PORTLAND’S NEW CITY COUNCIL

WHAT IS THE NEW STRUCTURE OF PORTLAND’S CITY COUNCIL?

In 2022, after years of discontent and after two years of work by a volunteer city commission, Portland voters approved Measure 26-228 with 58% of the vote. This measure would fundamentally reshape the antiquated and unique commissioner system of Portland’s city government that had been in place for over 100 years.

The measure had three fundamental components:

  1. Expand City Council from 5 members to 12 members, with each of 4 new geographical districts in Portland electing 3 council members apiece.

  2. Change City Council from a commissioner form of government—a system which no other large city in America employed—to a modified council-manager system, where the mayor would neither sit on City Council nor have veto powers over legislation but rather would hire a city manager for day-to-day city operations.

  3. Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) will be used in city elections. For City Council districts, which elect 3 people each, Single Transferable Vote (a form of Ranked Choice Voting) will be used.

WHY WAS THIS SYSTEM ADOPTED?

Portland’s current form of government has been the subject of frequent complaints since its adoption in 1913. However, attempts to change the system over the years—which have been frequent—have been voted down. This new system addresses many of the issues of the commissioner system, including:

Better geographic representation

Incentivizing better representation of diverse communities and communities of color

Create more personal connections with constituents

Expedite passing of policy

Prevent clashes and favoritism regarding bureaus managed by individual commissioners

RANKED CHOICE VOTING

HOW DOES RANKED CHOICE VOTING WORK?

Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) is a voting system that allows for better representation and encourages candidates to try to reach out to a broader segment of voters, which discourages negative campaigning and pushes candidates to run on who they are instead of who they are not.

It also provides voters with more choice by removing the spoiler effect, where a candidate who is ideologically close to another candidate is discouraged from running due to potentially taking some of their support and making it more likely a less ideologically-aligned candidate will win.

With this system, voters can support whoever they like and know that their vote will not be wasted.

For Portland City Council, instead of voting for one candidate above all others, you will have the opportunity to rank SIX different candidates based on how much you like them.

If you really love one candidate, you would rank them first, whereas if there’s a candidate you have some issues with but are overall okay with, you would rank them lower.

The results are tabulated by computer by the City Elections Office, with any candidate getting over a certain threshold (25% of total 1st place votes) in the first round of tabulation winning a seat. Any winners have the votes that they win over that threshold distributed proportionally to the candidate that their voters ranked 2nd. If, after this, nobody reaches the threshold, the candidate with the lowest number of 1st place votes is eliminated. This process is repeated until 3 candidates have accumulated over 25% of votes and are elected.

If you have any questions on this process or how to fill out your ballot, please visit this page on the Portland City Elections Office website. If you’d like to see an example of how this system works watch this video!