It's not completely unwarranted to view the potential revision of the City Charter to replace its current commission government with a strong mayor form as a kind of re-founding of the City of Portland. That makes Charter review one of the single most important decisions the City's residents can face. With the work of the Charter Review Commission complete, this is the real deal. Whatever your views, the time to speak up is now.
Contributors
Each contributor is responsible for the content of their own posts, and by participating they are agreeing to abide by the editorial policies listed on our About page. If you'd like to become a contributor to Portland's Future Charter, please email The One True b!X, including a brief explanation of your interest in Charter reform and what you would like to bring to the discussion.
Amanda Fritz
Amanda Fritz has been active in policy issues from the concerned citizen's perspective in Portland for 15 years. She served 7 years on the Planning Commission, participating in many amendments to the Zoning Code and Comprehensive Plan. She was a member of the 1995 Task Force on Neighborhood Involvement, the Land Division Code Citizens Advisory Committee, and the Environmental Violations Code revisions committee. In her paid job as a Registered Nurse, she knows that regulatory details matter and attention to them can be life-or-death decisions.
Mark Oliver
Mark Oliver resides with his partner in the Roseway district. He works as an Indonesian- and Javanese-language translator. He also serves on the board of the Associated Linguists of Oregon, an affiliation of Oregonians employed in the language industry.
Chris Smith
A citizen activist focusing on transportation, neighborhood issues and civic engagement, Chris Smith is a citizen representative on the Metro Policy Advisory Committee and chairs the Citizens Advisory Committee for Portland Streetcar. He also publishes Portland Transport, "a conversation about access and mobility in the Portland/Vancouver metro region."
Chris is also a former member of the Board of Governors of City Club of Portland and for eight years served as a board member for the Northwest District Association and chaired its transportation committee.
His day job is as Internet Technologist for Xerox Internet Marketing in Wilsonville. He has a B.S. from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and an MBA from Boston University.
The One True b!X
A ten-year resident of Portland, The One True b!X was the writer, editor, and publisher of Portland Communique, a critically-acclaimed experiment in reader-supported independent journalism which ran from late 2002 until late 2005.
He currently writes FURIOUS nads! but refuses to indicate whether or not it is his nads, specifically, which are furious.