Peace has largely reigned over Portland’s budget process this year. Despite filling a $21.5 million budget gap, Mayor Charlie Hales has tried to deliver what good news he could to safety net advocates and parks boosters and others, even as he’s proposed big cuts to the police and fire bureaus.
And there has been curiously little public pushback against those public safety cuts. Neither residents nor groups like the Portland Business Alliance have lined up to decry the pending loss of 50-plus sworn police positions and 26 firefighters. 38 fire bureau workers, including 26 from the bureau’s battalions.
Behind the scenes, that’s not quite the case—especially when it comes to the fire bureau. A memo (pdf) obtained by the Mercury—essentially a script for Hales to follow during a meeting Tuesday morning with the Portland Fire Fighters Association—reveals intense deliberations in private over the best way to meet Hales’ goal of saving money without maybe having to lay off so many firefighters.
The memo also expands on simmering discontent with managing another of Hales’ main goals: swapping in two-person rapid response vehicles, designed to handle medical calls, in place of four-person fire engines and ladder trucks. PFFA President Alan Ferschweiler wrote a stinging op-ed in the Oregonian on Monday criticizing the mayor’s initial attempt at the change. Later that day, Fire Chief Erin Janssens leaked to the O a plan that would ameliorate some of the fire union’s concerns, something that came up in the meeting.
I’ve left a message for Ferschweiler, and I’ll update with his comments when they come.
Labor negotiations also appear to be on the table. Though the firefighters agreed on a new contract last year, Hales’ office has suggested the union could avoid some layoffs by reopening the deal and agreeing to forgo some cost-of-living increases. The memo claims Ferschweiler personally supports the idea but doesn’t think his members will go along.
“We should respond that the COLA is a one-time thing to get us to a new normal, and it is up to them,” Hales’ talking points say. “You are dead serious about the RRVs and overall savings. They can either choose jobs or trucks.”
Members, according to the memo, want the city to apply for grant money that would help mitigate layoffs in the short term while waiting for better economic times. But Hales’ office tells me there’s still “a gap,” because that grant money would only be a “band-aid”—although, “who doesn’t like free money?”—and wouldn’t help the city get even over the course of it’s five-year budget.
“We’ve been flexible,” says Noah Siegel, a policy adviser for Hales. “The goal is hitting the savings number and introducing innovations.”
Peace has reigned? Did you go to the budget hearings? The ones on April 11 and May 16 were standing room only, with people waiting for hours just to sign up to speak. The budget process was very contentious this year and as the realities play out, the controversies will continue. Some examples:
Around 170 City jobs are still being cut, the compromises saved only a few. More than half are union positions. While some were vacancies, many are not. Even cutting vacant positions is a down-sizing of city services, as our population continues to grow. City workers testified about huge backlogs of work orders. Not maintaining our city parks and infrastructure is bad fiscal and civic policy. He should be hiring MORE people to maintain our city, not cutting their jobs.
Hales did NOT spare the safety net. Housing will suffer deep cuts because the Federal sequester means $1.2 million less to Portland Housing Bureau. The city funded housing at the same level as last year. They should have increased the City funding, knowing that the Feds are severely reducing theirs. This is far from preserving the safety net and Hales and Council know that. Yet they continue to congratulate themselves for “fully funding” housing.
As for other programs, while the services for sex trafficking victims was not totally eliminated, nor was it totally restored. Several positions will still be eliminated there. Some programs like VOZ and East Portland Action Plan were moved to one time only funds, in effect given notice that they will be cut in a year.
Hales is proving to be a spinmaster. His tactic of asking for 10% cuts and then “restoring” it back to a 6% cut level was disorienting. What he never talked about was getting revenue from those who can afford it the most–big corporations and very wealthy individuals.
Denis,
I’ve admired a lot of your work over the years, which makes the glaringly limited perpective displayed in this piece all the more disappointing. If you had attended the entirety of the April 11th budget hearing in particular (which from your interpretation I assume you didn’t) you would have seen anything but “peace.” From the hundreds of Portlanders who showed up at hearing after hearing, to the passionate testimony we have heard on behalf of the safety net and the many other vital programs on the chopping block this year, to the pleas of union city workers to not be laid-off when there is already more work to be done than there are workers to do it, the actual process has borne little resemblance to the story you have concocted.
Anti-austerity activists such as myself and my friend above have been giving up our free time to fight back against Mayor Hales’s baseless assertion that cuts are our only way forward. We have been there from beginning to end at budget hearing after budget hearing, and we’re not even being paid to do so, so what’s your excuse? If you had stuck around on April 11th, you would have heard Robin Hahnel, Professor of economics at PSU, deliver an impassioned and expert speech on the folly of austerity, from Portland to DC. You would have heard the City Council attempt to cut him off only to be vocally overruled by the community members in attendance. You would have seen the majority of the room stand up in opposition to cuts and for progressive revenue when asked to do so. You would have heard the crowd crying out for City Council to “go get the money” from the wealthy and rich corporations.
That doesn’t sound so peaceful to me. I think you need a more diverse range of sources.