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oh no! the link should be fixed now

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The Portland - Seattle rivalry is alive and well. Seattle is leading the way on social housing in the US. Tonight we put a down payment on social housing with the passage of our Keep Portland Housed ordinance. We’ve got some catching up to do, but I know we’re built for it.

Today we have two big housing policies coming before Council! The first is a Technical Adjustment Ordinance with an amendment that creates a historic Social Housing fund (brought to you by yours truly, along with Councilors Green, Dunphy, and Avalos) and my Inner East Side For All Resolution.

Great news for lovers of music and people who generally don’t like to get fleeced by monopolies. Would have been great for the prior council to have not made it so easy for Live Nation to inflict themselves on Portland’s music scene, but now we have this protection at least.

Used to have a “Stop Demolishing Portland” sign on my block when I lived in Brooklyn that was in front of a duplex that was built presumably by demolishing whatever stood there originally.

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Yes. But the question is whether that is less expensive to rate payers than continuing with the filtration plant, which has another $1.5 billion in debt to issue. To be clear: we’re on a path to commit to growing to $168 m in annual debt service and holding it there for 30 years.

That’s what I’d like to see, too. It pains me as an economist to acknowledge that a distributed POE might be less expensive than a central plant. They each have different cost structures and risk drivers. POE probably has higher ongoing O&M, but likely much lower capital costs.

It’s worth noting that the filtration plant as proposed won’t be completed until 2029, assuming no risks to the schedule. I did raise the question of exploring a “point of entry” distributed filter approach to compliance. I.e. city installs a whole home water filter for each meter.

We need a formal rate setting hearing process, with a regular cadence, that mirrors what we see in other regulated utilities. We are now in a space where the magnitude of costs requires far more scrutiny of what costs we accept and how we design rates to recover them.

Finally, I am very worried about the potential dynamic that Council approves certain bond issuances but then later can’t stomach the rate increases to service them, and then shifts the costs to the operational work of the bureau.

I have increasing concern over the filtration project. I can’t go back in time and change Council’s decision to take us down this path, but I can pump the brakes to know for certain whether there are other ways to come in compliance with the regulatory body (Oregon Health Authority).

The average monthly water bill is $72. If those rate changes materialize, then you’re looking at a $144 monthly bill in about 8 years.

To pay for that, rates will need a sustained increase on the order of 9.8% at Current Service Levels through 2031. There may be opportunity to cut that down to the mid 8% zone. In any case the cumulative impact is a doubling of the water bill inside of a decade.

The impact of the debt issuances required to build that filtration plant is a dramatic increase in debt service. The impact statement in the ordinance describes debts service following the proposed action growing from $55MM in FY 26 to $168MM by FY 35, requiring sustained annual rate increases.

I voted no today on an ordinance that authorizes $525 million in water bonds. This issuance is part of a broader debt management strategy to finance the water filtration plant. I’d like to share my reason for that no vote.

Flyer with picture of Portland City Councilor Mitch Green speaking into a megaphone outside of city hall. The text reads: Inner Eastside for All Resolution City Hall Rally + Hearing! With special guest Councilor Mitch Green, District 4 April 15th @ Portland City Hall Rally at 5PM Hearing 6-8PM Wear Green!

Come hear certified IE4A booster and resolution cosponsor @councilorgreen.bsky.social speak at our pre-hearing rally on the 15th! Rally at 5PM, Hearing from 6-8PM, wear green if you can, and join us in making sure that Portland welcomes all of our current and future neighbors!

That’s really helpful to know! Would love to chat about it.

My understanding is that there are potentially preemptions in place, but that’s the depth my knowledge. Haven’t looked deeply at it yet.

I generally support the idea of public / municipal banks. Likely some legal barriers to doing this in Portland. But, we can create revolving loan funds for this purpose and we did just that yesterday by passing our Keep Portland Housed ordinance.

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That may still be an acceptable risk, buts it’s not clear anyone is contemplating this risk. Oversight of underwriting standards is extra important in this regard. That’s why I don’t want this delegated outside of the city, where Council is closed from direct oversight.

The city is obliged to repay the state regardless of the performance of the grantee. Basically if the project recipient does not repay the loan (grant) the city loses an asset that no longer offsets its liability to the state, leaving us with the bag.

The way it works is that the city applies for a loan from the state and assumes the liability, and then immediately grants the funds to a project recipient. To recoup the funds from the grantee the city may establish a repayment structure. This introduces counterparty risk.

This was largely eclipsed by the housing money business, but it’s actually really important and I will be bringing forward amendments to the full council. An under discussed aspect of this is the counterparty risk that is introduced by the MIRL as proposed.

We passed this (mostly) today as an amendment to the Spring budget adjustment, with a notable amendment via Housing Committee that establishes a revolving loan fund for social housing. I didn’t support all of the changes today, but I’m glad we’re finally getting rental assistance money out.

Going to keep pushing the land use fee TUF variant as this thing develops. I amended the proposal to create an explicit expectation that rate design changes are in scope annually. I think we have an opportunity to use TUF to shape land use. Still think we need more time for analysis however.

MIRL hasn’t been successful because you need local jurisdictions to adopt a program / rules to implement it. Not sure why it’s taken this long. I had an amendment that failed that just simply removed the unit minimum entirely, as well as chose not to just delegate to Prosper out of the gate.