On Being Impressed 6/22/03

Commissioner Sten:
I commend you for having the courage to express your opinion on the use of Urban Renewal Funding during the city council's budget hearing last week. Your point that Columbia Villa in the Portsmouth neighborhood was worthy of consideration for Urban Renewal dollars was legitimate. You could make the same valid argument for portions of the St. John's neighborhood and across the bridge to parts of Linnton. With that reasoning shouldn't they have been included? Would you extend the boundary of the Interstate Light Rail Corridor Urban Renewal District to the border of Gresham because there are many neighborhoods worthy of urban renewal funds east of the Interstate rail line? At what distance from a project's core is gerrymandering an Urban Renewal District map incredulous and obviously just plain wrong. You didn't comment upon institutional bullying and deceit as acceptable means to the ends of inclusion into an urban renewal district or disregarding the written opposition of the local business community. In a public debate, it is a losing proposition to argue that an Urban Renewal District should be created in any bizarre configuration that suits the most politically powerful constituency looking for bucks and not a justifiable defensible zone surrounding a public project that requires additional economic assistance due to the disruption of businesses and households in the affected location.

Citizen advisory committees quickly learn that they are most welcomed when their "advice" is consistent with what the real decision making authority intends to do and wants to hear. In this case that's the Portland Development Commission. PDC has a recent official record of both board and staff ignoring the democratic process which would have resulted in silencing citizen voices PDC did not want to hear.* The personal economic motivations of the citizen co-chairs of the Interstate Light Rail Corridor Urban Renewal District have not gone unnoticed by many who have been involved and watched this exercise in citizen participation.

I would have been impressed with Commissioner Saltzman if he had acknowledged and taken credit for his worthy and enlightened commitment for $2 million for methane conversion hardware which would have made use of a currently wasted resource and reduced to some degree the energy costs of those in need of such support.

I would have been impressed with Commissioner Leonard if he had said, "despite the fact that Richard Ellmyer and I have had some harsh words** (nothing new in the political arena) and differences of opinion on how HAP has handled this project (also not new in the political arena), as the Commissioner in charge of supporting the viability of neighborhoods as political entities I am compelled to ask the Housing Authority of Portland to tell my bureau, elected neighborhood leaders and the City Council the whereabouts of your clients by neighborhood. ONI will cheerfully offer its assistance to help HAP bring this public information into a form useful to neighborhood leaders and other elected officials throughout our city."

I would have been impressed with Commissioner Francesconi if he had said, "You know folks, I'm running for mayor and I don't think our city should support a policy of concentrating all our low-income clients into certain neighborhoods. As a lawyer I need the support of evidence I could take to court. Guesswork and blank slates do not qualify. So today I'm going to ask HAP to make a map like Ellmyer's but one that is not an estimate but relies on real accounting data so that I can have an authentic defensible foundation on which to base my public housing policy recommendations during my mayoral campaign. "

I would have been impressed with Mayor Katz if she had said, "In good times we would have used general fund dollars for the Villa remodel. There would be no argument that we could use this source of taxpayer dollars because it is available for any project that the council feels is in the public interest. But in tough financial times we have to use more "exotic" funding methods. If the press or some citizen watchdog group chose to seriously challenge us because we were using a fee for service charge from the water and sewer bill to subsidize a very small group of rate payers not a system wide improvement or repair then we might have to back off. So far that hasn't happened. We may not be so lucky when we try this same trick when we annex Dunthorpe but that's another story.

I've spoken to my appointees on the PDC board and told them that not only does it make them look bad but it is bad and maybe illegal to disallow citizen testimony on public matters even if the PDC board and staff have made up their minds and don't want to be influenced by additional facts and contrary ideas.

I have done my best to get the biggest bang for the buck out of my budget. If it's true that it costs HAP four times as much to house similar clients on HAP property versus private Section 8 accommodations then many in need who could be are not being served because of policy decisions made without adequate accounting data. So today I'm asking my appointee and HAP board chairman, Howard Shapiro, to create a table, similar to the one Richard Ellmyer has put before the council, showing the comparative costs to house similar clients in HAP's various economic categories on HAP property and in Section 8 accommodations."

* http://www.goodgrowthnw.org/PDC.html
** http://www.goodgrowthnw.org/LeonardFlaw.html


Richard Ellmyer
Portsmouth neighborhood, North Portland


Richard Ellmyer's testimony before the Portland City Council 6-19-03


The 20 million dollar contribution to HAP’s Columbia Villa remodel project is scatted throughout the budget. To make sure that when we discuss your vote during the next election cycle we will all be able to agree on the numbers, I am going to lay them out.

6.4 million from the Interstate Light Rail Corridor Urban Renewal District
5.6 million from BES and Water Bureau
5 million from Community Development Block Grants
3 million from excluded System Development Charges

That makes 20 million. However, this does not cover the 500,000 to one million dollars in interest over five years on the 11.4 million dollar section 108 loan. Nor does it include Commissioner Saltzman’s two million dollar commitment for hardware to convert the 30% excess methane at the Columbia Boulevard Wastewater Treatment Plant into useful electrical or steam energy and then send it across the street to Columbia Villa.

Boundaries for Urban renewal districts are typically and justifiably created in generalized shapes such as squares, rectangles or circles reflecting the need to extend additional economic development opportunities to the area most affected by some new project. This mapping concept is easily understood and supported by the public. The boundaries for the Interstate Light Rail Corridor Urban Renewal District should have roughly corresponded to a corridor shape perhaps as much as half a mile on either side of the tracks. Instead, it turns out that the boundaries for the Interstate Light Rail Corridor Urban Renewal District were extended almost three miles west of Interstate Avenue in a giant irregular balloon shape under pressure from HAP with the understanding that the clearly gerrymandered district would be used only for leverage to secure a grant from HUD and not to access urban renewal dollars.

Columbia Villa has nothing whatsoever to do with support for economic development along the Interstate light rail corridor. A letter written by the North Portland Business Association identifying HAP’s breach of faith by asking for funds almost immediately after reluctant inclusion into the Interstate Light Rail Corridor Urban Renewal District has been on the public record for two years. The Portland City Council will permanently scar its reputation with citizens in our city the moment a single dollar of Interstate Light Rail Corridor Urban Renewal District funds shows up in a HAP bank account.

Electricity, natural gas, water and sewer bills are all based on the fee for service concept. Every ratepayer accepts the necessity to share in the cost of capital expenses required for system wide integrity or upgrade. The 5.6 million contribution from BES and the Water bureau to the Villa remodel is not a system wide enhancement. It is, in essence, a hidden tax on rate payers for the purpose of subsidizing a government project without telling the people who pay for it much less asking for their approval. It carries the same odor of deception as the wrongful use of Interstate Renewal dollars. Our trust in local government is not enhanced by these political machinations.

Behind me is a map of HAP client distribution throughout its jurisdiction, Multnomah County. This map was created with the help of the Portland Chapter of the NAACP, the Arbor Lodge neighborhood association, Metro’s data resource center and the community geography project at Portland State University.

Next to it is HAP’s map of client distribution throughout its jurisdiction. [point to blank poster board]

Here is a table which lists the costs to house similar clients on HAP owned property and Section 8 private property for all 117 neighborhoods in Multnomah County.

Here is HAP’s table with similar information. [point to blank poster board]

If I tell you that HAP spends four times as much to house clients on their property as opposed to private Section 8 housing would you or could you challenge that? In times of budget shortfalls, in fact any time, would you vote to fund a program that costs four times its alternative for the same results?

When I say that your yes vote for HAP funding will support HAP's policy of maintaining Portsmouth as the neighborhood with the highest number of taxpayer-supported low-income Housing Authority of Portland clients not only within HAP's jurisdiction but also among all the neighborhoods in the state of Oregon, what evidence will you use to dispute that claim?

The police bureau keeps crime statistics by neighborhood. The bureau of licenses keeps records of every business by neighborhood. ONI has software that can identify the neighborhood of any address in Portland. Unlike the water bureau software these programs actually work. Anytime HAP wants to provide the public with neighborhood related information all it has to do is ask any of these bureaus for help.

If all these other bureaus keep records by neighborhood and share them with us why won't HAP divulge basic accounting information related to neighborhoods? It's certainly not a technological problem. It has to do with power and institutional arrogance. As long as HAP conceals the whereabouts of their clients by neighborhood, there is little or no foundation with which to challenge HAP's activities and policies.

Blindly supporting social service institutions without demanding fiscal accountability can jeopardize those in need of help. In the late 70's I served on the board of a multimillion dollar Community Action Agency, The Portland Metropolitan Steering Committee. It had a so-called blue ribbon board. I was among the leadership that persuaded a majority of the board to close the place down because it was corrupt beyond repair. There was a great public fuss and most officials ran for cover. The director went to federal prison.

Just because important and well regarded institutions such as HAP, the police department and the Catholic Church are generally considered the "Good Guys" does not mean that they are above making grievous errors which must be called to account.


Footnote
To his credit, Commissioner Erik Sten was the only member of the Portland City Council that even made an attempt to respond to my testimony. While I disagreed with his argument I did appreciate his willingness to take a stand.

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