633  CHAPTER VII

REFORM AND REJUVENATION—2005 to 2013

Portland Mayor Tom Potter (2005-2008) dramatically reversed the decline of

Portland’s community and neighborhood involvement system and instituted the most

significant expansion of the system since the 1970s. The two mayors who followed

Potter—Sam Adams (2009-2012) and Charlie Hales (who began his first term as mayor

in 2013)—continued to support much of the increased funding and most of the programs

begun under Potter. The system changes instituted during this period represent a major

advance toward a more inclusive and vibrant participatory democracy culture in Portland

and a more effective and lasting governance partnership between city leaders and staff

and community members. This chapter examines the system reviews and key program

changes during the time period from 2005 through 2013.

Mayor Potter came into office with a deep belief that governance should be a partnership between City government and the community. Potter brought to his administration his unusually high level of support for public involvement and his long- standing-standing and deep commitment to ensuring a voice for historically under- represented groups—especially communities of color, immigrants and refugees, and youth. Potter used his position as mayor and the significant additional discretionary revenues available to city government during the good economic times of his administration to implement a wide range of processes and programs that put his values into action and implemented many recommendations of earlier system reviews. 634  This chapter begins with a review of a system assessment prepared by

neighborhood coalition leaders just prior to Potter taking office. The chapter also reviews

early leadership and programmatic changes made by Potter at ONI and four of Potter’s

twenty bureau innovation projects (BIPs): BIP 1/visionPDX, an extensive and very

inclusive community visioning process; BIP 9, which created a public involvement

assessment tool for city staff; BIP 20/Charter Review Commission, which proposed

amendments to Portland’s City Charter, including one to change the form of city

government (which voters rejected) and another that required the City Council to

establish periodic community charter review commissions (which voters adopted); and

BIP 8/Community Connect, the most comprehensive review of Portland’s community

and neighborhood involvement system since it was founded in the 1970s.

Community Connect established three primary goals and developed a “Five-year

Plan to Increase Community Involvement” that charted a new and expanded course for

Portland’s community and neighborhood involvement system. Community Connect recommended that Portland community and neighborhood involvement system be expanded and formally recognize and support organizations representing non-geographic communities—e.g., communities of people drawn together by shared identity or life condition—in addition to the traditional neighborhood association system. Potter initiated a number of new programs in ONI and elsewhere that implemented Community

Connect’s broader and more inclusive vision for community involvement in Portland.

This chapter describes these new programs. 635  Neighborhood activists also continued to seek ways to develop city-wide bodies to allow them to work together on citywide policy issues. This chapter examines two of these bodies, one focused on land use issues and the other on park issues.

Mayor Sam Adams took office in January 2009. Adams assigned responsibility over ONI to long-time neighborhood activist and newly-elected City Commissioner

Amanda Fritz. Adams and Fritz continued to support many of the new community and neighborhood involvement programs initiated by Potter and worked together to insulate

ONI from many of the sev