LAST SEPTEMBER, the Portland City Council stood with Standing Rock.
As voices around the country called for a halt to the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) that could carry millions of gallons of crude oil beneath the Standing Rock Sioux Tribeâs sole water source (and has just been given new life by Donald Trump), local officials joined the fray.
âThe City of Portland stands in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and other communities opposing the pipeline...â read a resolution [PDF] that passed unanimously on September 7.
It was a fairly routine symbolic gesture except for one thing: The DAPL item had been prepared by Patricia Davis Gibson, Portlandâs brand new tribal liaison.
After years of calls for a city official who could help Portland better engage local tribal governments and its Native American residents, former Mayor Charlie Halesâ office took action last yearâsecuring roughly $108,500 in ongoing funds and convening a selection committee. In his last major hire as mayor, Hales tapped Davis Gibsonâa Lewis & Clark Law grad, formal tribal judge, and member of the Comanche Tribe of Oklahomaâto the job. She began August 15.
âThis position is long overdue for the City of Portland, and we could not have found a better candidate,â Hales said in a press release.
Less than six months later after that release, Davis Gibson now lives in Wyoming and her position sits empty.
In a scenario that has inspired grumbling both inside City Hall and out, she was not among staffers retained in the transition from Hales to Mayor Ted Wheeler, and Wheeler didnât tap a replacement. The mayorâs office is pledging to conduct a brand new hiring process in the near future, though a member of its staff participated in Davis Gibsonâs selection.
The hiccup has led to varying accounts of what happened to Davis Gibsonâs short tenure. Several people the Mercury spoke to said Wheelerâs office would have had plenty of notice the new position existed and was fully funded.
âItâs unfortunate that Pat Gibson was not invited back early enough,â says Commissioner Amanda Fritz. âWe did remind [Wheelerâs team] before they were in office that this position was there, and we also said how great Pat was.â
âThe mayor-elect said he knew of the positionâhe heard from me directly on a number of occasions,â says Paul Lumley, executive director of Portlandâs Native American Youth and Family Center, who helped write the job description for the liaison position. âMaybe during the transition itâs hard to keep all the balls up in the air.â
Thatâs how Davis Gibson views the end of her stint in City Hall. She says sheâd been hoping to be contacted by Wheelerâs transition team about staying on. When that didnât happen by the second half of November, she gave notice sheâd be resigning as of December 28. Sheâs now director of an environmental organization in Sheridan, Wyoming.
âThis isnât my first political rodeo, and itâs not a good sign when someoneâs not reaching out to you,â Davis Gibson tells the Mercury. She says Wheelerâs chief of staff, Maurice Henderson, âtalked to me and said basically this just fell off the radar.â
Wheelerâs office offers another version of events. Spokesperson Michael Cox says the mayor relied on communications from Halesâ team when settling on new staffers, and that Henderson and Davis Gibson met twice. By the time they had their first meeting on November 23, though, Davis Gibson had already given notice she was leaving.
âWe were brought into the hiring process at the final stage and only as a courtesy,â says Cox, who helped scrutinize Davis Gibson and other finalists on Wheelerâs behalf. âOur preference would have been to hire for the position for the first time once we took office, conducting our own outreach and setting up our own process.â
Wheeler will hire a new liaison, Cox says, and is preparing a new selection process. That news, delivered late last week, came as a relief to people like Lumley, who view the liaison position as crucial.
During her brief stint, Davis Gibson helped push through a long-dormant agreement between the city and the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde, lent assistance regarding the Portland Harbor Superfund site, and paid official visits to local tribes.
She also went on one pilgrimage thatâs raised some eyebrows. Two days after council passed the Standing Rock resolution, Davis Gibson took a week-long trip to the North Dakota reservation in a city vehicle. She says sheâd been asked by the Standing Rock Sioux to hand-deliver the councilâs letter of solidarity.
According to records obtained by the Mercury, the 2,600-mile round trip cost the city $1,590, between lodging, meals, and transportation. It also spurred a complaint to the cityâs Ombudsmanâs Office.
Davis Gibson says she drove because she âwasnât flying at the timeâ due to migraines, and that she was well received in North Dakota. âThe Standing Rock Sioux Tribe really appreciated that gesture,â she says.
Whomever Wheeler taps to take the liaison role, it wonât be directly under him, as it was with Hales. Cox says the mayor intends to place the position in the cityâs Office of Government Relations. (Halesâ office tried to do that, but met pushback by the officeâs then-director, Martha Pellegrino.)
That would mean potentially more stability for the job, something Davis Gibson says is necessary. As she notes: âThere were all sorts of things I wanted to do, but you canât do much in four months.â