Portland city councilors are allowed to receive free representation to defend against legal complaints, so long as they go through the proper channels outlined in state law.
That’s according to the Oregon Government Ethics Commission (OGEC), which officially dismissed a complaint against five Portland city councilors on April 10. The commission said none of the five named officials violated state ethics law when they received free legal services beginning last year.
“In this case, there was no information found in the preliminary review to suggest that… Councilors used or attempted to use their official position to obtain a private financial gain or avoid a financial detriment that was only available to them but for their official position,” the OGEC findings said.
Filed by Veronica Gallegos Lozano in December 2025, the complaint alleged that five members of an informal caucus of progressive councilors—colloquially known as “Peacock”—illegally received a gift by accepting pro-bono legal counsel for a prior complaint filed that September, citing reporting by Willamette Week. That prior, separate complaint alleged that six progressive councilors may have violated public meetings law by holding a private retreat that gave them a forum to potentially talk about public policy outside the public view.
Oregon law requires all public bodies like elected councils and commissions to make their meetings open and accessible to the public. Even gatherings that are below a voting quorum, but are held for the purposes of discussing future items that may come before the council are generally discouraged.
Councilors Candace Avalos, Jamie Dunphy, Mitch Green, Sameer Kanal, Tiffany Koyama Lane, and Angelita Morillo attended the August meeting. The complaint about the retreat is still open.
Dismissals were issued to each councilor separately, though the text of each was identical.
The dismissals offer some reprieve to the five city officials who found themselves facing legal risk. Ben Haile, the Oregon Justice Resource Center (OJRC) attorney who provided the services, told the Mercury April 14 that it also represents a win for a fledgling representative democracy on the local level.
“Our city councilors are not rich,” Haile said. “When they ran to be elected, they didn’t have personal lawyers to back them up. So, legal challenges and legal investigations are as scary to them as they are to most people, and they don’t necessarily have anyone to turn to. It can be very reassuring for them to know that there are people who have their back, who they can turn to in a crisis related to their job.”
After the initial complaint about the retreat was filed, Haile offered to provide legal services to the six councilors during OGEC’s preliminary review phase of the investigation, and everyone but Dunphy took him up on it. The central question was whether the legal services fit the state’s definition of a “gift” to a public official, or whether they had properly set up a legal expense trust fund—the legally appropriate way for public officials to receive and report the services, as outlined in state law.
State law exempts those trust funds from the definition of a gift, even if no money exchanges hands. The trust funds contain their own reporting requirements, and if set up correctly.
Haile said he was aware of potential concerns regarding ethics law before advising the councilors on how to proceed. So, he researched relevant state law and previous case law to see whether it would be an issue. Through the legal trust, Haile is required to report the time and value of the services, but otherwise, he was confident it was legal to move forward, and advised the councilors on what to do.
OGEC ultimately agreed.
“Based on the information gathered, it appears that The Councilors followed the statutory provisions required to establish the Trusts in order to receive the pro bono legal assistance from Mr. Haile,” the OGEC review stated.
The complaint also alleged that the local attorney’s representation of elected officials could present a conflict of interest, as Haile’s firm OJRC has periodically sued the city, particularly over police misconduct. The complaint suggested that since the City Council is responsible for approving or denying settlement amounts—and can increase dollar amounts if it chooses—councilors could ostensibly do so for OJRC-related settlements. But if a case came before the City Council in the future, Haile said, the councilors would still be subject to the standard procedure around conflicts of interest.
“There’s a whole process for that, and there’s nothing that has been violated just by them having some legal representation,” Haile said.
During its preliminary review, OGEC interviewed Bobbin Singh to learn more about the law firm’s work. Singh explained that the firm—the largest Civil Rights organization in the state—may be occasionally reimbursed by the state for its services, but the firm never charges clients. That’s largely because it represents people impacted by the criminal justice system, sometimes including elected officials.
That’s an important facet of the case, which could more broadly impact local democracy as the federal government appears to slowly dismantle representative democracy, according to Haile. It’s part of the reason he took the case in the first place.
“We were afraid that there might be a lot of harassing or retaliatory lawsuits against our elected officials for doing their job and speaking their mind,” Haile said. “Especially the Portland City Council. Because it’s a new experiment in representative democracy at a time when the federal government is trying to reduce representative democracy.
Haile said he and his colleagues wondered if Portland’s new government structure—in which voters approved ranked-choice voting, four multi-member geographic districts, and new mayoral responsibilities—could be particularly vulnerable to attacks from President Donald Trump’s administration. In other words, Haile’s offer of legal services could serve as a model to protect local democracy from more sinister threats.
“This complaint had nothing to do with the federal government,” Haile said. “But it was a good test run.”
Gallegos Lozano, who filed the complaint, declined to comment to the Mercury when reached by phone Thursday.