Hours before the November 15 city council meeting on whether
or not to rename Interstate Avenue for César E. Chávez,
the latest twist in the months-old saga emerged: Late the night before,
Portland’s four city commissioners had crafted a compromise idea to
rename Fourth Avenue—city hall’s address—for Chávez.
They tried to bring Interstate stalwart Mayor Tom Potter on board, but
he called the Oregonian instead—breaking the news to
Fourth Avenue residents and businesses as well as Interstate rename
supporters, and cranking up the drama on an already tense issue.
By the time the meeting rolled around, there were several items on
the agenda people could testify about: There was Potter’s pair of
items, a resolution declaring the city’s intent to rename Interstate,
and the ordinance to actually set the rename in motion. Commissioners
Randy Leonard and Sam Adams still had a resolution calling for
additional process to determine the best street to rename for
Chávez. And, thanks to the last-minute negotiations,
Commissioner Dan Saltzman had a substitute resolution in his back
pocket—one that would supplant the mayor’s Interstate resolution
with one declaring Fourth Avenue as the council’s preferred option.
Several hours later—following testimony from over 80
people—the council had decisions to make. But now Commissioner
Erik Sten, the originator of the Fourth Avenue idea, was wavering;
testimony from members of the Chávez rename committee, and from
their supporters—most urged the council to simply affirm the
committee’s choice of Interstate—had swayed him back into the
Interstate camp.
Three other commissioners, however—Saltzman, Leonard, and
Adams—elected to swap out Potter’s Interstate resolution and
replace it with the Fourth Avenue one, despite Potter’s call for vote
on Interstate. “I believe the people deserve an up-or-down vote on
their proposal,” the mayor said.
But with Interstate now off the table, Sten rejoined the Fourth
Avenue camp: The substitute resolution passed 4-1.
However, Fourth Avenue isn’t renamed yet. The city code governing
street renames prohibits the council from initiating an honorific
rename. (Not that the code has stopped the council before; for both the
Portland Boulevard to Rosa Parks Way, and the Front Street to Naito
Parkway renames, the council waived the code that should have tied
their hands.)
To get around that prohibition, the council plans to vote to amend
the renaming code on Wednesday, November 21, by passing an ordinance
that Saltzman added to last week’s agenda at the last minute. (The
Interstate proposal, which was “contrary to our city code,” was
potentially vulnerable to legal challenges, Saltzman said at last
week’s meeting. The new process is intended to make the Fourth Avenue
rename defensible.)
If the amended code passes, the council is no longer barred from
initiating a rename. Instead, the council would follow a new process
for council-prompted renames that differs from citizen-initiated
renames. While citizens who follow the process have to collect
signatures from 2,500 people citywide, or from 75 percent of property
owners on the street in question—plus pay notification fees, fill
out an application, submit a biography on the honoree, among other
things, before the proposal goes to a panel of historians—the
council simply needs to pass a resolution, like the one the council
passed regarding Fourth.
From there, the council’s rename proposal heads to the Planning
Commission, which must determine if the renaming is “in the best
interest of the city and the area within six miles of the city
limits.”
Following the Planning Commission’s recommendation, the council
holds a public hearing. If, after hearing the testimony, the council
concurs that the rename is “in the best interest of the city,” they
pass an ordinance to rename the street.
According to several commissioners, the new process isn’t intended
to be a lasting fix. Rather, the new process is a way to rename Fourth
Avenue for Chávez as soon as possible. Commissioner Randy
Leonard is considering a charter amendment that outlines the rename
process, which could go to the ballot as soon as May. Outlining the
process in the charter—which the council can’t waive—would
make renames resistant to “political manipulation,” he says.
Meanwhile, Potter’s ordinance to rename Interstate didn’t die at
last Thursday’s meeting when its companion resolution was replaced.
Leonard and Adams’ pulled their “more process” resolution at the end of
the meeting, but Potter—bent on forcing an up-or-down vote on
Interstate—declined to remove his ordinance. It’ll come back on
November 21 for a second reading and vote, unless the other
commissioners do something procedurally to kill it.