Housing

The Community Development Network, an association of nonprofit community development organizations, presented Sam with the Industry Partner Award at their Annual Awards Banquet in October. The Industry Partner Award goes to "an organization or individual that is an invaluable partner in strengthening nonprofit community development organizations or helping provide a collective voice for healthy, diverse communities."

CDN's executive director Sam Chase said that Sam Adams "isn't a politician at heart, but someone who knows how to navigate the political system. He seems to have a unique understanding of community needs and certainly understands that in order to succeed in life, people need stable and affordable housing."

In 2005, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) gave the nation an infrustructure report card.  Overall, the U.S. got the GPA equivalent of a "D."  America's total investment needs to shore up our infrastructure totalled $1.6 TRILLION, a number that increases as time passes.

Done years before recent high-profile tragedies, this report outlines a nation chronically under-investing in its infrastructure.

Community Warehouse is a non-profit organization that gives donated household items and furniture, for free, to low-income individuals and families recovering from crisis. Over 3,000 households are served each year in the Portland area.

The items received by Community Warehouse are direct donations given by individuals from the Portland area community... like yourselves!

Silverware is always in need.Among the household items currently needed by Community Warehouse include: pots and pans, silverware, cooking utensils, casserole and baking dishes, toasters, coffee makers, mixers, alarm clocks, blankets, twin size bed sheets and full size bed sheets.

This letter was published today by the Oregonian from Sam.

The Oregonian editorial board is right in their March 27 editorial. It is the City's job to "build a plan that works for all the [Hayden Island] neighborhood."

The development hiatus that City Council unanimously approved six months ago on Hayden Island allows the residents and the City to complete a neighborhood plan that can address the unique transportation challenges of the island.

At Sam's urging, the Mayor and City Council directed PDC in December of 2005 to negotiate a new funding package with South Waterfront property owners that included a significant increase in affordable housing. As a result, in April City Council approved $18 million in new dollars for affordable housing in South Waterfront, bringing the total allocation to $25.7 million, which will fund 3-5 projects and funds completion of the first 200-unit project by 2009.

To meet the growing demand for affordable housing in Portland, the City has continued to invest in community development corporations and other organizations providing affordable housing and implementing the City's 10 year plan to end homelessness.

Much of this funding, distributed by the Bureau of Housing and Community Development (BHCD), is provided by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. This funding, however, was cut 8% from 05/06 and 13% from 04/05.

Unfortunately, federal support for the programs that help ensure affordable housing has been declining every single year since Sam took office.

To fill the federal funding void, Sam expressed support in 2004 for a dedicated percentage of urban renewal dollars for affordable housing.

With City Commissioner Erik Sten's leadership, this November, Sam and the City Council and the Portland Development Commission established a policy ensuring that 30% of Urban Renewal Dollars are spent to address the need for affordable rental and ownership opportunities throughout our Urban Renewal Areas.

For more than a year, the Central Eastside community has been discussing the possibility of extending the Urban Renewal District.

Sam supports an extension on the basis that the Central Eastside has not realized its full potential. Specifically, additional investments in affordable housing, context-sensitive transportation infrastructure, and economic development are needed to ensure the district redevelops in a way that mitigates the worst characteristics of gentrification.

Sam filming the introduction for the Clean River Rewards videoThe Bureau of Environmental Services is launching a Clean Water River Rewards Program that will offer new incentives for homes and businesses to make their property more eco-friendly. Eligible accounts will be able to receive up to 35% percent off their monthly stormwater management fee. As part of the program, BES is putting together two informational videos for the website. One will lead you through how to fill out the registration form and the other describes ways to make your property more stormwater safe. There are separate versions of each video for residential and business property owners. All versions begin with a clip of Sam introducing the program and talking about the importance of stormwater management.

We are at a pivotal decision point in our collective and ongoing city-making and city-remaking responsibilities.

Depending on the choices we make, and how we spend tax increment financing, we can greatly influence affordability for perhaps the next two generations of Portland families.

Rarely have the stakes for Portlanders been higher.

The state legislature has been resistant to taking needed action on housing.

This is a summary of the comments I made at today's City Council meeting regarding the housing resolution that I co-sponsored with Commissioner Erik Sten:

I am the product of subsidized affordable housing. 

My single Mom raised four wily and independent kids while she attended college.  She was able to do so because of affordable housing programs and other public benefit programs we were fortunate enough to be eligible for.

But my co-sponsorship for this resolution is about more than honoring my roots. 

I want change and results.

A recent in-depth study in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported that about 30% of income earners in Multnomah County subsist as the working poor.  This compares to about 20% in King and Snohomish counties.  A recent Economist.com study ranked Portland as the 3rd least affordable city in the U.S. Why?  Because our buying power as Portlanders just doesn't match up to our costs.

My co-sponsorship of this resolution is part of my overall mission to help boost the economic self-sufficiency of Portland’s families, and so is my support for:

• $10 million in new city government funding for local schools;

• new grants for neighborhood businesses districts; and,

• reforms to WSI, Inc., the organization that trains Portlanders to increase their earning power.

We can create more opportunities for our families to reach economic self-sufficiency by increasing their affordable housing options. This resolution is about those options.

This resolution begins a process that will require an informed discussion of stakeholders.  It will identify opportunities and potential trade offs for the use of tax increment financing.

I look forward to being informed by this discussion.

As Sam points out, investing in the economic success of our local artists is more than buying public art. In recognizing that work/live space meets Portland's economic development and affordable housing goals, we began to meet with developers, non-profits and public agencies to figure out what were obstacles to work/live, what public resources are potential sources of investment, and what was the first step the City could do to ensure more creation of affordable work/live spaces.

We settled on a pilot project for new construction of work/live as a suitable aim. In December, we drafted a preliminary Request for Information (RFI) to solicit ideas from developers and non-profits interested in the endeavor. We hope to have a final RFI out by the end of February.

Related Documents

• The draft RFI

Weblogs

• Five Promises for the Arts

To meet the growing demand for affordable housing in Portland, the City has continued to invest in community development corporations and other organizations providing affordable housing and implementing the City's 10 year plan to end homelessness. During the 2005-06 budget cycle, Commissioner Sten and Sam advocated for allocating budget savings and other one-time money totaling $2 million into the Housing Investment Fund. Sam has also instituted a waiver program on Bureau of Environmental Services' system development charges, resulting in  $1 million savings for affordable housing development.

Related Documents

• 2005-06 Budget, Volume One, Page 29
• City's Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness

Today, City Council unanimously passed a resolution to support the Urban Indian Regional Strategic Plan “Restoring a Cultural System of Plenty” to reducing poverty in the Urban Native American population.

With funding provided by the Northwest Area Foundation, community members in Portland, Seattle, Rapid City, and Billings have been able to meet for 2 years to devise community generated strategies to reduce poverty in Urban American Indian/Alaskan Native communities. The resulting strategic plan has been submitted to the Northwest Area Foundation which will decide by December whether or not to fund this effort.

The Portland Urban Native community, organized as the Youth and Elders Council on Poverty Reduction, held over 30 meetings to generate discussion, problem-solving, and cultural unity. During this time, they conducted two rounds of community-based research, employing 9 young adults and reaching out to approximately 650 community members.

Over the course of this year, the Urban Native community has combined efforts with three other Urban Native community pilot sites and leaders to complete a 10-Year Strategic Plan to Reduce Poverty in an eight state region.

According to census data, 50% of American Indians and Alaskan Natives in Multnomah County live 200% below the poverty level. This strategic plan is a community based approach to empowering Natives and reducing poverty in the Urban Indian Communities.

The Portland region helped pioneer the transit oriented development (TOD) concept with the construction of Pearl District, The Round and the emerging South Waterfront district.

• What are the lessons learned? 

• How can we improve the TOD of the future?

• The Pearl, Orenco and South Waterfront were built on nearly vacant or under utilized land: What about TOD-like projects in existing neighborhoods?

To help answer these questions, on third day of the Rail-Volution Conference here in Salt Lake, I attended at seminar titled,