We’ve had roughly a year and a half of the new Portland city charter, and as I and others predicted, it’s been a fiasco. The question is whether the ship will right itself, or whether the city government will degrade further, all the way into a disaster.

There’s a lot at stake. Potland’s downtown was just ranked third-worst in the world in some sort of survey. Whatever the validity of that polling, downtown – and the business climate generally – need emergency care. Unfortunately, any recovery seems unlikely, as the emergency room is in the hands of a band of quacks.

It’s the charter’s fault that we have such an ineffective City Council. That laughable version of “rank choice” voting that determines who gets the council seats has, as I feared, ensured that half of them are occupied by marginal ideologues of the far left. They are determined to Stick It To The Man™ and create a socialist paradise. Alas, few of them have ever had a real job, and they couldn’t manage their way out of a paper bag.

But some of them have learned quickly how to milk their positions for personal enrichment. Before it disappears into the ether, Portlanders should be sure to check out this story in last week’s Weed, about the many junkets being taken on the taxpayers’ dime by the “progressives” on the city council. Five of the top six “business” travel spenders are from the self-described socialist faction. 

And the biggest spender of them all? Candace Avalos, who got her council seat as the result of her own votes on the charter commission. In 2025, her first year on the job, she saw fit to bill the city roughly $20,000 for her travel to, count them, eight cities: Atlanta, Chicago, D.C., Detroit, North Bend (Oregon), Salt Like City, Seattle, and Vienna.

Vienna! And she wasn’t the only one on that trip. Her socialist colleagues Jamie Dunphy and Mitch Green were also there. They were all studying “social housing.” Sure. Sure they were.

What’s holding Portland back more than anything right now is the City Council lineup. And those personnel are clearly a function of the insane voting setup. In November, the voters will get another crack at filling half the seats. It may get better. But it may get worse. The charter is to blame.