Our City Issues
Homelessness
Unregulated camping has been a disaster for both Portland and the homeless population. Unpredictable movements of people experiencing severe addiction or mental health issues through neighborhoods is a recipe for disaster. Letting people who can’t care for themselves sleep on street corners in the rain is cruelty.
Doing nothing was never a solution. We must immediately move to a regulated camping model. By providing sufficient space we overcome the legal barriers to enforcing camping, sanitation, and litter rules. By registering designated spaces by name to homeless campers we create the capability to track needs, offer continuity of support, and work toward long term solutions.
Public Safety
We need to correctly size our public safety apparatus. The argument over whether police were defunded in 2020 is a red herring. Portland had 180 police officers per 100,000 residents in 2002. Today we have 120. We let the Police Bureau and our public safety sector slowly decline while the city it served grew, effectively starving the agencies. Decisions like the disbanding of the Gun Violence Reduction Team had a hand in the unprecedented spike in homicides in Portland. Doing nothing is never the answer. We must embrace proactive policing.
The Police Bureau and the Bureau of Emergency Communications have amazing employees. At the same time the public is not receiving the service it needs and deserves. We have to overcome a substantial hurdle to reinstate appropriate capacity.
Accountability
I’m happy to pay taxes that drive great services, but I don’t believe Portland is achieving good returns on our investments. Consider that this city spent approximately $700 million over the last two years and achieved no reduction in homelessness.
We need to think carefully about how the city government uses the money entrusted to it. Each dollar squandered is a lost opportunity to do something meaningful for the people who live here and our community’s future.
Our Mission
At the core of Eli’s approach is a belief that you must know a problem to solve it. He believes that his hands-on experience with homelessness, crime, policing, and livability issues is a needed perspective. He wants to help repair the damage and be an agent of change to restore the Portland we all know and love.
