Murmurs: Labor Interests Eye Portland City Council

LABOR INTERESTS EYE PORTLAND CITY COUNCIL: The Oregon Labor Candidate School will host a one-day training session for Portland City Council hopefuls this fall in anticipation of the 2024 election cycle, which will determine who serves on the regionally elected 12-member council seated in 2025 under the city’s new form of government. The nonprofit is just one of several groups that aims to recruit and train candidates. Two-time mayoral challenger Sarah Iannarone plans to lead left-leaning candidates through a two-week training academy in September once the boundaries of the four voting districts have been established, and a politically centrist group backed by business interests, and likely the Portland Metro Chamber (formerly the Portland Business Alliance), is expected to put forward its own candidates. That means voters in each district could choose among leftist, labor and law-and-order tickets. Meanwhile, the names of prospective City Council candidates are swirling. Rumored hopefuls include Eric Zimmerman, a former mayoral staffer and now chief of staff to Multnomah County Commissioner Julia Brim-Edwards; onetime Multnomah County Commissioner Loretta Smith; Verde executive director Candace Avalos; and former Multnomah County Sheriff Mike Reese.

PROJECT TURNKEY COMPLETES SECOND ROUND: The Oregon Community Foundation announced July 10 it had completed the second round of helping nonprofits buy up cheap hotels around the state to use as shelters and transitional housing. State Rep. Pam Marsh (D-Ashland) was among those who pioneered the program in 2020, after devastating fires left thousands homeless in her district. In order to move quickly, lawmakers appropriated money to OCF, which since then has worked with nonprofits across the state to acquire 32 properties that added 1,384 units at a total cost of $125 million. That’s $90,000 per door, or less than a quarter of what the Portland Housing Bureau and other local agencies routinely pay for affordable housing projects, which can also take years to complete. “This achievement demonstrates what’s possible when the state and private partners work together to solve urgent needs in our communities,” Gov. Tina Kotek said. “It’s tremendously satisfying and thrilling, and I’m so grateful we were given the chance to do it,” says Marsh, who adds that the state needs to continue to look for innovative ways to produce more housing quickly.

ETHICS COMMISSION WILL PRESENT FAGAN FINDINGS: The Oregon Government Ethics Commission will present findings at its July 14 meeting of its preliminary investigation into former Secretary of State Shemia Fagan and her consulting contract with the co-founders of cannabis company La Mota, who were also prominent contributors to Fagan’s campaign. The commission will then decide whether the preliminary findings warrant a full investigation by the body. The ethics commission launched its investigation April 28, just one day after WW reported on the contract, after it received two citizen complaints. (Gov. Tina Kotek also asked for an investigation.) Fagan resigned four days later, on May 2. Two other investigations remain ongoing: one by the Oregon Department of Justice into an audit overseen by Fagan of the Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission that was tailored to La Mota’s interests, and an ongoing criminal investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice. Last month, the Oregon DOJ asked the feds to narrow the scope of their subpoenas.

REPORT RECOMMENDS POLICE BUREAU ADDRESS “PRETEXT” STOPS: The Portland Police Bureau’s Strategic Services Division is recommending the bureau address traffic stops that don’t result in a citation or arrest, noting they “can undermine the sense of procedural justice.” The recommendation comes out of the division’s latest annual report analyzing traffic stop demographics, which it found largely reflected demographics of crime victims and traffic injuries. (With one exception: Pacific Islanders and Native Hawaiians were overrepresented in stops by traffic cops.) Still, it notes, Black drivers were “significantly more likely” to be stopped for non-moving violations, such as a missing license plate, than white drivers. And the division noted that many of these stops resulted in no enforcement action, such as an arrest or citation. Traffic stops aren’t an efficient way to stop crime, and can lead to cases of mistaken identity or the pursuit of false leads, it says. “The Bureau should consider providing guidance to reduce the number of stops that end without an enforcement action,” the report says. In 2021, Chief Chuck Lovell directed Portland cops to reduce enforcement of “non-moving” violations, an effort codified by the Oregon Legislature in a law limiting the practice last year. In happier news, 2022 was the first year that the bureau found no significant racial differences in the drivers it asked to search. “Historically, Bureau personnel have disparately searched Black/African American drivers; however, this is the second straight year that the search rate for this group has moved closer to the overall search rate of White drivers,” it notes.