 I am Lisa Savage. Welcome. Thanks for being with us tonight. We're here to do pathways to progress. We are also a podcast now. So check us out on Spotify and like us and rate us. I'm here tonight with Portland City Councilor Victoria Pelletier and Roberto, check the comprehensive plan Rodriguez. And we are going to be reviewing the year 2022, the roses, the beautiful sweet things that happened, the thorns, the hard, difficult things that happened. And then we're going to spend some time on buds, in other words, potential. Things that you're excited about, things that you see happening and developing. And hopefully we'll come out of here with a lot of optimism for the new year. I know you guys feel a lot more relaxed being sophomores rather than fresh. Yes. Yeah, I think I was watching our first episode earlier today and I was like, oh my gosh, I feel like I was such a baby. And now I'm, you know, I'm seasoned and we've been in for a full year. So it feels nice to be a sophomore on the council and come into this new session. At least for me, just knowing a little bit more of like how it works. We've almost been meeting in person now for nearly a full year. So that feels really natural. So yeah, being a sophomore on the council and at least just getting that first year down and surviving that first year for me feels like a really big deal. So it is a really big deal. It's an accomplishment. Congratulations. Thank you. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, 100%. And I think maybe it's not always this way. But when we are first month, there seemed like the agendas were packed with like incredibly controversial issues. I think we were in the face of the, you know, the pandemic health protocols that were still making it feel like it was super and I mean, it was really intense. And in a matter of like three or four months in the spring, I felt like things got more into a groove and certainly now going into our sophomore year, I feel way more relaxed. I like that word a lot, a way more relaxed. And, you know, you have familiarity with the patterns and the routine of things. Certainly knowing the people like the department heads, that also helps a ton. And you know, you start to build working relationships with people and know how they communicate. They get to know how you communicate. Certainly we have our own unique approach to the work. Yeah, definitely in a better place. Well, you kind of have a new council now. You have lots of new members, yes. And you don't have the charter. I mean, the charter commission only happens every 10 years. Right. So that's you got that under your belt. Yeah, that's so true. Because that was happening on the background all through last year, which was incredibly heated and contested. And then, of course, it's built into our work, of course. And clearly, we were part of the campaigns and in the elections. Yeah, that's a layer. See, I always forget about that. A significant layer that we had to deal with. Yeah, we did a lot, yo. We did a lot, yeah. And I think, too, it's like something's always happening while we were on the council. And even just now, I was like, well, it's nice. Like nothing will be going on. So we'll kind of get to just do the work. But then the mayor's race is going to be happening. So this will be Mayor Snyder's last year. And so our third term or our third year on the council will be serving with a new mayor as well. So that will be really interesting to see what happens with that. And with the new city manager. And that's right. Who was I talking to this week that I said, every council, I feel plays a role based on the circumstances of the time that they're serving in. And for a while there, you had a council that had continuity. We had the same city manager and the same council it felt like for a long time. We had some several members that were there for many terms. And now we have a council that's here in a period of transition, lots of interim department heads, a new city manager coming in, a new mayor coming in. And like we just said, an entirely new council. So we're certainly in a period of transition. And it feels like it's our responsibility to carry the city and help people through a really difficult time of change. Well, let's look at 22 a little bit before we move on to what's gonna happen in 23. Who wants to go first? You wanna start with the bad? You wanna start with the good? I really wish to start with the bad. Okay. And then we can go to the good. That sounds good. So what's your, pick a couple of thorns for us there, Victoria. Shocker, I think one of my biggest thorns was obviously the hazard pay vote heard around the world and then the subsequent couple of months. That was my first couple of meetings on the council. Everyone was getting to know me for the very first time as well. And so I think that combined with everything made it a really challenging time. The vote obviously didn't go the way that I wanted it to. But I do think that it helps me prepare for what it's like when you feel like the whole city is looking at you and talking about you. And I was getting a ton of emails. I was getting a ton of calls, a lot of heat. A lot of people were very upset with me. And that was really challenging. But I also, I'm kind of glad it happened so early because then when I made it through the other side, I was like, well, I was like, that was pretty bad. But I at least made it where I know that feeling really early. So that was tough. And that certainly didn't go my way. Some of the charter questions didn't go my way either. I mean, that wasn't something that I had a direct, that I directly worked on. But I was really excited for a couple of the questions, specifically question two. I was actually excited just to see how that would really change our local government, how that would change the representation. And unfortunately, that did not go my way either. But again, that's the nature of this world of politics. Is that sometimes things go your way, sometimes they don't. But I still am very excited to continue to advocate as much as I can to make local government as accessible to the people as possible. And I'm doing that a lot just through my own social media work. And I'm hoping that if anything, people feel a little bit more in the know as to what's going on than they did a couple of years ago. So those are probably like my two thorns are just things that didn't go my way. But again, I think one of the first things I said on this show was that not everything is gonna go my way. And I have to get over that really quickly. So I think that I did, and now it's just kind of moving forward for the future. Okay. I don't know that I had any particular vote or issue that I felt really bad about not having to carry it over the way that I wanted to. There were a couple of land bank votes where we're designating some parcels to the land bank that I wanted us to make a deeper dive into whether or not we could potentially have housing development. And those didn't, I didn't do a good job at getting my votes aligned beforehand. But I think if there was one aspect of the work last year that was super, super challenging, not challenging, but that I did not enjoy and that was certainly a thorn. I think some of the dynamics with the district three counselor, I felt that times were just beyond, I think what I had expected to this work to include, I think at times I got really personal, having him attack me on social media and just making accusations that were completely untrue. I think he was jeopardizing both the organization that I'm working with and my reputation and so much more. And I never understood where that came from. So that to me was really disheartening because there were horrible attacks. He was clearly having people in this town siding with him that didn't care about how ugly it got. They were just adding fuel to a fire. And the fact that he just instigated that was really, it was disheartening. And that was certainly the biggest thorn. And I totally appreciate the challenges of this work. Like I've been doing it for seven years now, or six years now. And I'd never experienced something like that from a colleague. So that was the biggest thorn for sure. I'm glad that that's what we're doing. Yeah, well, that's behind you for sure, completely. Let's move on to some roses. Some of the sweet things. Recently, well, I think my first early rose was I just got to spend a lot of time in a lot of our schools. And that felt phenomenal to me to be able to visit with Portland High School, to be able to visit with Deering. Black Student Union was amazing. I go to King Middle School. I feel like pretty often they're in my district and I love hanging out with all the kids and the educators. So that really kept me going. Was just getting to engage with young people. I'm super impressed by all of the young people that we have in schools and just how much they are involved in what's happening. So much more than I was at that age and it's really inspiring to see. And so that's always been one of my favorite parts is just getting to engage with the students as much as I can. And then recently at our inauguration, I got to read and sponsor a proclamation for our racial equity work. And I'm really excited for that. It'll be the city's first DEI committee that we'll have and it will work with the new DEI manager that we're hiring, which we're still in the process of that. So it's essentially when this person gets hired, we will then form a DEI committee and it feels exciting because that was kind of a lift. I think that was a lot of conversations of getting that to be cemented in writing. And I feel really excited that I was able to bring that across the finish line. And now going forward regardless of who is hired or whether I'm there, whether I'm not, I'm excited that we can really start prioritizing racial equity at the city of Portland. So that felt like a big win for me. It's good to get some infrastructure in place because then as you said, people change, circumstances shift, but if you have that vision and that goal, what you want to accomplish, that's really helpful. I kid you about in a return to the strategic plan, but I'm totally like that myself. If I don't understand what the context is, I can't make sense of the individual fact or policy or whatever. So I do think that's a huge step forward for Portland. Congratulations. Thank you. Awesome. Yeah, so actually along the same lines, the part that I felt most satisfaction with was the work that we did at the sustainability and transportation committee. And it was precisely because I always felt like there was a clarity into what we were doing. We were following some of the big plans that multi-regional or multi-minicipalities have come together to put forward and we've been kind of like taking part of it. So I feel like I know what we're trying to do. All we have to do is be good advocates and get as informed as possible and advance it. And then we build capacity to get those structures by adding a position to the department. So that committee to me felt like really effective council work. We've talked about wanting to be in positions where you are going to be effective in having a broad impact. And that committee has certainly been a good lesson in how government can be effective in advancing things forward. So that's been super, super rewarding. And the staff too has just been Troy and his staff has been amazing to work with. So by far, one of the most satisfying parts of the weekly routines. Did you both keep your same committee assignments? Yeah, yeah. And so in that committee, we've been serving together and we'll continue this coming year with Councilor Zaro. So committees are definitely a rose. I might have expected you to say, wow, that's a lot of extra work. Wow, that's a lot of extra time. But that's where you really get in there and do some things. And on the council, there's a lot of procedural stuff. There's a lot of just things that have to be dealt with. And that's really great to hear. So what are you excited about for the coming year? You've alluded to a couple of different things. Where do you see your work heading this year? Yeah, I'm excited for what's to come. I mean, some of that definitely involves what I just talked about with the racial equity, hiring the racial equity manager. And I hope that that's something that we can get moving forward on and maybe even have a determination in the spring or in the summer. I'm excited too for our Health and Human Services and Public Safety Committee. It's the first time in Portland that we've had an all women committee. So that's really cool. I'm serving with Councilor Travaro and Councilor Fornir. And we had a really great first meeting and we're talking about a lot of things in terms of making sure that we're cementing abortion here in Portland and making it as safe as possible. It is luckily still legal here in Maine, but I think we're trying to put as much work as we can forward so that if anything does happen in the future, at least Portland is protected. So that's really exciting. We're gonna look at making sure that we're providing as many resources as we can for our unhoused community members, the larger shelters opening up in Riverside. I think in like a month and a half, I think maybe March, beginning of March. So that's gonna be a lot of conversations around staffing and around making sure that we are providing the necessary resources for people to get to and from. And I'm just looking forward, I think, to us really putting out a lot of work. I think that committee specifically is so important in terms of the community aspect of Portland. And I'm similar to the Sustainability and Transportation Committee. It's a three-person committee and I'm excited for us to just churn out as much work as possible. So I certainly look forward to that and seeing where we are at the end of the year. Great. One of the pieces that I'm most excited about is carrying over the results of the election. So the clean elections ordinances that we have to put in place, we already have a timeline for that. And that's happening like in the immediate future. So we need to get that stuff in place by April. So that it could be part of our budget, right? Because we need to fund it somehow. And then the candidates that wanna run for November, it is accessible to them. So I talked about how important I thought that was and how transformative that really could be from municipal government and democracy as a whole. So I'm really excited to play a role in that. Can you share any details of what you think the clean election opportunities for candidates are gonna be or are we still too far out there? There's still a lot to be determined but what we heard from the city clerk's office is that they're looking at the state procedures and see how much of that we can mirror here. But I know that there's groups that have been talking with the city clerk's office to look at programs like in other cities like Seattle and New York. And there's some really interesting clean election programs out there where registered voters or even non-registered voters like residents have vouchers and that's the way that they could contribute to candidates campaigns. And I've heard already a multitude of ideas that are out there. I'm not sure how far and broad we can explore them and what's applicable here to Portland but I'm excited that we have a city clerk's office that's receptive to hearing from community partners about these ideas and then when we get to dive into the work we'll figure out what's the best match for Portland. But again, that's transformative work and I'm excited to be part of that. Yeah, vouchers, what an interesting idea. Yeah, I think Seattle does that. Seattle does? Yeah, and I hear that it's not like because they automatically mail their ballots to register voters, you automatically get those vouchers. So you get a high percentage of all participation. And you said but even if they aren't registered voters they can get the vouchers. I believe that I heard those examples of non-registered voters, just residents being able to participate in the clean elections. So it's in a way kind of like a vote before you get to vote. You get to support that candidate financially with your voucher. So that's an idea I think, I don't know again if Portland has the capacity to run a program that detailed but exciting that that's an option out there for us to explore. Right, well Portland's not that big of a city that populous of a city so it seems like that might be it's kind of, it's analogous to you have to collect signatures to get nominated to get your name on the ballot. And so basically you're collecting the funding to go with that because you both know getting a signature, getting your name on the ballot that does not a campaign make. Right. And you end up reaching into your pocket a lot, right? Some people are in a position to do that and some people aren't and that's something that we're always reminding viewers about that it's not good representative government if only the people with the resources to do that can get their name on the ballot or get elected. Right. Absolutely. Yeah, there are too many constituencies and issues that just don't make it into the conversation. So wow, that would be exciting. I don't think the state of Maine is giving out vouchers for claiming. I don't see it happening any time soon. What's the state model you can donate $5 to any candidate and it doesn't have to be a candidate in your own district. And if they get enough, right, there's like a trigger point where they've got enough people I've given them $5 and then they qualify for the clean elections fund. Are you in favor of setting that bar pretty high, pretty low? Yeah, I mean. In terms of how much money or vouchers or whatever it does a candidate have to get to. I think that because the municipality has to hold that within its budget we kind of have to be realistic. But I think the idea is that it grows, right? That we can expand it. And also there's circumstances that happen at different times of the campaign trail that people are gonna need additional funds or there's different types of campaigns, right? Like a city council district race versus a mayoral race are gonna be two completely different experiences and have a different financial requirements. We'll have to see what other municipalities do was within our budget capacity. And again, if there's an idea that we can revisit this year over year and either expand it or tweak it as the circumstances dictate. And our candidate is it going to be mandatory? In other words, is everybody gonna be a clean elections candidate or? I would love it. Person A can take corporate money over here and outspend the clean elections people or? I would love it for it to be mandatory. I doubt we'll get that. You both would. Yeah, absolutely. There's two votes right there. Yeah, yeah, right, two votes. So. I know. Because I know that is an issue at the state level and at the national level where people are like, I ran clean elections once but my opponent didn't so then I was outspent completely and I'm not sure I wanna do that again. Even people that philosophically think clean election funds are the way to go. I think that one of the biggest problems that we saw with the charter campaign is not the candidates themselves but like those action committees that get formed. So that's why I really wanna limit. Like they raised half a million dollars. I think they ended with a million. Why are they all in this city? So that's the stuff that I think we really need to like put a hold on. I mean, if we can get $10,000 to run an at-large campaign I mean I ran under less than that. I think that's a reason for me that's reasonable for candidates. But those action committees I think that stopping that craziness that we saw last year that we should all have urgency towards that. That was horrible. I mean no one in this city enjoyed the way that those campaigns that were being funneled by Airbnb and Uber. No one enjoyed seeing that stuff. They tend to be real negative and had personal attacks. That doesn't fit into this city. That stuff is not what Portlanders want in their politics. So you think the council can create a law that keeps political action committees from participating in elections? That is very ambitious. I would be very impressed. I'm not being skeptical. I'm just wondering how that would work. But it's for 20 years already. I know, that's the list of buds that could be coming up. Yeah, I like that. I think it's certainly, we're all talking about having big systemic impact. I think that that's the kind of stuff that we meant. That would be huge in fact. Can we talk about transportation a little bit? It's a subject near and dear to my heart just because I've lived in places where public transportation was available to even the most low income people. In this country, you basically often have to keep a car to even be employed in this state especially. And so what's a bud for transportation that you see developing here? I mean. You talked about some kind of transportation out to the new shelter because it's not in the city center. Yeah, I'm not. And again, we're hoping there's an advisory group that's being created for that type of conversation. And so our committee will have a little bit of a look into it but that was one of the biggest concerns was the level of transportation and when it's gonna be running to and from the new shelters. The new shelters in Riverton, it's off Peninsula and it's gonna be really challenging. I think for a lot of people who need that shelter to be able to get there. So that I think is the number one question is how is it running? When is it running? Who is it going to pick up? And how can we make sure that that's not an issue of getting people the care that they need? Because I think even where I am, I have Deering Oaks Park in my district. District one has the Bayside area not in their district and not. Those areas are certainly going to be places where I hope the shuttle would be considering picking up. But again, I have no idea it will really depend on the conversations that are happening at the advisory committee level. And I'm hopeful that we can have our eye on it through our HHS committee to make any changes that we need to make. But yeah, that's a huge question. Yeah. And I think other than the immediate, when we talk about transportation, the immediate thoughts of vehicles and buses. I think the pedestrian and bicycle aspect, looking at our city and to making it more pedestrian friendly. So there's a lot I think that we can start doing. These things take many years, right? Because there's a lot of investments particularly we were talking in our committee about sidewalks. We have to make commitments in the CIP where year over year we're spending a percentage of that CIP money to create more sidewalks and to create more of these, the signal walking passes, particularly in Forrest Avenue which is like a highway out there. So anything that we can do to make it more pedestrian friendly and bicycle, these forms of transportation that are a little bit more accessible to people. And in the city, our size, I think if we go in that route, we can probably make it a lot easier for people to get around without depending on those vehicles. And then obviously the infrastructure to those really needy folks in making sure that those shuttles running time that they're accessible, yeah. So this is going to be a separate from the regular bus system that serves Portland? Or it will be a, oh you do. Okay, what's the thinking there? I think they're trying to just make sure that they have a shuttle that all they're doing is going back and forth from the shelter. At least that's my hope in that there's no like time constraints of when there is going to be a to and from shuttle. But again, I got to tour the facility. It feels like so, I did, but it was, oh my gosh, I don't even remember when we were getting to do those tours. It was before the holidays and it wasn't done. So I'm looking forward to going again because there were a lot of questions like that that were still being worked on by the time that I got to tour it, so. And what's the capacity of the Riverton Shelter intended to be? It's much more than that in the Coxford Street. Yeah, I want to say on the women's side, it was like close to like 70 or 80. And then I think on the men's side, it was 60, I think. These are the numbers that came into my head immediately. I put it all on my phone when we were there visiting, but it is going to be a lot larger than anything that we have now, so. Families can stay there? Families can stay there. They have certain areas that will be dedicated to families. But I think too, with a couple of the other shelters that we have, I think that they're hoping to alleviate the impact for these family shelters where single individuals will be using Riverton and then the family shelter will be able to remain operational. And presumably there will be feeding meals there because it's too far to come in. Yeah, the last time I was there, they had, they were going to do an RFP for some local food options to make sure because of course we have a lot of different ethnicities and races and cultures here. And so they wanted to make sure that they had culturally relevant food. So that's the last that I heard is that they were going to do a couple of RFPs for food delivery service. So we'll see, I hope I can get to tour it again because again it's supposed to open, I think March 1st, which is so much sooner than I actually thought that it was going to open. So I'm hopeful that we'll be able to see it again one more time before they do. And I'm sure that, I'm sure those emails are coming to us, any minute. Well, I think my grandchildren would think I was remiss if I didn't in our last few minutes here ask you about the parks and recreation situation in Portland. What do you see happening there? Well, my grandchildren just love the parks, that we go from one park to the next, to the next, to the next. Anything happening in parks that we should know about or the rec programs? Again, I don't live in Portland. I mean, the parks are the ever changing conversation of what are we utilizing parks for. Notice I didn't say the F-T word. The continuous back and forth in that I think was the most relevant in our recent vote. I feel like, again, time is escaping me. It was maybe a couple months ago or a couple weeks ago, the Payson Park conversation about whether or not we were gonna have a concert in Payson Park. That drew out a lot of responses from individuals that were saying parks are not for concerts, parks are for concerts, Payson Park can't hold it, why can it be somewhere else? Similar to the food truck conversation on the Eastern prom, do food trucks belong in the park, do they not? And so I think we're trying to figure out our park usage and what it's for and how it will serve Portland as we continue to grow and expand. So I look forward to having more of those conversations. We postpone the Payson Park vote. The food truck determination actually should be coming out in probably a couple of weeks, but it's an interesting discussion to have in Portland because people are very passionate about parks and what they're supposed to be used for. So I don't know, to answer your question, to answer your question, I'm not sure what's gonna happen with the park. There might be concerts, there might be food trucks. Or there might not be, yeah. We don't know. I have no idea. Well, we are coming toward the end of our show. Is there a last thought that either of you would like to share with us about 2023? What do you think is gonna excite you? Or should we thank our crew? Yeah, I mean, I'm thankful that we're able to be here. So thank you. Thank you both of you into Portland Media Center because I'm glad that we get to continue this into our sophomore year. I actually think that's really cool and it's a big privilege that we get this platform to share and I like watching our old episodes and seeing how we've grown and changed and it's been really fun. So that's all I have to share. This is the first episode of 2023 and I'm excited to see where we are at the end of the year. Absolutely. I think this is definitely one of the roses, one of the shining moments of the year. And it started really kind of like low key where it was like, hey, let's just try this. And I didn't have any idea how long we'd be doing it. I thought it'd be the first few months or whatever. And then it was obvious then that we did have a routine and then we were set here on the schedule. And yeah, I'm excited for this year to do it again. We missed a month. So I feel like we really had good momentum, kind of like a little bit of a hiccup when here we're back. Yeah, I'm really, this has definitely been a very grateful to have done. It's been a great opportunity and looking forward to doing it again this year. Great. Well, I'm super excited that we became a podcast. So our whole archive, all our first eight shows are on Spotify. They will be on Apple too, but right now they're on Spotify and that's great to be able to people can revisit that. And now going forward, each episode will be a podcast. And I know that you, Roberto, thought that that would help build audience, that not everyone's gonna sit through a video or watch live TV, great as it is. But they can listen to a podcast while they're making dinner or whatever they're doing. So that's a great leap for it. I think that's my bud that I would say. Rose, working with you all, working with the wonderful Warren Edgar, our director and Jeffrey Cooper, our audio wizard and David Bedell, our cameraman, thank you so much, could not do the show without you. Thank you to Portland Media Center for hosting us and thank you to our audience because obviously without an audience, we don't have a show. You've been so encouraging and I've heard so many positives from people that I know that have watched the show and really feel that it's useful and they learn things and they feel closer to their city government because you take the time to do this. So let's try and maybe do it a little more often. We said we'd do it once a month and that's been a little challenging. We're gonna try to stick. That's my New Year's resolution, monthly. There you go. Works for me.