First Responders. PARKS. 911 Dispatch. Shelters.
Measure 26-267 puts them all on the chopping block.
This measure will move millions of dollars out of the fund that pays for Portland's core services — and locks the annual cut into the city charter, permanently.
Vote NO on 26-267.
You can believe in a bigger voice for Portlanders and vote NO on Measure 26-267.
Participatory budgeting — inviting residents to help decide how public money is spent — is a genuinely good idea. Portland's own City Club studied it for nine months and agreed: it's worth trying here, starting with a carefully designed pilot.
But Measure 26-267 would lock Portland into an approach no other city in the country has tried.
Measure 26-267 skips a pilot and writes a permanent obligation of $16 million a year — and growing — into the city charter.
There’s no dedicated source of funding, which means that money comes straight out of the fund that pays for core services like public safety, parks, and homeless shelters.
In a year when Portland just laid off 100 workers and cut homeless services by 31% to close a record budget gap, we can’t afford to lose more essential services.
We believe Portlanders deserve a bigger voice in the budget.
But a good idea written this badly doesn't belong in the city charter — especially when the unintended consequences would be permanent.
We're voting no, and we hope you'll join us.
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Measure 26-267 doesn’t have a dedicated funding source. That means at least $16 million a year will be diverted from the fund that pays for firefighters, 911, police, parks, homeless shelters, and other basic services Portlanders count on.
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Measure 26-267 requires 'at least 2%' — a floor, not a ceiling — to be diverted to this new program. And the dollars diverted from core services grow as the budget grows.
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Measure 26-267 sets no rules for what can be funded or who receives your tax dollars — projects can be carried out by the City 'or its agents,' a term the measure never defines.
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Measure 26-267 says the budgeting vote is binding on the City, but there are no rules on who's eligible to vote, how residents will be able to vote, or how votes are verified. The measure text even says the vote is "not subject to city or state laws governing elections and voting."
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Measure 26-267 is not a pilot, and it’s not a budget line City Council can adjust — it would bake this novel program into the city's constitution. Fixing a single word would require another citywide election.
Portland is already $170 million in the hole. The city just closed a record budget gap by laying off about 100 employees, cutting homeless services 31%, and cutting Parks by $11.4 million. This measure takes at least another $16 million off the top — permanently.
Nobody can tell you where the money goes. The measure doesn't say what the money can be spent on, who's eligible to vote, how a vote is verified, or how it's audited. Its own text says the process is "not subject to city or state laws governing elections and voting."
If it doesn't work, we're stuck with it. This goes in the city charter — Portland's constitution — not the budget. No pilot, no sunset, no course correction. Cleveland voters saw an almost identical measure in 2023 and rejected it.
Portland has looked at this before. Twice.
Portland's Charter Commission — twenty citizen volunteers, not politicians — spent 2022 rewriting city government. Participatory Budgeting Oregon submitted a proposed amendment: a charter mandate funding PB at "no less than 1%" of the General Fund's discretionary ongoing resources, with binding resident votes. After public testimony, the proposal fell short of the support needed to go to the ballot.
Now the idea is back — and now the ask is “at least 2%. That’s double the original request, in the worst budget year Portland has faced in a generation.
“Proposals to adopt and institutionalize PB as a city-wide program funded through a charter change or citizen initiative appear to be nearly unprecedented in the U.S. and difficult to justify from the available evidence.”