Let's talk about a new way to allocate resources for Portland.

Maria Sipin is working with the Community Budgeting for All campaign and they just launched a petition drive to get participatory budgeting (PB) on the November 2024 ballot in Portland. They want to take 2% of the city's General Fund (about $15.6 million) and put it in the hands of everyday people. In this conversation, you'll learn what PB is and how it's different than the traditional, top-down budgeting process.

Links:

https://www.communitybudgetingforall.com/

Thanks for being in here, Maria. Welcome to the show. for inviting me. Cool.

Um, and I know a lot of large, other large West Coast cities already have participatory budgeting in effect, right? So, uh, Is there a reason why Portland, uh, by Portland's just getting into this now? Or can you tell me something about why the time is right for Portland or what, what is spurring this effort locally at this point?

And we've even had City Council members who have campaigned using PB, but have not followed through on those promises.

But electing people into these government positions is another form of democracy, which is representative democracy, but it's not direct democracy. It's nice to champion these people and also try to rely on them to push forward community priorities, but it's not guaranteed. And when we do things through participatory budgeting, it is a way we can exercise our power as people in Portland without relying on certain people championing.

Priorities or making promises that they'll carry something out during their term, and we've seen in cities that have successfully implemented P. B. Cycle after cycle that people get projects that they really care about, and the city implements them within a time frame. That's clear. And the vote in P. B.

Is what makes things legally binding. We can ask our elected officials to take action, but it doesn't Really require them to do something within a given amount of time. So it's the legally binding aspect of PB that really can demonstrate People's power and government's ability to implement something that the people want.

So are there things that you all have worked on or, you know, sidebars that you're putting in your approach that makes sure that. You know the, that everybody's voices are, can be as equally heard as possible.

So in a successful PB implementation, you'll have a process that is designed for the people. It's not your typical community outreach effort where you have A planning led forum that tries to generate the kind of input that favors project outcomes. We don't have things already determined in a PB process.

The sideboards you're talking about, though, are really important. And in a PB process, you have a community and government appointed steering committee. That sets the parameters with government and community partnership. So if you want a PB process, that's justice oriented, that has climate outcomes that meets the needs of people who have the highest needs or who have been left out, then projects that government and community develop together are bound by those criteria. So PB processes are still bound by some kind of criteria, and it's not just a free for all. But you will have people showing up who have high interest in something. And that's what we want. We want community experts. We want technical experts. We want people who live close to these issues to be able to shape project proposals and eventually the projects that get implemented.

You would just basically show up and say, I want a community garden down the street or maybe a bike path over here. I'm going to see if anybody else is interested and like take me through how that might work though.

Like you might have seen in transportation, like I might have seen in transportation or that I've presented to the public in the past. So I'm acknowledging that oftentimes you have money carved out for a reason. Like, let's say it's the gas tax

I have to, I have to butt in because Maria knows it's, it's so striking to me, the difference from other places I've talked to you about when you were working at, let's say the state of Oregon transportation department and how they would go about it.

So you can really speak with some experience here on the difference between that and the PB model. So, sorry, but go ahead.

Also, research shows there's less backlash or people don't fight them because it is a community adopted project and they were part of the process every step of the way. So, like I said, we can dream a little bit, but before that, I will mention that we've already put PB process in place in Oregon, participatory budgeting, Oregon, the organization I represent.

has implemented Youth Voice Youth Vote PB in East Portland to Gresham to North Clackamas using federal COVID recovery funds. So the sideboards there, which is important to note, um, serving young people in the East Portland metro area who have the highest needs, whether it's low income households, LGBTQ youth, unhoused or houseless. And then the criteria around that is around economic justice, health, housing, art, and culture and recreation. So projects that were developed using that half a million dollars of federal money have to fall within those categories.

No, they really spent over a year developing projects with experts to come up with projects that they want to be implemented in their Senate districts 24 and 25.

So with PB in the city of Portland, we get to do the same thing.

There's some way to take, it's not so I could see this. I could see a critic coming in and saying, well, of course you're going to, everybody's going to ask for just random things. And if it's their power to implement them, then they'll get them. And I don't like that because we have actually real needs and serious projects or whatever that we have to fund.

So how do you make sure that. The things that the people request have at least some measure of, you know, being vetted in terms of prioritization and stuff like that.

versus citywide PB. That's something that they could decide. That's not in the ballot language or it's not in the initiative petition language now. So that's something that could be up for decision or they could decide, Hey, east of 82nd only for this first PB cycle. There's some learnings from PCF on how to set up.

Some of the parameters for a program, and we've learned from city of Boston, Seattle and New York on how to write the PB process up and then how to help it evolve eventually. And then PCEF has also taught us how you can delegate power. What are the limitations and who are the highest needs committee community?

And that's how you can decide some of those project targets. And so we can imagine that in the city of Portland, let's say we focused on every district gets a part of that 15 million, which could be exciting. Every district gets to have their own facilitators, maybe their own leadership body or steering committee.

And then they attract assemblies of Portlanders to participate in a proposal development process. After collecting ideas about what kind of needs does their district have. So with that, I think the proposal development that a lot of people are concerned about is that you're going to come up with projects that aren't meaningful or that could be funded with other pots of money, which are legitimate concerns.

Like, why would we fund, let's say, Vending machines in schools. If we know PPS already has a vending machine budget. So we create sideboards. We bring in all kinds of technical experts, whether it's, you know, water infrastructure, people or transportation, people, or housing and homeless services, experts, people really come here and help develop proposals with the community.

And that's, what's different than regular community engagement. We are teaching community members how much. Projects cost. They get to see, wow, a curb ramp is 40, 000. Maybe we can't do 8, 000 in two months. And people get to see the realistic side of project development and they get to learn and they get to take away their own expertise as well.

So I think that's, that's something that's different in PB proposal development that doesn't exist, um, in regular community outreach or planning processes.

But they essentially brought people that weren't typically at the table, let's say, and said, here's needs that aren't being met by current budgeting and all that sort of stuff. So let's make it happen. So is there something that you could say that that looking at that clean energy fund process? can you talk about what you could learn, uh, based on the, the experience of the clean energy fund and doing PB in Portland more successfully.

There's interest of young people being able to drive the kind of outcomes they want to see in PCEF Because they are highly affected by climate change some of the population that's most affected So we can't ignore youth power in PCEF and I hope it continues to grow but what we have learned in PCEF Portland Clean Energy Fund The design is awesome as it was, and it's urgent and necessary.

And I'm in the camp of protecting and preserving it for climate and clean energy only. So if you haven't seen that quote in the Oregonian, let me just reiterate, we have to keep the integrity intact and we have to make sure we preserve every dollar we can for climate and clean energy. There's no such thing as.

We are having too much money for climate change and climate action. I think many of the advocates you know and the people who read Bike Portland care about making sure we meet our sustainable transportation goals. And PCEF could be one of the avenues we do that. With that aside, Portland Clean Energy Fund follows more of a community grant making model.

Which is not participatory budgeting. It's, I think there's a lot of, um, conversations about PB that ends up incorporating things that are not PB or miss associating things with PB, but PCEF does have a lot of the components around criteria and sideboards, um, moving forward community leaders, like a committee that was part of the code, but it does not.

Secure allocations in the very beginning that are for, uh, Direct decision making process by the people. We know PCEF has all kinds of revenue overages and unexpected revenue growth, but none of it has been carved out for direct decision making by the people. And had the initial PCEF ballot measure been written like that, then it would PB process where let's say out of every cycle of PCEF, Or every tax filing you capture 30 million just for the people deciding not a committee, not bureaus, um, but the people get to come up with their own projects and programs piece of still relies heavily.

Nonprofit organizations putting forward proposals, but PB really appeals to those who are not affiliated with organizations, people who want to learn about all kinds of issues in Portland, but don't want to attach themselves or cannot attach themselves to a specific issue or organization. So this allows them to participate meaningfully in all types of priority areas and not just transportation, because They're affiliated with a transportation nonprofit.

So I think PB really opens it up to people who are not affiliated. And one of my favorite parts is that people can vote in a PB process without having the legal rights to vote. So PB all over the world, particularly in American cities, has. Had an inclusive way of being able to include folks who are less likely to participate in other forms of civic engagement, and it really opens up people who have barriers to doing that representative democracy option of voting so they cannot elect their elected officials.

But they can vote in a PB process, they can come develop projects, they can work with non profits and government to come up with projects that they care about.

Would I be able to go to a meeting and basically, uh, advocate for a specific project and then it would end up becoming funded? Or like, is there a way you can share a little bit more detail about how something goes from an idea to an actual funded project?

You work with PBOT, community orgs, parents, schools, everyone who can engage in this process or who is invited to engage, they can design a proposal like that together. That doesn't guarantee that the proposal will win, but a PB process can design dozens of proposals if there's appetite and interest around them. So if a PB process is well funded. And well facilitated, maybe you can bump the proposal number up to 30 or 50, but

What kind of, um, engagement do we need to do with neighbors? How much personnel do we need to reinforce or enforce that on the street? Monday through Friday. Let's dream of every cost, and that's what the community gets to do. They get to see what that full project proposal process could be like. So, if there are tons of proposals like that, Transportation and safety, which I know are really important, the public then gets to come and see all the proposals that are developed at the end of that phase, then they enter the voting stage and you might have a rank choice voting system.

PB process also gets to decide what kind of. What kind of voting, um, structure you need or want?

We got to brush off the whole pilot notion. We know that pilots are not, Sometimes mean that is meant to be done once and the political will is not there. That project will not stay. We need to have lasting projects, the community members care about, and we need city government to support that. And it's also possible for community members to put forward a proposal year after year, if it's that popular, or at some point, just say, Hey, make this a five year project or program. And sometimes bureaus like PBOT, if they see how popular it is, they might just say, Hey, forget putting this in the PB process. Let's invest in, in it, in our annual budget. And I think this does the work of community engagement for them and it gives them the confidence to implement a project that has widespread support.

And that's what PB does sometimes. Even the losing projects get adopted by bureaus. They get adopted by non profits. Foundations want to fund it. Maybe the state government will see some promise whether it's the Oregon Health Authority or Oregon Department of Transportation. And it just takes on a life of its own.

But PB demonstrates community engagement, community power in a way that doesn't exist in current planning processes.

I think being able to witness this and be part of it, it's really powerful. And this is why some cities really, once they put PB into place, it just becomes part of their democracy from here on out,

In community budgeting for all and what I personally like about it is in a PB process You don't end up with highway projects You come up with projects that are at the community scale Some even larger scale or some that you could scale up people really put forward projects in this process that have Never been funded in the past, but should have it addresses community safety, um, basic needs and all kinds of things that might have been overlooked.

And I also want to give a shout out to the nonprofits too, because there's a place for them in this. They can engage in this. They're going to be part of the experts who come up with these assembly panels and they help develop projects with government. To make feasible, implementable projects happen. We hope you join the campaign, whether you endorse it as a community member, as an organization or a small business or a large business, check it out.

I think you'll, you'll enjoy the company that you're in. We also have opportunities to volunteer. We need signature gatherers who can show up to farmer's markets and other public spaces where people deserve to hear about this. We also have paid opportunities for signature gathering from 22 to 80 an hour, depending on the amount you can work and how successful you are, um, on sidewalks and street corners. So there's a way to plug in. We'll look for ambassadors too. If you enjoy being able to talk about tools for direct democracy and how much you love Portland and why we need this now, you're going to want to join on board and you'll, you'll be supported through this journey to be able to engage with your friends and neighbors and other people who can vote and get this on the ballot.