Murmurs: PPS Proposes Cutting 290 Positions Amid Budget Gap

PPS PROPOSES CUTTING 290 POSITIONS AMID BUDGET GAP: Portland Public Schools officials released preliminary budget recommendations Jan. 16 to patch a $50 million gap projected for the 2026–27 school year. They propose eliminating 288 positions, 180 of them in schools and 108 of them in the central office. The cuts come as the district continues to struggle with rising costs, limited revenue and declining enrollment; the budget is expected to be finalized in June. Before then, it’s likely the district will face pushback from families over its proposals. The district plans to blend grades in more classrooms at elementary schools and increase staff-to-student ratios in upper grades, resulting in the elimination of 91 full-time positions. And some of the most dramatic cuts will come to coaching and interventionist positions, the latter of which will be partially centralized. (Instructional coaches work with teachers to help them improve, while interventionists often support struggling students.) Across elementary and middle schools, about 110 positions are on the chopping block. Declining enrollment will account for another 51 reductions in classrooms, counselors, and other departments across schools. Those cuts at the school level would save the district $25.7 million. It’s saving another $24.3 million with staffing cuts in its central office. The Portland School Board will hear the preliminary recommendations Jan. 27 and kick off a community engagement process expected to last through much of spring.

NO MORE MULTNOMAH? A citizen activist seeking to combine Multnomah County and the city of Portland into a single government has sold out a 100-seat discussion of the matter to be held Thursday at Lucky Labrador Beer Hall in Northwest Portland. Mattt Zmuda, a software engineer, started his organization, MultNoMo, to seek enough signatures to initiate consolidation under a state law that allows it. Zmuda says folding Multnomah County government into Portland’s is the best way to drag the city out of its economic malaise. The idea has precedent; Jacksonville, Fla.; Nashville, Tenn.; Louisville, Ky.; and San Francisco have all consolidated with the counties that surround them. Such a move would eliminate duplication of administrative departments, remedy confusing jurisdictional boundaries for services, and bring more accountability, claims MultNoMo’s website. It would also save taxpayers money. Zmuda, a Pittsburgh native who moved to Portland in 2014, says urban blight drove him to start the effort. “Every time you go out, you’re rolling the dice on whether it’s going to be a traumatic event or not,” he says. As evidence of inefficiency and conflict between the two governments, Zmuda cites the city-county fight over which is responsible for public safety at the Central Library downtown. The county operates the building, but city police patrol the streets around it. The county’s press office declined to comment. MultNoMo needs 21,963 signatures by July 20 to start down the road toward consolidation. Zmuda invites people to join a waitlist for the Thursday event, which was first reported by the NW Examiner.

ETHICS PANEL OPENS PRO BONO LAWYER REVIEW: The Oregon Government Ethics Commission has opened a preliminary review of the legal counsel retained by five Portland city councilors. As WW reported in February, Ben Haile, a lawyer with the Oregon Justice Resource Center, is representing five councilors pro bono in a case pending before the commission. That’s peculiar because the OJRC has regularly sued the city in recent years on behalf of people alleging misconduct by Portland police. Some have reached settlement deals that must be ratified by the City Council. Haile now represents five of those councilors. Haile’s pro bono work raises questions about state statutes that prohibit elected officials from accepting gifts—including services—in excess of $50 from donors who may have business in front of such officials. Five applications obtained by WW show all five councilors applied for legal expense trust funds on Jan. 5, three weeks after Haile first represented them in front of the commission. Such funds, approved by the ethics commission on a case-by-case basis, are one way elected officials can record pro bono legal work as campaign contributions.

STARRY NIGHT KILLER LARRY HURWITZ ARRESTED: One of Portland’s most notorious murders is having a long afterlife. Sandy police arrested Larry Hurwitz, 71, on Jan. 16 and booked him into the Clackamas County Jail on a misdemeanor harassment charge. The Sandy Police Department did not disclose details of the arrest, first reported by The Oregonian, but a Jan. 20 charging document says he subjected the victim to “offensive physical contact.” It adds: “The state further alleges this act constitutes a crime of domestic violence.” Hurwitz pleaded no contest in 2000 to the murder of Tim Moreau, a 21-year-old promoter at the Starry Night rock club in 1990, when Hurwitz strangled him to cover up a ticket counterfeiting scheme. The murder was uncovered by reporter Jim Redden, who investigated it for WW and another newspaper, PDXS. Hurwitz served eight years of an 11-year sentence, and was arrested again in 2019 in Huntington Beach, Calif., with 2 kilos of cocaine. At the time of his arrest last week, records show, he was living in deep Northeast Portland. A civil court ordered Hurwitz to pay $3 million to the parents of Moreau, whose body was never found. But Moreau family attorney Erin Olson, also retained by the family of Hurwitz’s latest alleged victim to represent her interests, tells WW the civil judgment expired in December 2021 and is no longer collectible. Hurwitz was arraigned Jan. 20.