May 17, 2017

This afternoon, Council approved the City Budget for the upcoming fiscal year. In June, City Council will formally adopt the budget. Nick’s full statement during the vote is below:

“Mayor and colleagues, I’m very pleased to support this budget.

This has been an unusually collaborative and collegial process.

The budget before us today addresses many of the issues I care most about and includes targeted and strategic funding for our shared priorities.

In particular, I want to highlight that it:

 • Directs a $50 million down-payment on Build Portland, a bold initiative the Mayor has proposed to tackle our backlog of street maintenance and repair.

 • Invests significant new funds in Vision Zero, affirming our belief that one death on our streets is too many.

 • Continues our commitment to partnering with the County to fight homelessness in our community. And I want to acknowledge the Mayor’s early work to build a strong partnership with County Chair Deborah Kafoury – that relationship is vital to the success of our work.

 • It continues investments in highly-performing programs that support our neighborhood small businesses.

 • Supports the Rose Festival, Portland’s official festival.

 • Continues to show discipline with ratepayer dollars, focusing on basic services like resilience and water quality. And this budget continues General Fund support for improvements at the historic Mt. Tabor reservoirs, work we’re doing in partnership with the Mt. Tabor Neighborhood Association.

 • We have partially restored funding for the arts, funded the first-ever performance audit of the Regional Arts and Cultural Council, and continued to fund the Portland Film Office.

 • This budget funds new Park Ranger positions in East Portland to work upstream with the community to solve problems.

 • Finally, this budget launches a program I’m very excited about called Project Search, which brings the City together with a non-profit to provide work opportunities for people with intellectual disabilities. We’ll be piloting this in the utility bureaus starting this summer.

Mayor, I want to thank you for leading what has been a very collaborative and transparent process with your colleagues. I also want to recognize your staff – Maurice and Kristin in particular, my Council colleagues, Andrew Scott and his incomparable team, and my own staff for their hard work.

And lastly, to all those who attended forums, sent emails, came in for meetings, and made their voices heard—thank you. Your advocacy has led to a better budget for our community.

Aye.”