Portland's mayoral candidates take Street Roots' pop quiz

Where do they stand on funding public services? What will they do for small businesses? How often do they smoke pot? And more.

by Street Roots | 10 Apr 2016

Street Roots asked Portland’s 2016 mayoral candidates 13 questions — a mix of short answer, yes or no, and multiple choice.

The following nine mayoral candidates participated in Street Roots’ pop quiz:

Jules Bailey
Patty Burkett
Sean Davis
Bim Ditson
Deborah Harris
Sarah Iannarone
David Schor
Jessie Sponberg
Ted Wheeler

Steve Entwisle Sr., Lew Humble, Trevor Manning, David “The Ack” Ackerman, Eric Alexander Calhoun and Bruce Broussard did not respond.

QUESTION 1

You only have $10 million to spend. The fire bureau says that without $5 million, call times for critical services will be hampered, potentially costing people’s lives. Social-service agencies need $5 million because rent increases mean they can’t place people into housing, creating a backlog of people waiting to get off the streets. Both the police and the parks bureaus need critical support for services totaling $7 million. What do you do? (150 words or less)

Jules Bailey

Jules Bailey, 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

Fortunately, while there are always tough choices to be made, real public budgets aren’t this reductionist. I’ve been part of complex budgeting at both the state and county level, and I know first hand that good budgeting means diving into the details, measuring return on investment, and listening to the community about where their priorities are. One of my consistent themes is to fund programs based on evidence and results. When there are lots of voices asking for more funding in a limited budget, a clear focus on results and outcomes helps break through the noise. I’ll bring those same skills to the mayor’s office.

Patty Burkett

Patty Burkett, 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

This scenario speaks to fiscal administrative issues. There is more than enough funding available to protect all the priorities above with ease. A non issue to me. This schematic of an insinuation is, in my view, a quirky political football at best. The players, of which are pretty much every city employee and administrator, are responsible for: discipline, structure, including detailed specificity in whatever coordination efforts are required, to allow them to perform their duties with distinction. It is imperative that all persons throughout the city must be treated with respect for a job well done! THAT is a BIG DEAL to me! And so, in my view, their success is predicated on the leadership of the mayor, Council and administration. Good!

Sean Davis

Sean Davis, 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

Poverty creates crime; crime does not create poverty. Among the largest contributors to poverty is home insecurity. Those areas of spending that are immediately related to home security must be prioritized, but public funding is not the only resource the city has available. The Portland Housing Bureau’s 11x13 program provides $4 for every $1 spent by the city from the feds, state and private investment. One million dollars spent on housing may net the $5 million needed for social services, leaving $9 million on the table.

Next, fire and rescue will be covered as they are essential for the preservation of life and property, leaving $4 million.

Finally, on the eve of Portland’s expected growth, we’d propose a municipal bond measure with an expected return of 5 percent over 20 years, which should more than cover the police and parks, and maybe have some money for a publicly funded art project.

Bim Ditson

Bim Ditson, 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

A public bank of Portland. With a municipal bank we can leverage that 10 million to bond for our future. This gives us access to the funds that we need now, without entering the debt cycles of compound interest and regional equity extraction that all profit-based Wall Street banks inflict on cities who bank with them. We must tackle the causes of issues instead of only treating the symptoms and wondering why we aren’t getting better.

1. Comprehensive investments into transitional housing dedicated to solving homelessness, long term. Emergency services must happen in tandem with clear paths to not needing those services in the future.

2. Crime increases with disparity. It is disparity that we must fight. Programs that increase community empowerment, access to education, economic equality and opportunity are the answer. Not more police. When given a choice between a bright future and crime, people choose a bright future.

3. Land acquisition to ensure that every Portlander has a park in their life. Parks are the lungs of a city, and without them we will suffocate.

I do want to answer this directly as well. I would prioritize social services and the fire bureau over parks and police funding.

Social sevices: 3.8 million
Fire Bureau: 2.7 million
Parks: 1.8 million
Police: 1.7 million

Deborah Harris

Deborah Harris, 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

My first response would be to compliment those agencies for showing a desire to address and support the human needs of people with a sense of urgency. Too often leaders either fail to give recognition, or a simple “thank you” to those who are passionate in supporting economic stability to improve and enhance the quality of life for our communities. Yes, the cost and benefit(s) of each need to be weighed due to our instinct that one’s needs supersedes another. I will request a review of analysis and documents from each bureau defining the expenditures for requested finances. Knowing these represent critical issues that mayors before me have allowed to set on the shelf, I will effectively collaborate with constituents, bureaus, analysts and related: $17 million/$10 million. What do I do? At my inception as the new mayor, I took an important step by having an audit of the treasury and audited our city’s debt obligations. I can comfortably take the available resources, divide them into our cited neighborhoods thereby avoiding behaviors that created a debt-ridden city such as Detroit.

Sarah Iannarone

Sarah Iannarone, 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

I’d take the $10 million and build a 311 system, including cost-effective digital interfaces. Then, I’d reallocate the overall savings to human services and parks.

David Schor

David Schor, 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

I would try to raise more revenue, either through fundraising, taxes or bonds. Barring that, I would look for ways to reduce administrative overhead, perhaps by combining fire and police agencies. Ultimately, I would ask the people of Portland to help me set the priorities by meeting with the public to seek their input. I expect that we would prioritize social and emergency services, and accept some increase in fire response times as well as some decrease in parks and police services. No agency will get all that it wants in this scenario.

Jessie Sponberg

Jessie Sponberg , 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

I’d be reluctant to give the police any extra money so long as they fail to act in good faith with the community. I would use this leverage as part of the negotiations for the new contract (and they have to fire Mark Kruger). Of course they would immediately threaten to cut our most vital services, as usual. I won’t fall for that. The fire bureau has Randy Leonard all over it, so assuming it is halfway as wasteful as our Water Bureau I would encourage them to stretch 4 million, giving the full 5 million to social services and asking our friends at the parks department to be patient with me while I find the funds and let the grass grow for 1 million. Of course, this is a hypothetical box, and the trick answer is go cut your bloated budgets. AUDIT TIME!

Ted Wheeler

Ted Wheeler, 2016 Portland mayoral candidate

When you only have $10 million to deal with $17 worth of needs, your approach needs to be diligent, rigorous and creative. That’s the approach I took as chair of Multnomah County when we were faced with massive budget shortfalls as the result of the Great Recession. Among the strategies we employed:

• We focused on the core mission of county government, which was services for our most vulnerable citizens.

• We examined whether county leadership and manager ranks could absorb cuts in order to protect front line workers.

• We asked our front line workers to tell us what tools and resources were most important to their job duties, and protected them.

• We looked for technology innovations to decrease the cost of providing services.

The city will increasingly be in a resource constrained environment, and the next mayor must have the budgetary experience and expertise to navigate these challenges.

QUESTION 2

The Portland Police Bureau’s contract with the city says police officers involved in an incident using deadly force must receive 48 hours’ notice before being compelled to speak to bureau investigators. Average citizens, however, are questioned often immediately on the grounds of capturing the best memory of events. Yes or No: Would you abolish the 48-hour rule?