Question 1

Real Solutions To Homelessness

Accepted Answer

A New Direction on HomelessnessEvery city should offer compassionate services that help people rebuild their lives and regain self-sufficiency.Portland and Multnomah County have invested more than $2 billion addressing homelessness over the past seven years—more than $400 million last year alone. Yet despite this enormous investment, homelessness remains at crisis levels and has increased dramatically.We have to start being honest with ourselves: continuing the same policies isn’t solving homelessness.We should measure success by how many people actually move from the street into shelter, treatment, housing, and long-term stability.Continuing to manage street homelessness isn’t good enough. We need a new approach focused on ending it.1. Progress in Exchange for ServicesFor many people experiencing chronic street homelessness, active addiction, serious mental illness, and behavioral-health challenges can become major barriers to returning to stable housing.We need a system that pairs compassionate assistance with an expectation of progress toward stability—whether that means engaging in treatment and recovery, pursuing employment when appropriate, or taking other meaningful steps toward self-reliance.Setbacks and relapse happen, and basic emergency services should never be withheld as punishment. But our system should remain focused on helping people move forward rather than simply maintaining life on the street.2. Strengthen Coordination & Demand AccountabilityPortland relies on more than 40 nonprofit contractors to provide homelessness services. Many do important work, but a fragmented system can make accountability, coordination, and consistent performance difficult.Portland has taken steps toward better coordination through Portland Solutions, which brings several of the City’s homelessness and livability programs under one umbrella. We should build on that progress by creating greater coordination and accountability across the broader homelessness response system.Changes Needed:Strengthen coordination, shared goals, and consistent performance standards across homelessness service providers.Tie continued public funding to measurable outcomes such as shelter-to-housing conversion, housing retention, treatment engagement, and responsible use of taxpayer dollars.Expand programs that demonstrate results and rethink those that consistently don’t.
Do more of what works. Fix or stop funding what doesn’t.3. Expand Government-Owned “Social Housing”High rent costs remain a major factor pushing working families and vulnerable Portlanders toward homelessness.I support expanding government-owned affordable housing, often called social housing, and preserving the affordable housing we already have. By dedicating a greater share of our city budget toward building and preserving truly affordable housing, we can increase total supply, relieve market pressure, and lower overall rents in Portland.We should also strengthen short-term rent assistance for people facing temporary financial hardship, helping them stay housed before a missed paycheck, medical bill, or unexpected expense turns into an eviction and homelessness.Preventing homelessness is less expensive—and far more humane—than trying to solve it after someone has spent months or years on the street.4. Consistent Citywide Camping EnforcementCompassion and public order are not opposing ideas.Portland must establish and consistently enforce clear boundaries for the use of public spaces.When appropriate shelter is available, camping should not be allowed indefinitely in public rights-of-way, city parks, or on private property without permission. Encampments near schools and youth centers should receive especially urgent attention.Compassion requires offering people somewhere safer to go. Responsible government also requires protecting public spaces for everyone.5. Decentralized Micro-Shelters & Priority PlacementEnforcing camping restrictions requires providing realistic indoor alternatives.Portland should expand smaller, decentralized shelters and micro-shelters throughout the city rather than concentrating services in the downtown core or placing the burden on only a few neighborhoods.Shelter placement should consider vulnerability while prioritizing rapid intervention for:Families with childrenPregnant womenThe newly unhousedWhy prioritize people who have recently become homeless? Because early intervention can prevent temporary homelessness from becoming chronic homelessness.Shelter should be a bridge to stability—not a permanent destination.6. Rethink “Cash for Cans” Redemptions — and Measure the ResultsMore than 50 years ago, Governor Tom McCall helped champion Oregon’s groundbreaking Bottle Bill. It worked—boosting recycling and reducing litter.But Portland has changed, and even successful policies can have unintended consequences as circumstances change.  In 2017, Oregon doubled the cash redemption value from 5 cents to 10 cents per container. In the years since, Portland has seen a significant increase in unsheltered homelessness.Today, we should be willing to ask a difficult question:Is immediate cash redemption making it easier for some people struggling with addiction to remain on our streets rather than engaging in shelter, treatment, and recovery?Rather than argue about it, let’s find out.Because the Bottle Bill is state law, Portland cannot make this change on its own. I will ask the State of Oregon to authorize a temporary, one-year pilot pausing cash container redemptions within Portland city limits.Under this pilot:BottleDrop Blue Bag fundraising would continue, so schools, neighborhood associations, youth programs, and other nonprofits could keep collecting containers and receiving the proceeds.10-cent cash redemption would remain available outside Portland, including in neighboring communities such as Milwaukie, Beaverton, and Gresham.Portland residents could still conveniently recycle bottles and cans within the city. Instead of individual cash payouts, the redemption value collected during the pilot could be directed toward local nonprofits, Portland parks, or other community programs—preserving the value of recycling while putting those dollars toward broader community benefit.
During that year, we’ll measure the effects on street camping, neighborhood scavenging and litter, public safety, participation in shelter and treatment services, and recycling rates.If it works, build on it. If it doesn’t, move on.This isn’t about punishing people experiencing homelessness, ending recycling, or taking away legitimate community fundraising. It’s about being willing to challenge assumptions, test new ideas, measure the results, and follow the evidence.Portland has spent years managing street homelessness. It’s time to focus on ending it.

Question 2

Safer Communities

Accepted Answer

Rebuilding Public Trust & AccountabilityMeaningful public safety depends on mutual trust between the community and the police.We must acknowledge that a major driver of public skepticism is the perception that union contract protections prevent police officers who engage in serious misconduct from being fired.To restore confidence in local law enforcement, we must balance fair labor protections with uncompromising standards of integrity.Transparent & Enforceable Discipline: I will advocate for clear discipline standards during police collective bargaining agreements to ensure termination for egregious misconduct, building back public trust in the heroes who keep Portland safe.
Solving Portland’s Police Staffing CrisisDespite restored budget allocations in recent years, the Portland Police Bureau continues to face staffing challenges due to many factors. Among these are a bottlenecked hiring pipeline, high national competition for law enforcement personnel, significant burnout, perceived lack of political support from local leadership, and negative public sentiment.Due to this lack of available officers, the average police response time in Portland for high-priority calls (crimes in progress or danger to life) sits at roughly 20 minutes, which used to be 8 minutes a few years ago.We need to streamline our hiring process, protect our officers from forced overtime burnout, and ensure we send the right response to the right call every single time.My SolutionsCompressing the Screening Timeline: 
Police applicant background checks currently take up to 6 months, dragging out the total hiring and 14-month academy training pipeline. We must hire dedicated civilian background screeners to streamline applicant evaluations, cutting time down to 60–90 days.
Attracting Experienced Officers: 
Reallocate recruiting resources toward experienced officers transferring from other jurisdictions by offering competitive relocation stipends tied to three-year service commitments.
Expanding Civilian & Specialized Teams: 
Fully support and scale Portland Street Response for non-violent behavioral health crises, and expand Public Safety Support Specialists (PS3s) to handle non-emergent property crime reports and traffic control.
Retention & Wellness:
·       Predictable Scheduling: Introduce stable shift patterns to curb forced overtime.
·       Truly Independent Mental Health Care: Provide wellness support entirely separate from department oversight—ensuring officers can seek care without fear that insurance usage will trigger mandatory "fitness-for-duty" evaluations or desk-duty assignments.
·       Access to Culturally Competent Specialists: Subsidize specialized trauma and first-responder clinicians who operate outside standard insurance networks, removing high out-of-pocket costs so officers can access experts they trust.
Improving 911 Call Answering Times: 
We need more dispatchers. The state certification training timeline for 911 dispatchers is 12 to 18 months (comparable to police training). We need to look at ways to improve this timeline and accelerate 911 dispatcher hiring.
The "Safer Portland" Initiative: 
I support the goals of the current “Safer Portland” initiative to fund additional police officers and establish a baseline goal of 2 sworn officers per 1,000 residents. Should the “Safer Portland” initiative fail to qualify for this November's ballot due to ongoing signature validation disputes, I will advocate for the City Council to refer a public safety funding measure directly to voters on the May 2027 ballot.

Question 3

Lower Utility Bills

Accepted Answer

Real Utility Rate ReliefWith Portland households now paying over $2,000 a year in combined water and sewer bills—placing Portland among the most expensive cities in North America for basic utilities—it is time to stop treating families and small businesses as blank checks. We must deliver lower bills through strict fiscal discipline, independent oversight, and refocusing our utilities on core infrastructure.Protect Ratepayers from “Cost  +” Megaproject Overruns:Implement strict Guaranteed Maximum Price contracting and mandatory third-party "value engineering" reviews for any infrastructure project over $25 million. If a major capital build exceeds its original baseline budget by more than 15%, a mandatory scope freeze and re-authorization process will trigger before additional debt can be issued. Example, when the Bull Run Filtration Project was approved in 2017, Portlanders were told it would cost $500 million. Today, that price tag sits at $2.56 billion—a 5x increase.Although water testing detected low levels of parasites from local wildlife, there have been no reports of anyone getting sick from drinking water since 2017. Under federal law, Portland was required to install a treatment system, but the city chose full filtration over a less expensive UV light alternative.Cap Utility Rate Increases:Portland water and sewer rates are due to go up 7-8% a year for the next 5 years to help pay for the Bull run project.  I will champion a policy that caps routine water and sewer rate increases to local inflation + 1.5%, requiring a mandatory supermajority City Council vote and an independent cost-mitigation audit for any request exceeding that limit.Give the Portland Utility Board Real Binding Authority:Transform the Portland Utility Board from a purely volunteer advisory body into an Independent Utility Oversight Commission. The PUB must have binding veto authority over non-mandated capital projects and major rate hike proposals to ensure consumer interests come before bureau spending.Optimize Utility Debt Strategy:Because interest and debt service on revenue bonds account for a massive share of every utility bill, I will direct an annual Treasury Debt Review to aggressively refinance high-interest utility debt, leverage federal low-interest infrastructure programs (like WIFIA), and reduce the long-term carrying costs passed onto ratepayers.

I'm Running For Portland City Council District 3

I grew up in Portland and my wife and I have called the Brooklyn neighborhood in District 3 home for the last 6 years. We love Portland, and I am deeply committed to doing the work to make our city better for everyone.

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