned with Vice Chair Smith in concerns around safety, surveillance.
I'm also opening our roads to billionaires.
I'm worried about, rather than letting some little bit in and seeing what happens, I'm worried about what will happen.
And, and I, I am more wanting to start with no.
And then see what happens and then go from there.
I do have a couple questions.
Like, one is, this is connected to Policy Concept 4.
I'm wondering if you all can speak to how the city would plan to address in real time issues like AVs blocking an emergency vehicle from accessing someone in distress.
Jacob Sherman
Thanks, Councilor Koyama Lane, and appreciate your opening comment about us being thoughtful and working hard to do our jobs.
You know, I think this is something where we have kind of within the agency a bunch of regulatory enforcement staff that are on a regular basis taking taxi rides, taking Uber and Lyft rides, going out to the airport, making sure that people are permitted, making sure that the vehicles don't have substantial wear and tear or damage to them.
And so we would probably be using some of those regulatory enforcement specialists to be out monitoring these kinds of things.
We need to have further discussions with the City Attorney's Office about how we can build cases to take potential regulatory action.
One thing that we've heard from our colleagues in California as well as Texas is that social media is often the place you hear about some of these incidents first.
Yeah.
And so I think one thing we're very interested in is how might we use some of that information as part of developing a potential violation or a code or a package that we could then take action on.
And so we have some more work to do there, but that's kind of preliminary how we're thinking about this.
You know, when the City of Portland first had e-scooters arrive in our city, it wasn't because we wanted them or invited them.
It was because we also found out that companies were coming and getting ready to deploy them.
And we kind of developed a very similar approach, took a policy, created a policy framework, told the companies they had to wait, told the companies that they had to come and play by the rule.
And then we had staff working on this on a daily basis and picking up the phone and solving some of those problems.
We'd be taking a very similar approach here.
It would be very hands-on for probably the first year or more, or the first few years.
Tiffany Koyama Lane
I had another question about fees, maybe per trip fees, or if we're going to do per mile fees.
And I'm wondering if there's been any consideration about having higher fees for certain vehicles that are maybe taller or heavier, lower price for ones that are shorter, lighter vehicles.
And we know that smaller, lighter vehicles are safer, and just wondering if there's been any conversation around that.
Mitch Green
Thank you.
Shoshana Cohen
You know, those are all good questions, and I think some initial thoughts.
Those are things that could absolutely be considered.
You know, again, might make sense across the private-for-hire industry, but absolutely could be considered.
Tiffany Koyama Lane
And has there been any community engagement related to the recommendations, and what has that been like, and can you tell us about that?
Shoshana Cohen
Yeah, well, yeah, I think it's fair to say we've been doing engagement this whole year, maybe, at different levels.
And, you know, we did sort of the— went through the official administrative rule engagement process, had a public hearing, put the rules out far and wide, met with individual groups.
We've continued to do sort of ongoing stakeholder engagement.
We've met, you know, just in the last couple weeks, we met with some of the regular transportation advocacy groups and other groups.
Thank you.
Like Disability Rights Oregon and folks sort of continuing to try to take people's temperature and continue to hear lots and lots of reservations and also concern about what might happen if it were to be done at the state level.
So I think we're— we continue to hear similar things, I think.
But yeah, I don't know what else you all want to say about it.
Jacob Sherman
And maybe just to underline a specific piece of engagement, you know, we also working on broader private-for-hire issues including Uber and Lyft issues, we meet regularly with the Oregon Drivers Union and their representatives.
We've got a standing monthly meeting, and this is a topic that we discuss often and have, I think in the last 2 months, have probably discussed it 2 or 3 times, including an hour and a half session a week and a half ago.
So I think in many ways we know some of those concerns.
I think some of those concerns are definitely shared.
Thank you.
And as Chair Clark said, I think we're trying to put forward what we consider to be kind of a nationally leading framework that is going to hopefully solve the vast majority of the problems.
It might not be perfect, but it might be really good.
Shoshana Cohen
And maybe just last thing on that point, just again, we've met with some people in the last week or so and have heard some additional specific recommendations which haven't yet been incorporated, but absolutely could be.
So we're still, So this is sort of, I think, if this keeps moving, which maybe it will not, but if it does, feel like it's sort of a continuous conversation.
And know there's some other specific proposals out there as well.
Tiffany Koyama Lane
I want to acknowledge the commitment to community engagement and that you all are open and are continuing to do that.
That's really important.
And for me personally, it's unclear if there's— if this moving forward, if AVs would benefit Vision Zero Portland values, age-friendly values.
I'm not saying that's what you all are saying here, but what I'm— where I'm at is that even if we have strong policies in place, I'm worried about introducing untested technology onto our roads that are going to mix with pedestrians, cyclists, and drivers.
I keep hearing from constituents that they are worried when they see the different Waymos around.
I feel the same way.
They just feel creepy when I see them.
And I would like us to have a frank conversation about what it looks like to really just say no to AVs in Portland.
I'll leave it there for now.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, Councilor Koyama Lane.
I seem to recall that one of the, um, one of the things that you heard in your outreach that was at the top of the list was safety.
I thought that was sort of the universal concern, was safety.
Thanks for those questions.
Excellent.
Councilor Kanal.
Sameer Kanal
Thank you, Chair Clark.
Thanks everybody for being here.
Thank you for all your work.
Um, I'm obviously a critic of this industry and, and this proposal.
I want to be clear that I think that the work that you've done is what you've been asked to do, uh, and that you've done a good job of it.
And nothing I say going forward is, is a criticism of either you or your work.
Um, and all my questions and comments are for the 3 people up here, just to get— be clear.
One quick question before I start.
The guidance to staff that this entire project sort of started from in terms of authorization to pursue this is the resolution in 2017, right?
This all kind of stems from that 2017 resolution?
Shoshana Cohen
We had a standing administrative rule.
So I think when we heard that AVs were becoming active again in Oregon, we knew that that rule needed to be updated.
It was, I don't know, 8 years old or something like that at that point.
And since it was on the books as a testing permit, we needed to sort of start there and look at what we needed to do.
Jacob Sherman
Yeah, and I think that's correct.
As Shoshana was saying, we have an existing administrative rule on the books.
That administrative rule on the books is undergirded by that resolution, the Smart Autonomous Vehicle Initiative resolution from 2017.
And I think the, The SAVI resolution is undergirded by our broader kind of charter and the authorities that are granted to us as the steward of the right-of-way, which we use to then regulate, in this instance, not just proposed automated vehicles, but also shuttles and taxis and limousines.
Sameer Kanal
Yeah, I was mostly referring not to the authorization to come up with ideas, but the sort of directional element of it there.
I personally respectfully disagree with the chair, uh, in saying it's important that we send a signal to the state legislature that we're invested in ensuring the safe operation of these vehicles in the city.
I'm interested in ensuring the safe operations of vehicles, but not these vehicles.
Um, I agree with the idea that if we don't do something, there's a problem because the state will do their thing.
That's true.
I think we should just ban it.
That's doing something.
Um, and I will personally commit to spending time in Salem to, to help with That, um, to the degree that it is, it is helpful.
Um, you know, we've heard several times things like we've heard or citations on safety from industry-funded studies.
I've still not seen, and I've asked, and if anyone watching this would love to email it to me, I would love a, a, a study that is proven to not be industry-funded that actually shows anything about, uh, safety in the, um, in the long term and not just the part where there's someone in the vehicle But the overall, since these vehicles are just circling the cities that they're in even when they don't have passengers.
I floated an amendment to replace all proposed text with, quote, all vehicles require a human driver, end quote.
It's 6 words long.
Everyone can understand it.
Today I realize we may also need to add one other thing to that amendment, which is a repeal of Resolution 37296 to change the direction that we're giving to staff On this and should probably also override the administrative rule that Shoshana just referenced.
I want to acknowledge that the drivers union has been reaching out and I, you know, we, they've asked for human safety operators.
This provides needed access and assistance to people with disabilities.
That is an important part of this conversation regardless of whether these are autonomous vehicles or not.
That is one of the functions of the human operator of a vehicle.
There are countless safety scenarios that a computer cannot navigate, and a human safety operator ensures accountability and safety.
This is similar to what Minneapolis put in as well.
I will note that because the mayor vetoed it there, mayor can't veto here, so there's slight differences there.
But I do think that it is slightly less preferable than a ban, but I wanted to put that on the table.
Looking at the policy concepts, I really appreciate the work that you've done on the definitions.
One, as well as on the concept of US driver's licenses.
I think the numbers of 7 and 8 got swapped, so I don't remember which one it is, but the driver's licenses one.
I have no concern about the idea of setting fleet caps and authority to do so, but they're way too lax with 100 vehicles per company and then allowing the mayor to effectively waive them after 2 years by setting a large fleet cap.
I'm also concerned that the concept of an impact I think the impact fees creates a financial incentive to give away Portlanders' privacy and seems like a clear attempt to get the support of the drivers union.
But I want to note we can fund the Drivers Resource Center without this particular source of revenue.
We have to.
I wish we'd done a testing permit.
Concept 3 is great.
I just wish we'd done it in 2017.
I do want to spend a little time on 5 and 6.
The loading and unloading and bicycle lanes piece I appreciate the note, Hannah, you raised on the other option, but I think that the other option kind of proves why this is a bad idea.
Because although disallowing stopping in bicycle lanes might have negative effects on safety and mobility, that's also kind of upside down because mobility includes bicycles that are prevented from navigating effectively if there's an autonomous vehicle or any vehicle.
Thank you.
Um, in a bike lane.
Same thing for safety.
Um, but I really want to spend time on Concept 6, which is the thing that proves why this can't work.
A regulatory structure cannot work.
There is no way to honor the, quote, reasonable expectation of privacy that Portlanders have, end quote, with 250 at first and eventually an unlimited number of rolling surveillance vehicles on the ground.
Pair this with the forthcoming administrative push to allow cameras in every inch of our sky with Amazon's drone facility, and we're building a surveillance state here even faster than Washington, D.C. is.
The policy concept is unenforceable.
The only way to guarantee non-transfer of data is to not create it in the first place and will inevitably result in both private companies using it and transfers to ICE and other malign actors.
Specifically, the proposal is to put it into administrative rules, which gives no accountability to the public for any changes.
The idea that administrative rules will be changed to allow unfettered surveillance is already being acknowledged yes.
You know, it was acknowledged that, quote, city code, as you might know, is generally reserved for policies that are bigger picture and more foundational and durable rather than kind of fine-grained implementation things that might need to change in the future, such as administrative rules.
So I just want to put this out there that the mayor will be able to waive that at any point in the future and allow us to have unfettered transfer of thank you.
And the drivers union raised this issue in their letter as well, and I, I really appreciate that.
Councilor Smith, I agree completely.
There's nothing in here on protecting workers.
The discussion about the fees that came from that made it clear that, that the idea from the companies, not from staff, but from the companies, is to promote large-scale worker displacement of an entire industry.
And I'm personally not interested in assisting in the unemployment of any workforce.
And I should note, it's particularly important when we're discussing a workforce that So with all that said, I want to be very clear about my ask here.
I am begging my colleagues not to actively support the creation of a dystopia in our city.
Between the drone conversation and this, those are both really important parts of that.
And so I ask for support in changing the direction here and not supporting this.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Councilor.
Olivia Clark
And you're certainly welcome to offer amendments on the policies as well.
Councilor Green.
Mitch Green
Thank you, Chair Clark.
I'm just going to echo the 3 of my colleagues who spoke before me all hit on my primary concerns.
I do want to talk about the— you guys have been very well engaged with my office.
I think that that you're bringing a deep desire to build a policy given the guidance that you've received and within the sort of context of trying to avoid a world where we get preempted and then lose control of the situation.
So I want to acknowledge that.
I think that I have a higher risk tolerance for taking that fight on.
Like, you know, I think the person who championed the bill last time represents cities in Washington County.
And I'll note that Washington County has revolted against AI data farms and the like.
And so I don't know that the political appetite is there to continue to pursue that.
And so we'll see how that fight goes.
But there's one thing I wanna uplift that we haven't really talked about a little bit is that, you know, I also share some skepticism of industry-funded studies, but it's probably true that on a per-trip basis in isolation, these autonomous vehicle trips are safer on average than others.
But that's not really the stakes.
The stakes are whether we are producing better or worse outcomes in terms of safety for the system as a whole.
So this is a holistic greater than the sum of its parts problem.
And what you also find in these studies is, is robotaxis or AVs generate increased VMT.
So that's vehicle miles traveled.
And that's particularly exacerbated in a situation where there's no place to park.
And because the City of Portland doesn't have the appetite to appropriately price on-street parking to disincentivize storing a car basically for free in the public right-of-way, Okay.
And then we have a lot of places downtown in particular where it's like, this is valet parking, this is loading and unloading just for trucks.
And so there's not a lot of extra space to just pull over and park for a bit.
You're gonna get way more deadheading and a lot more vehicle miles traveled.
And that may actually result in increasing safety risks faster than it does the sort of reduction on the, Kind of like driver versus robot lens.
And so they— this is a problem that can only really be ascertained with more data.
And I would suggest that— I'm not sure that's a risk I want to take.
I support Councilor Kanal's sort of direction here.
It's the only place where we can talk about that more than 1 or 2 people at a time.
So that's the appetite that I have.
But if we can't, if we can't do an outright ban, I think my My next best option is the human safety operator.
And I feel like if you want AVs in Portland because you want to have experienced the sort of potential that they are a safer trip for you, that should still be true with the safety officer in the seat.
And so if we have to go some sort of direction that's Less than a ban, that's the direction I want to go.
Um, I, I also, I, I want to laud your focus on minimizing the time that's in the bike lanes.
I want to extend that to, um, you know, to the extent that we can, uh, prevent them from idling in, in, in, uh, daylight at intersections too, because that's, I mean, the biggest threat to pedestrian safety.
So I'll leave it there for now.
Olivia Clark
Thanks.
Thank you, Councilor Green.
Uh, colleagues, we're really at time, so I'm going to make some concluding remarks here and then we'll take a break, if that's okay with everybody.
First of all, I just want to thank the team again for all the work that you've put into this, how responsive that you've been to everyone, how you've tried to, um, take into consideration all the things that the other cities have told you, um, about what it's like to be preempted.
And you've tried to design the best package that you possibly can to protect us.
Um, I think, uh, Councilor Kanal's comment about dystopian future— I, I don't want that either.
I'm— let's be really clear that I'm not supportive of Waymo being here either, or whatever company.
Um, but I'm also— I've worked in the legislature most of my career and fought preemption, and I'm quite concerned that we will be preempted.
And I feel like the canary in the coal mine sometimes here, but we have 15 other cities to learn from.
And if we could be the city that actually designed something that worked, imperfect as it may be, and prevent the state legislature from taking away our power, I think that's the direction we could go.
But clearly, I think I'm— I could be outvoted here, but I'm going to keep trying.
Because I think that, um, if you really believe that, um, the legislature won't preempt us, then you win, and that's great, and I think that's super.
If they do, uh, I think that you all ought to start working on getting a governor's veto after the election, because I think the composition of the legislature, even though it's changing and maybe getting better in some people's opinion, I think that we will lose this debate.
So we need to prepare for it, and I thought this was the best way for to prepare for it, to design the best package we could based on what other cities have experienced when they've been preempted and don't get any data, don't get money, they get nothing.
So I was hoping that we could actually get something out of this.
But in any event, we will, we will continue this conversation.
We will draft something that is the best thing we can do, bring that back in 2 weeks, and we'll see how the chair feels about that.
Thank you.
So thank you, everybody.
Thanks for your excellent comments, the work that you did on going through all the concepts.
I really appreciate that very much.
And thanks to the staff.
So let's take a 10-minute break.
Um, why don't we come back here at 11:26?
Thank you.
All right, we have a quorum.
So let's go ahead and, um, let's see.
Diana, would you please read the next item?
Unidentified speaker
Item number 3, document number 2026-364, amend transportation fee schedule to establish an event parking rate within the Lloyd Event District and Zone V parking permit area.
Olivia Clark
Amend thank you so much.
So colleagues, this legislation is to address parking issues in the Lloyd Event District during events at the Moda Center.
I think they've impacted neighborhood residents and their ability to find their own parking during peak events.
And is this your district, Councilor?
It is your district.
Loretta Smith
Mm-hmm.
Olivia Clark
With that, let me just hand this off to PBOT staff.
Glad to see you here.
Kristen, are you here to kick it off?
Kristen Hall
I am.
For the record, I'm Kristen Hall, PBOT's Interim Director for Planning Programs and Projects.
I'm here with Raylee Stark, our Parking District Project Manager.
We're here to discuss an ordinance to amend the transportation fee schedule to adjust the hourly rate in the Zone B permit area in the Eliot neighborhood.
As we dive in, I want to acknowledge the many people at PBOT who work on parking districts, including our parking operations team, especially Erica Neville and Kristen Aldrin.
I think they're here in the back, as well as our meter shop and parking enforcement team.
It's truly a whole bureau effort to manage our parking system.
I also want to acknowledge the timeliness of this ordinance.
The residents of the Zone B permit area are impacted by events throughout the year.
But blazer season is a particularly big deal.
Given the season is kicking off, we're bringing this ordinance forward now, which would allow us to implement the changes as soon as 30 days after approval by City Council.
Next slide.
Thank you.
We manage on-street parking because it's a limited resource where demand far exceeds supply in many parts of our city.
Without management through pricing and other tools, parking spaces become impossible to find negatively impacting businesses, employees, and residents.
Parking management has many benefits.
It improves safety in line with our Vision Zero goals, and it ensures that customers can shop at our small businesses.
At its core, it matters because it reflects what Portlanders want: a vibrant city with thriving businesses, convenient access to services, and walkable, safe neighborhoods.
Achieving that vision requires thoughtful parking management.
And I stress the word thoughtful here because the needs of different stakeholders can be in conflict.
Successfully managing parking requires that everyone compromises a little bit.
So how do we do it?
We manage parking based on the land use context and the community's goals for an area.
For each of these contexts, we use our suite of management tools, including time limits, parking permits, and paid parking to manage that on-street parking supply.
Thank you.
When we look at a commercial Main Street like the West End, we manage parking so visitors are able to find a space when they want to visit a restaurant or shop, and we make— try to make sure each space, parking space, sees more visitors per day.
We manage parking for neighborhoods adjacent to an employment or event center, like here in the Eliot neighborhood.
To ensure that space is available for residents during events.
That means that a resident returning home from work or who needs to run to the grocery store during an event can find a place to park, even on an event night.
We manage parking in dense residential neighborhoods like Slabtown.
When parking is managed, we can continue to grow and housing can be built without unintended consequences like congestion PBOT has 5 parking districts, and in our most dense neighborhoods, we're also working with businesses and residents to establish a 6th parking district in North Northeast Portland, which should be ready for council consideration in the coming months.
Importantly, in these areas, it is not just designating an area parking district.
More importantly, it's a partnership between PBOT and the neighborhood to manage parking and make it easier to get stakeholders implement parking management tools as— or we work with stakeholders implement parking management tools, as well as making it easier to bike, walk, and take transit to create the walkable, thriving neighborhoods and business districts that Portlanders want.
So we're here today to talk about this ordinance to increase the hourly parking rates in one portion of the Eliot neighborhood where it overlaps with the Zone B permit program.
Thank you.
The mechanism to do that is an amendment to the transportation fee schedule by adding a new line item.
I'm going to pass it to Raylee to get into the specifics of the proposal.
Raylee Stark
Okay, thank you.
Good morning, councilors.
For the record, my name is Raylee Stark, and I'm a parking district project manager within the transportation planning section, and I've been working with the Eliot neighborhood for the past 3 years on their parking issues.
So to frame what we're talking about today, this is the Lloyd Event District.
It was established in 2022 to better manage parking during large events at the Moda Center.
So when there's a large event or a combination of events with 10,000 or more attendees, the district is activated and you must pay to park.
It is activated approximately 120 days or a third of the year.
Highlighted here in red is the Zone B Permit District.
This was created in 2024 to help prioritize parking for residents during large events.
And this came to fruition because there was a number of residents in the Eliot neighborhood who have been asking for years to help support them on the congestion that they are experiencing in their neighborhood.
I want to highlight that this, this program was designed for the neighborhood by the neighborhood.
So back in 2024 when it was created, a couple things I want to highlight is that there are income-based permits.
So based on your income, the rate for an annual permit is $65 or $155.
There's also guest permits.
So this was really important to the committee for caregivers and any visitors to the neighborhood to— that are regular and routine visitors.
So we have a guest permit program, and we also have nonprofit permits available because there's a number of nonprofits in the neighborhood.
So we have worked with the neighborhood for a couple of years, and since the establishment of the permit, we have been evaluating ever since.
We then added a pay-to-park to this area.
So if the— if you are not a permit holder, you must pay to park.
The current rate is $5.40.
Here on the screen is an occupancy study that was done during a Blazers and Winterhawks game in March of '26.
During this year's data collection, the peak occupancy was 96%.
96%, Which matches what we heard anecdotally from the neighborhood.
Parking is still extremely constrained, and residents are having difficulty parking during events.
As you can see from the screen, any, any block face in red is considered constrained, so 96% is really high for the neighborhood.
We talk a lot about occupancy when it comes to parking management.
And I want to show you a diagram about why this matters.
So the peak occupancy in Eliot was 96%, which is— which means that some blocks were actually 100% and you could not find a space anywhere.
When parking is this constrained, we also have other issues, mostly safety issues, because people tend to then park in front of fire hydrants, block vision clearance, And park over crosswalks.
If you lived in Eliot and came home during a game, this is what you would experience.
How PBOT manages parking is to, to keep the occupancy under 85%.
So ideally, there'd be 1 to 3 spaces available.
As you can see by the diagram that shows an 80% occupancy.
So when a resident comes home from work or running an errand, we want them to be able to find a space on the street.
And if they're a business or a nonprofit, we want their, their guests, their customers to be able to find a spot.
Our proposal today is to increase the rate from $5.40 to $8 per hour only on the block faces that are experiencing the highest demand.
So we will update— the proposal is to update the transportation fee schedule to create a new line item for an $8 rate.
For event parking, if eventgoers must drive, we want them to be able to park in the area of the remaining area of the Lloyd Event District and not in the Eliot neighborhood.
The rest of the Lloyd Event District is— are different types of uses, and the capacity for parking is there.
Here is a zoomed-in version of that so you can see specifically which block faces are being impacted.
Right, this is our proposal today, um, and as I said, I've been working with the neighborhood, and I am committed to making this program work Thank you.
Olivia Clark
Is that the end?
Kristen Hall
That's it.
We're here.
I'm sorry, we're happy to answer questions.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, Raylee.
Um, uh, before we do that, is there— has anybody signed up to testify on this?
Kristen Hall
We do have one invited testimony.
Olivia Clark
One invited.
Can we hear from that person before we have our conversation?
Welcome.
Thank you for joining us.
Jason Franklin
Thank you.
Thank you for— thanks for having me.
Uh, for the record, I'm Jason Franklin.
I live at 1907 Northeast Rodney Avenue, so within the parking district and within the proposed, um, $8 increase area.
So, um, first I want to say thanks to Ray Lee and all the staff who've been working with the neighborhood for a long time.
Uh, my wife and I have lived at our current, um, residence for 28 years, so we've seen the traffic, uh, gradually increase over the years.
Um, Partially to more and more events in the district, which is great, and also more residents, which is also great.
But as was pointed out, parking is a scarce resource and needs to be managed adequately.
And currently that's just not the case.
So as was pointed out, we do pay a yearly rate for our parking privilege of parking in front of, hopefully close to our house, and that's $155 a year.
And that is in no way guarantees that we'll have any place to park on a game day or a major event.
And so we just, we don't go out, right?
You want to make sure that you have groceries and don't have anything come up during a game day because you're not getting a space to park anywhere close to your house if you're in that impacted area that, that really indicated.
So hopefully this increase will help alleviate that somewhat.
I'm I'm not entirely convinced that $8 is even enough, really, given that it's, you know, $50 to park next to the arena and $25 to park across the street or whatever it is.
So I think there will continue to be parking impacts, but this first step is important to take.
And I think moving in more of a dynamic pricing, giving staff a little more leeway to continue to manage the district as we move forward, Working with the neighborhood association is going to be important.
So, um, again, I want to thank you for your time and encourage you to vote yes on this resolution, move it to, um, or this ordinance, and move it to full council.
Olivia Clark
Thank you.
Well, thank you.
Thank you for being here today.
Colleagues, I don't see any hands up yet, so I'm going to ask a question.
Um, can you— oh, we do.
We have testifiers.
Oh, we have another person.
Unidentified speaker
We have, we have 2 testifiers today.
Olivia Clark
Yes, I thought it was just one.
Unidentified speaker
Great.
Olivia Clark
Thank you.
Super.
Unidentified speaker
We have Alan Redwick and Edan Krolowitz.
Olivia Clark
Hi, Alan.
Thank you for being here.
Alan Redwick
Hello.
I have extensive notes, but I'll try to be brief.
Good morning.
My name is Alan Redwick.
I'm currently the co-chair of the Eliot Neighborhood Association.
I've been very involved in all of the committee meetings.
There have been many, more than 20 over the years, talking about this process.
You know, the first attempt for this was in 1992.
In 2011, there was a mini area permit program that was created.
In 2018, there were 2, like, pilot areas, Boise and Eliot, that were created.
The parking task force started in 2022.
This is now the second round.
We tried permits, enforcement couldn't do it.
Now we have meters, the price isn't high enough, and and we also have a larger plan, the North Northeast Plan, which is still waiting for you guys.
We're waiting for staff to bring something to you guys that you could let us create a committee today, but you could also wait and instruct staff to come back with a little bit more information for you about that.
But as Jason said, you know, people can't park in front of their house.
The entire purpose of this district was to let people park in front of their house.
So a lot of money, you know, $25,000 a year from residents, plus sounds like $750,000 in meter revenue, is going to not accomplish anything.
I mean, revenue is great, but that's not what we tried to do, and we're quite frustrated.
This Zone V was supposed to be like one of many things that we talked about during this parking area plan.
As you know, like, we have several commercial districts in the area, and parking around those areas has been constrained as more housing has gotten built, and we aren't able to deal with any of those issues until the North Northeast Parking Plan is adopted.
I think you guys have some potential language you could amend to the ordinance you have in front of you today if you wanted to pass that in my written testimony online.
But there's a couple other problems with the current setup.
One is most of the newer parking permit areas share 51% of their revenue with the area that they're set up in, but this one is currently just dumping all of its money somewhere else.
We're not getting any benefits.
We had tried to subsidize low-income permits, provide guest permits, which I guess disappeared in one of the iterations of this plan.
So there were supposed to be some perks to the neighborhoods in the area that have been lost I think having a North Northeast parking district would allow us to continue the conversations and kind of get some of that stuff back.
But we're pretty— I personally am frustrated.
The people that live in the area are frustrated.
I mean, they have additional enforcement, so they're getting parking tickets.
I know someone is getting like their paychecks garnished to pay parking tickets based on the new district that was created because, you know, if you park in front of a anywhere that you're not supposed to, now you're gonna get— there's a lot of enforcement going around, so now you're gonna get ticketed.
But there's, you know, the whole point of this was you should be able to park on your block or close to your house during the event.
So I'm nervous that $8 is not gonna be enough, that this is not gonna come back to you for another 2 years and it'll be a totally different group of faces.
And, you know, we're gonna be stuck dealing with the realities of this semi-failing parking district for a while.
So if you want, I can read the suggested amendment language, but I don't know if that's worth your time.
It's written down in the written testimony.
I can give you more information about all the many, many meetings and phone calls I've had about this, but also, you know, I don't want to I'd love to have more of a discussion if that's—.
Olivia Clark
Colleagues, um, do we have an opinion on the amendment?
Mitch Green
I, I would like for the testifier to read it.
Olivia Clark
Okay, okay, go ahead.
Alan Redwick
Okay, so there's 3 pieces, um, that the Deputy City Administrator in Public Works is authorized to implement the North Northeast Parking District as outlined in the Parking Management Action Plan.
This is a long document.
It was created over 2 years second.
Second.
The Portland Bureau of Transportation director is authorized to appoint a North Northeast Park and District Stakeholder Advisory Committee to inform future actions.
Part 3, the Portland Bureau of Transportation will return to council to establish any new meter or permit programs.
Without council action, meter or permit programs cannot be implemented.
You know, I would love to not see that last one, but I know you guys will probably want control.
So basically, this isn't really allowing us to do anything except keep talking.
Um, otherwise, we're gonna have to come back and ask for permission again to continue that work.
Um, so I'd love to not have to spend y'all's time—.
Olivia Clark
No, thank you.
Thank you very much for that.
I'm, um, not as familiar with the process that PBOT uses on parking districts, so I'm not sure how— what their reaction is to this.
And it's not my district.
I'm curious to know what Councilor Kanal might think about this.
Okay.
All right.
Let's see if there's— are there other witnesses, other folks here to testify?
Unidentified speaker
That concludes testimony.
Are there Testifier chose not to today.
Thank you.
Olivia Clark
Okay, thank you.
Thank you.
Yes, well, we have, um, a bunch of hands up starting with Councilor Smith.
Okay, thank you.
Loretta Smith
Thank you for reading that.
Uh, how will PBOT measure whether the proposed $8 parking rates improves parking availability without creating unnecessary financial burden Really?
Kristen Hall
You want to talk about that?
Loretta Smith
Yes.
Raylee Stark
So the reason why we proposed $8 is because we have a parking management manual that helps us dictate how much parking should be.
And it also, based on that, we were— we doing $8 an hour, we're hoping to see a decrease in occupancy.
Now, we are actively working with the property managers in the neighborhood to make sure that residents are purchasing permits.
And we know that if there, if there, the, there is a low-income discount, so we are, are promoting that and just making sure that they have permits because it is much more inexpensive than paying for parking on a daily basis.
Olivia Clark
Councilor Kanal.
Sameer Kanal
Thank you, Chair Clark.
Um, so first, uh, thanks for bringing this forward.
I'm—.
It's my district, obviously.
I'm happy to see the, the, the work that PBOT's done in this.
Um, while I'm very, um, excited about the idea, you know, obviously Moda Center, Veterans Memorial Coliseum bring necessary business to the district.
Obviously we see, um, the effects of that when you're at Cartside or Tamale Boy or, or anywhere else, um, on Williams, for example.
Uh, it's, it's There's a lot of impact as well on adjacent neighbors.
We've seen a lot of testimony and emails come in around event parking spilling into the neighborhood.
You've obviously backed that up with the data today.
And I think the idea is that we should be taking a step to make it a little less attractive for eventgoers to park on residential streets and therefore create more spaces while protecting as we implement that, residents and permit holders from any of the potential negative effects.
I did have a question around a few different things.
So heard about from neighborhood businesses like Lazydays Brewing, for example, about some of the unintended impacts of this approach around customer access and confusion about when event pricing is in effect.
Mm-hmm.
And so I wanted to just kind of understand that as someone who's been to Lazydays a few times, trying to, you know, make sure that they're able to succeed.
But how is— yeah, it seems like you know where this question is going, so I'll just let you do it.
Kristen Hall
Yeah, we have heard from Lazydays Brewing as well.
That area is not proposed for a change in the pricing meter parking.
The top part, we're not proposing to change the meter rate.
So it's a little bit separate from the ordinance we brought today.
But we also, We are really glad that through this process we have opened up the avenues for more engagement with those stakeholders in that area.
It's— there's some office buildings, there's some new multifamily housing, there's Harriet Tubman School, Lazydays Brewing, and we want to continue to work with them to figure out what the solution to the problem is there.
Is it the way the signage is displayed, which I rode my bike by this morning and looked at and It's a little confusing, so I think we can work on it.
So can we work on the signage?
Can we understand better what the issues are from all the stakeholders and figure out what the solution is?
So we are committed to continuing that conversation and figuring it out.
I don't have an easy solution to offer you today, but we are going to stay in the conversation, and that is not impacted by the ordinance that is before you today.
Right.
Sameer Kanal
And I think you're raising, it's a good pivot into my next question, 'cause signage is another thing that's come up and broadly enforcement.
We get a lot of emails.
I know that Councilor Perlegany has also mentioned it to me that there have been concerns about enforcement, concerns about lack thereof, meaning there are people who are alleged to be parking longer than the stated time limits as well as not paying at all.
And obviously it can feel like I, you know, if you're a resident there, I have to pay for a $110 a year permit and other people are kind of getting away with not doing so.
So I wanted to, I wanted to just kind of ask about that.
There's one side of it, which is ensuring that everybody knows what the standard is, and signage is a part of that.
But the other piece is sort of PBOT's enforcement.
Can you speak to how that's going to work?
Kristen Hall
Yeah, I really appreciate the framing of the two-sided equation of both making our expectations Communication's clear and then making sure everyone follows the same set of rules.
We've had a lot of conversations about how to improve enforcement in this area.
Do you want to talk about the strategies?
Olivia Clark
Sure.
Raylee Stark
Yeah, we know that pricing alone is not the only tool that's going to fix this issue, so we are working with parking enforcement on a couple other strategies.
We plan to have, especially during the, the beginning of the season, really have focused enforcement in that area.
So that is one plan.
We also are still engaging with the residents on ensuring them that they get permits and then putting out some temporary signs, letting people know the rules and knowing also what the potential citations could be so that it encourages them to pay to and then along— and one other thing along with this proposal is that it actually will allow for us to highlight this neighborhood and send it to, you know, work with Rip City Communications so that they can now put a map on, you know, on their website that says, do you know, we do not encourage you to park here, we encourage you to park in the rest of the event district.
And we did not have that prior.
Sameer Kanal
Thank you.
Okay, I appreciate that.
Um, so, you know, in the financial and budgetary impacts, it says that the anticipation is that this is going to be revenue neutral because even though we're increasing the number— or sorry, we're decreasing the number of people who pay even as we're increasing the amount each person pays.
Um, I had 2 questions related to that.
One is, can we earmark any additional revenue to pay for this?
Yes.
Revenue that does come in if those projections are off for signage and enforcement?
Is that something doable on your end?
Kristen Hall
We can certainly talk about how any additional revenues get spent.
I would want to consult with our interim director who's sitting in the back about how we might do that.
Tiffany Koyama Lane
Okay.
Sameer Kanal
And then similarly, has there been analysis done on if there's an expected increase to revenues in the parking garages.
Because if the idea is to displace event parking from the streets, some of that may end up being transit, of course, but some of it may also end up being parking in the Rip City garages.
Olivia Clark
I think the—.
Kristen Hall
I think, you know, with the city's on-street parking management in this small area going up to $8 an hour, we're hoping that it helps people find parking in other areas, whether that's off-street in a lot or in the rest of the event district where the parking rates aren't changing.
So most of the Lloyd District event district will remain at that $5.40 an hour, and there is capacity for more people to park in the rest of that Lloyd event district.
So we're hoping instead of parking in the, in the residential neighborhood that has a negative impact on the people who live there, people instead park in the rest of the Lloyd District where the land use context is, is more that opens up a question of if that makes those areas above 85%, should we expect that you're checking that frequently and coming back to us at that point?
Sameer Kanal
Because I'd prefer that over, you know, neighborhood associations raising it and not feeling like that's reflected, right?
Raylee Stark
Yeah, we will continue to monitor.
So we will be doing another parking study.
We do one once to twice a year.
Year to check to make sure that the occupancy is at that level that we want to see it at.
So we do the entire Lloyd Event District once to twice a year.
Sameer Kanal
Okay.
The last thing that I wanted to raise is, you know, when we're on the topic of earmarks, and I don't think there's enough revenue to make this all work, but I am concerned about affordability.
I appreciate that there is a That there is an option for low-income residents to get a $65 permit annually instead of a $110.
But obviously, if you live elsewhere, it's free to park on the street.
So I just wanted to understand in terms of one, making sure that there's awareness of the eligibility for the discount program.
Mm-hmm.
I know there's a lot of folks who don't know that they could get that.
And then the other piece is there's Streamlining of the online application.
We've gotten feedback on that being a fairly arduous process to my office.
So also, just one other thing.
Is this in fact going to be the highest rate for event parking anywhere in the city?
Because that's— I've gotten that in email, but I don't know if that's true.
Raylee Stark
Right now, in the Northwest Parking District around Providence Park, I think the rate right now is $7 an hour.
Sameer Kanal
Okay, so this would pass that.
Okay, so then, you know, I would request that, you know, when we're talking about farmers markets and neighborhood association meetings and all that, just being visible to kind of let people know what's changing.
I think the first time they should learn about it would ideally not be the ticket that they get, right?
Which it happens everywhere.
It's not specific to this part of the city or even the city, but I just wanted to excellent point.
I will move to refer it with a do pass recommendation.
Olivia Clark
Oh, the amendment?
Sameer Kanal
No, the ordinance.
Olivia Clark
Oh, the ordinance.
Oh, thank you.
Thank you very much.
And actually Providence Park is $7.40.
Okay.
So maybe this is inflation.
Sameer Kanal
I always take the max, so I'm—.
Olivia Clark
Right, right.
Great.
So I have a— the motion's been moved by Councilor Kanal.
Loretta Smith
Is there a second?
Olivia Clark
Thank you.
It's been seconded by Councilor Smith.
I— sorry, we can have some more discussion, but I was going to ask PBOT for their opinion about the amendment that our witness has offered up.
Kristen Hall
So the amendment that the witness offered is very similar to what we hope to bring to you as a north— when we ask you to consider the north-northeast parking Plan in its complete form.
Whether or not you want to consider that today without the presentation and full discussion of the North and Northeast Parking Plan is really up to you as the council committee.
Olivia Clark
Kristen, when do you intend to bring that?
Kristen Hall
It's ready to bring to you.
It's been a minute since we finished it, and so Rayleigh has actually been doing a bit more stakeholder engagement to make make sure stakeholders who have moved into the area since we completed our outreach are aware of the plan and how it will impact them.
So we would, um, I think in our perfect world, we would finish that outreach over the next, uh, 6 to 8 weeks and come back to you, I think, probably in January, given what— how we understand your, um, current agendas.
But we could be ready to come back sooner if you'd like.
Olivia Clark
Well, I'm open, uh, should someone like to move that amendment.
Alan Redwick
I just wanted to say that a bunch of the concerns that Commissioner Kanal is bringing up, we right now have like an ad hoc email list where we talk about these things.
We— creating a committee would be actually quite helpful to address all of those concerns in a more structured way.
So if that's—.
Olivia Clark
Let's stay on point here.
So, um, I don't see anybody offering— what?
Oh, I'm sorry, in the queue.
I forgot the queue.
How about Councilor Green gets an opportunity?
Mitch Green
Thank you, Chair Clark.
Um, I was going to ask, uh, Councilor Kanal, who is the only member of the committee who lives in the district, what your appetite is for the specific language.
You think it's appropriate at this time?
Sameer Kanal
Yeah, I, I— it's not about the time, it's about the legislative vehicle.
I just want to be clear about that.
I think that there are a lot of things in the plan So, you know, looking at, there's 3 things that were floated in here.
You know, one is on authorization to implement the plan, which I think is the broader conversation that our staff was just talking about in terms of doing that.
The second thing is appointing a stakeholder committee.
The third thing I think is fair to talk about the idea that whether or not council needs to approve any further meter or permit programs.
I think that's already effectively in place in terms of— we have to change the rates, right?
So if there is a new program, no problem with that piece.
But in terms of committee, obviously I've expressed, not based on being in District 2, but just my experience with committees of wanting to make sure we do that right.
And then the second piece is I would like to hear the I think there's, there's a lot more in there.
It is a very long document.
Olivia Clark
That's fair.
So we will reschedule.
I don't know, uh, Acting Director just stepped up and I think wants to maybe make a comment.
Tate White
Yes, I'm Interim Director Wendy Cully for PBOT, and I just wanted to share that we would be glad to bring this back to you after Rayleigh finishes her outreach.
Jacob Sherman
There's some—.
Tate White
It's been a complicated plan and we've put a lot of effort into it and just want to make sure that It's complete.
So I would appreciate the extra time.
Unidentified speaker
Great.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, Councilor Kanal.
Councilor Green, do you have any—.
Mitch Green
Yeah, yeah, still have some discussion here.
So, um, I heard, um, I, I think what I'm worried about is, and I don't think this is the intent of the Bureau, but, um, you know, 8 weeks becomes maybe 10 weeks, and then it— I feel like there's been a lot of engagement on this probably hitherto.
To date.
And, um, I wonder if there's just some appetite to put some declarative language that, like, there's a time certain this comes back, maybe before the end of the calendar year or something like that.
Um, I don't know if we can do that on the fly, if that's something that can happen after this committee, before council.
Olivia Clark
Um, I don't think we have time on our agenda.
Mitch Green
Okay, well, I'll tell you what I'm going to do.
I am going to think about what to do before this goes to the full body.
To put some sort of assuring language in that we are not in the business of— like, we want to move fast, we really do.
And, um, but I'm going to respect that it's your district, Councilor Kanal.
So maybe I'll talk to you about that offline before we— but so I'll support this getting out of committee, but then I think I want to make sure that we can maybe add something before the full council.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, I appreciate that.
All right, colleagues, we have a motion on the floor it's been moved by Councilor Kanal, seconded by Councilor Smith.
If there's not any more discussion—.
Sameer Kanal
30 Seconds.
Olivia Clark
Okay, we're running behind, just a warning.
Sameer Kanal
So yeah, first, just one, I want to follow up on lazy days and the signage and all that stuff, and I'd love a briefing with you on that.
Secondly, just want to make sure that we're— I agree with the idea of ensuring that there's a timeline pursuant to whatever limitations we have on the schedule.
I do want to have the big conversation.
I think there are probably a lot of stakeholders who want to be involved.
In the conversation when we get to that plan.
And I think before the end of the year is, is, is a— would be a goal for me.
Um, if it needs till January, I, you know, I understand, but it is also complicated with our schedule situation changing.
Thanks.
Raylee Stark
Thank you.
Olivia Clark
And we, we'll take a look at the schedule, Councilor Green.
We'll take it— we'll take another look.
Um, great.
Um, there's no further discussion.
Uh, Diana, would you please call the roll?
Loretta Smith
Green?
Mitch Green
Aye.
Olivia Clark
Smith?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Unidentified speaker
Kanal?
Sameer Kanal
Aye.
Unidentified speaker
Koyama Lane?
Tiffany Koyama Lane
Aye.
Unidentified speaker
Clark?
Olivia Clark
Aye.
Unidentified speaker
Uh, with 5 ayes, the motion to refer the ordinance document number 2026-364 to the City Council with a recommendation it be passed has passed.
Olivia Clark
Great, thank you all.
Thanks for all your good work, Raylee.
I appreciate it.
And, um, I'm sure we'll see you again, potentially soon.
Um, Diana, would you please call or read the next item?
Unidentified speaker
Item number 4, document number 2026-365, authorize the acceptance of real property from the Oregon Department of Transportation and approve a memorandum of understanding for future property transactions.
Olivia Clark
This ordinance accepts the transfer from an ODOT-owned parcel of land to the city.
It's located adjacent to the intersection of Southwest Naito Parkway and South Sherman Street.
It also approves an MOU between the city and ODOT for future property transactions.
So with that, um, David, you want to take over?
David McEldowney
Thank you.
Um, good morning, Councilor— or Chair Clark, good evening, Council Clerk and councilors.
My name is David McEldowney.
I am PBOT's— excuse me— Real Property Services Division Manager, and I'm joined by Kevin Ballock, who's a supervisor in the property management section.
Um, do you want to get the presentation up on the screen?
Olivia Clark
It's not letting me share here.
David McEldowney
So when the presentation gets up there, we'll have a map.
I just wanted to give you a little additional orientation here.
Do we have it?
Olivia Clark
I think we all have it handy.
David McEldowney
Okay, great.
So while you continue to work on that, as Councilor Clark mentioned— yes, here we go.
The property is bounded by Southwest Naito.
The picture, the left hand is north and right hand is south.
Top of the picture is east.
I-405 is just off to the east.
Mitch Green
Yes.
David McEldowney
The ordinance that PBOT is bringing today involves the MOU with ODOT that contemplates the transfer of land to the city as well as future property transfers.
I believe the committee is familiar with some of these parcels from a previous trade that we had with ODOT that resulted in the expansion of the Saferest Village, which you can see there at the bottom of the screen on the south side of Naito Parkway.
I'll cover some history really quickly here.
Kevin, I think I have the slides out of order.
If you'll go to slide 3, please.
One more.
Kristen Hall
That's on there.
David McEldowney
One more.
One more.
There we go.
Thank you.
Okay.
The parcels we're discussing today were formally improved with the Harbor Freeway, yes.
The majority of the former freeway land was jointly owned by ODOT and the city.
So in order to assemble the land needed for the Safe Rest Village, the 2 agencies traded property rights in 2021 and 2025.
Presently, ODOT and PBOT have reached a tentative agreement in which the state will transfer to the city 2 parcels of land adjacent to the International Kevin, if you go back to slide 2.
These are the 2 parcels.
They sit in between the International School property and Naito Parkway.
The slide shows the 2 parcels of land that would be immediately transferred to the city if the ordinance is passed.
And if they look familiar, that's because we had traded our 60% undivided interest to the state in the last trade to secure the rest of the land for the Safe Rest Village.
PBOT is anticipating that if the ordinance is approved, the city will resume our prior relationship with the International School as it relates to stewardship of this land while long-term options are evaluated.
Slide 4, please.
Okay.
This is 4.
There we go.
Thank you.
Following the initial property transfer, the heart of the MOU addresses the remaining lands, which you see on your screen now.
As you can see, the property on the north end is owned 100% by ODOT, while the other parcels are jointly owned 60/40, with the city having 60% and the state having 40%.
The MOU provides the city with options to either A, completely acquire ODOT's property interests through cash purchase, B, trade the property rights or trade property rights of equivalent value with ODOT to decouple joint ownership.
What that may look like is ODOT would own some of the land, we would own, you know, another part of that land, or C, decouple joint ownership through a combination of property rights and cash.
All 3 options would allow the city to land bank these parcels for future use.
The properties would be appraised to determine the market value.
Slide 5.
PBOT is requesting that the committee move forward the— or move the ordinance forward to the full council, and that the council authorize the city administrator to approve and accept the transfer deed from ODOT For the 2 parcels next to the International School.
We are recommending that council authorize PBOT to pursue the terms of the MOU, and if the property trades are recommended under options B or C, return to council and seek authorization for such transactions.
This concludes our presentation.
We'd be happy to answer any questions you may have.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, David.
Councilor Smith.
Thank you.
Loretta Smith
Thank you for the presentation.
What is the potential for affordable or workforce housing development on these properties, and what would it cost the city to pursue that opportunity?
David McEldowney
That's an excellent question.
I don't know if the report ever came out, but there was a draft report here a couple years ago that evaluated city-owned properties, and these properties were, I don't know, in the top 15 or 20, whatever it was, for affordable housing properties.
Not the 2 by the International School per se, but everything else that you saw in that last slide.
They, as far as the cost, I can't answer that question for you.
That'd be a Portland Housing Bureau question.
But I do know that they were high on the list for candidates.
Sameer Kanal
Thanks, Chair Clark.
Just a process question on this.
Um, for the— in the, uh, MOU, the, the transfer makes perfect sense to me, and I appreciate it, and I appreciate you being here and all the work.
On the MOU, there's Part 5, uh, which is on inability to perform, and it's what happens if we can't agree, and it says transferring it back.
Why was the default transferring it back as opposed to just paying the If we pay the appraised value, then there is no need.
David McEldowney
There is no default.
I mean, that is an option that, that would fall in one of the other options that I presented to you.
Sameer Kanal
So maybe outside of the scope of this, it sounds like the preferred option is trading land though.
David McEldowney
Well, I've heard interest in the city acquiring all of the land, all of the ownership.
And land banking that.
Yeah.
But the other options are really if the city is unable to come up with the funds to do that, then that provides us options to trade away portions of that land.
And the reality of it is if we did that, you'd still have another bite at the apple because of the— and I know Councilor Clark's very familiar with the state's rules.
Surrounding surplus property, but we would have another crack to acquire that from the state at that point.
But it shouldn't need to go that far.
This is just— it's always nice to have an option in an MOU or any agreement that allows you to reset things if you can't reach agreement.
Sameer Kanal
That makes sense.
Yeah, I guess just— I appreciate this because clear control of these is a good— it's a city interest, I think, to open the door to future affordable housing or social housing development.
So would love to do that.
And I know many of us care about land banking a lot.
Thanks.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, Councilor Kanal.
Councilor Green, do you have a question or comment?
Mitch Green
No, I'd just like to move to refer this to the full council with our do-pass recommendation.
Millicent Williams
Second.
Unidentified speaker
Second.
Olivia Clark
Terrific.
It's been moved and seconded by Councilor Green and Councilor Kanal.
I don't think we have anybody signed up to testify on this, do we?
Keelan McClymont
No one signed up.
Olivia Clark
Great.
Um, if there's not any further discussion, uh, will the clerk please call the roll?
Tate White
Green?
Mitch Green
Aye.
Unidentified speaker
Smith?
Loretta Smith
Aye.
Unidentified speaker
Koyama Lane?
Tiffany Koyama Lane
Aye.
Unidentified speaker
Clark?
Olivia Clark
Aye.
Unidentified speaker
Uh, and with 5 ayes, the motion to refer the ordinance document number 2023- Thank you.
Olivia Clark
Thank you, David.
Thank you, staff, for being here.
I know it's been kind of an arduous, arduous deal.
Appreciate your time.
Uh, colleagues, look at us, we caught up.
We're, we're, we're a good team.
Um, our next meeting is in 2 weeks.
What, you're laughing at me?
No, I like it.
Raylee Stark
We just got a gold star.
Olivia Clark
We are.
Um, just call me Teacher Clark.
Yeah, that's good.
Um, we're going to reconvene on October the 27th, and we'll continue the discussion of autonomous vehicles.
We'll have probably some more administrative items from PBOT, I'm thinking.
We'll see what— if we have any other time for other things that came up today.
So if there's not any other discussion, I will adjourn the meeting of the Public Works Committee.