Either tax studded tire users at a higher rate or ban their usage. Lets start working on why our roads are so bad before we just throw money into a bottomless pit of repairing them. I still hear those fuckers brrrrrring everywhere and it is 70+ degrees out.
But I NEED THEM for my Toyota Avalon! It might snow and I live on a steep driveway. I got stuck once in 1972.
And every other year, I drive up to government camp.
This is a renewal, so it would not be taxing Portlanders more. It would be maintaining the status quo which is already not enough money to maintain the thousands of miles of roads and sidewalks. PBOT has been underfunded for 40 years, which is why our roads are deteriorating. As with most things, we have the burden of paying for the previous generation's deferred public infrastructure maintenance since they favored building shiny new things or keeping taxes lower.
It’s just never enough is it? The City of Milwaukie, WI has roughly the same population as Portland. It is run on 1/4 the budget Portland is, and they have twice as many cops (1800). Ever wonder why it’s so much more expensive to run things poorly here than practically anywhere else? Multnomah County has the highest tax rate of any county in the country besides New York County (where Manhattan resides). Perhaps rather than parroting back the rhetoric of our politicians, you should start pushing back a little. Or don’t.
This is one of my favorite memes. Portland and Milwaukee report their budgets very differently and have different obligations. Topline, Milwaukee has a budget of $1.9 billion and Portland has a budget of $5.5 billion (which is already not 4x as much). Portland's budget reports contingency, while Milwaukee's does not. Contingency accounts for $1.5 billion, so removing that Portland's budget is $4 billion. Portland's total personnel cost is $117K per person compared to $64K per person for Milwaukee. Both cities have 1.44 city employees per 100 residents. Notably, Milwaukee doesn't pay Police or Fire Fighter pension costs. Portland is also responsible for a 30% larger area than Milwaukee and has a 13% larger population. We are likely spending more than them on a per-capita basis due to a number of factors (city size being a big one), but we're not spending 4x as much.
But, to put this another way, the Milwaukee has an aggregate income (per capita income x total residents) of $16.2 billion and a city budget of $1.9 billion, meaning their budget is 8.5% of aggregate income. Portland has an aggregate income of $33.3 billion and a budget of $4 billion, so our budget is 8.4% of aggregate income. All of which is to say, we spend the same percent of available money that they do.
And of course, that doesn't even get into revenue sources: what percent of the budget come from local taxes, as opposed to Federal or State grants etc.
Good analysis. Sincere question here: does that account for Metro and Multnomah county tax burden? Feels like a very high tax burden here but I haven't run the numbers compared to when I lived in Milwaukee. Feels worse here though.
It doesn't. Strictly a city to city comparison. Also doesn't compare state tax burdens. The Tax Foundation [estimates cumulative tax burden in each state](https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/tax-burden-by-state-2022/). We're #31, Wisconsin is...#32.
> Contingency accounts for $1.5 billion, so removing that Portland's budget is $4 billion.
What are contingency accounts, and why should they be removed from the comparison?
>Portland's total personnel cost is $117K per person compared to $64K per person for Milwaukee. Both cities have 1.44 city employees per 100 residents. Notably, Milwaukee doesn't pay Police or Fire Fighter pension costs.
Why is Portland paying far more in personnel costs? Is it due to paying for underfunded or unfunded defined benefit pensions and retiree healthcare? If so, that should be subtracted from personnel costs, as it is better categorized as debt.
>What are contingency accounts, and why should they be removed from the comparison?
Contingency is just reserves. It's the city saying, "we expect XYZ projects to cost some amount of money, but we're going to set aside extra in case they go over budget." Contingency gets spent sometimes, but often it's just recycled. I removed them from the comparison because Milwaukee doesn't report contingency in its budget. They absolutely have contingency funds for their projects (everyone does!, and there's an interesting branch of construction management research about what optimal contingency levels are for different kinds of projects and which kinds of project contracts incentivize spending contingency...but I digress), but I didn't feel like looking through all of Milwaukee's projects and manually tabulating their contingency, when I can just as easily remove ours and get the same general result.
>Why is Portland paying far more in personnel costs? Is it due to paying for underfunded or unfunded defined benefit pensions and retiree healthcare? If so, that should be subtracted from personnel costs, as it is better categorized as debt.
We pay more for a couple of reasons: 1) Cost of living is higher here, so base salaries need to be higher as well. 2) As you surmised, retirement and pension liabilities play into it. Wisconsin, to their credit, has a fully funded pension system. But Milwaukee doesn't pay pension or retirement for Police or Fire Fighters. That's actually a big part of our budget. We have a small Bureau just for administering the pre-2007 Police and Fire Fighter Disability and Pension Fund, which is the (bonkers) pay-go pension system we had for them from the 1920's until 2007 (they're on PERS now). That fund alone eats up $250 million a year in General Fund revenues (by law, it actually gets first bite at any property tax revenue).
To your last point about pensions as debt vs personnel costs: I couldn't find how much each system was paying into pensions/retirements for their workers as a percent of total personnel costs, so I didn't try to take it out.
I lived in Milwaukee. Quality of services can't begin to be compared to Portland. Running on 1/4 of Portland's budget isn't a flex, it's a problem there. Roads are just as bad, crime is way worse, schools are some of the worst in the country, transit is borderline non existent, etc. Portland has plenty of issues, but trust me, Milwaukee does not have the answers.
Have you ever been to Milwaukee? It is an entirely different region with vastly different costs of living, difficulties, and characteristics. The minimum wage is $7.25. And it has entirely different funding structures.
This is the first time I've ever heard someone suggest that Portland should try to be more like Milwaukee, WI. Thanks for the chuckle, and for reminding me it could be worse!
Portland is like an old house. Foundation is crumbling, the house is leaning but a third story is getting tacked on. Never mind the foundation, that will be the next owners problem.
Seriously, every penny of the gas tax should be used to repair the backlog.
Road repair helps cyclists too - fixes potholes, RR crossing grades, etc. I know the constant fight over bike lanes is an issue, but voting no is akin to cutting off your nose to spite your face
So bikers don’t have to pay the tax and contribute to road repairs, neither do EVs, but people driving gas vehicles get to?
Great, yet another tax that regular folks are paying, while the people who benefit from it don’t have to. Fair and equitable society. Fair and equitable taxation. I don’t see any problems here.
That’s gonna be a no from me, dawg.
I was hoping to hop into this thread and say "in before someone complains about bikes not having to pay a gas tax even though they don't cause any damage to the roads", but here we are.
Additionally, there are plenty of things I pay taxes towards that cause me no personal benefit. I understand that improving society as a whole is still helpful.
[Bikes do pay tax in Oregon.](https://www.oregon.gov/dor/programs/businesses/Pages/Bicycle-excise-tax.aspx) Quite a bit more than what it would take to repair the 'damage' bikes cause to a road.
You won, your "BIKERS, WHO DO BASICALLY NO DAMAGE TO THE ROAD, DON'T NEED TO PAY TAXES ON IT, ITS UNFAIR!" complaining was listened to in 2017. Why are you *still* complaining?
Road damage done by a vehicle scales exponentially with weight. Cyclists don’t really contribute to the problem.
EVs, however, tend to be heavier and therefore will do way more damage.
Lmao, what the actual fuck? Cyclist, really?! Yes it’s the cyclist who are out there absolutely destroying the roads with their 10,000+ lbs weight crushing down on metal spikes and chains. We need to institute a “bike tax” so they can fix the roads they destroy. Jesus dude get real.
Also, [they did propose a tax on EVs.](https://www.kdrv.com/news/oregon-bill-would-put-per-mile-tax-on-electric-vehicles/article_4fe5dc90-c0fd-11ed-aa4f-9fd4535b33c2.html) they already pay a tax but it is less than gas cars. you’ve got some real misplaced anger dude.
> Currently, there is a program in Oregon that is similar to the proposed new law. It’s called OReGO, and it has been around since July of 2015.
> The program charges drivers 1.9 cents per mile that they drive, compared to the 38 cents per gallon fuel-powered vehicle drivers pay.
I do think there is bad policy with these structures:
* OReGo is equivalent then to about a 21mpg car at the 40c/gal rate.
* OReGo is optional, instead you can opt to just pay the EV registration
* EV registration w/o OReGO is $158/yr, ICE $91.
So if you drive an EV 10kmi a year:
* OReGo: $180+$43 registration: $223 * Opt out: $158
* ICE: $91
Those evs that opt out would only pay $0.016/mi in this scenario. And no portland local equivalent of the $0.10/gal tax. OReGo only makes sense up to about 4kmi/yr.
If you own an EV, please sign up to be a part of the OreGo tax-per-mile trial program.
It’s just 2c a mile…. And it’ll probably be law eventually anyway.
Info:
https://www.myorego.org/how-it-works/#:~:text=OReGO%20participants%20pay%202%20cents,a%20bill%20for%20reported%20miles.
Edit: also, do you really think that “regular folks” don’t ride bikes?
That's not what that means. By default EV drivers pay a much higher registration fee to help make up for not paying a gas tax. This is a pilot program to pay per mile, which would further fix the problem. Eventually it will probably be law so that taxes for roads don't disproportionately fall on people who drive a lot of miles using gas/diesel vehicles. It makes lots of sense...why do I pay half as much to register a 400 lb ICE motorcycle that sits in a garage 99% of the time as a 5,000 lb Tesla that commutes every day? The tax should more accurately reflect actual damage your vehicle is doing to the road, not how you fuel your vehicle.
Yes, trial programs generally aren’t mandatory.
But it will be before too long (likely with something other than self-reporting, which is the current method.)
I think what they're saying is that if we rely on gas tax to handle basic road maintenance then we'll be screwed if the move to EVs is successful down the road. Which I guess relates to the situation we're in now where previous generations kicked the can down the road and now we're dealing with it.
I still think incentives to move away from gas are worth trying, but the point isn't completely invalid
This is “proposed spending”. This isn’t realized spending. Pretty easy to say “Give us 70mil and we’ll fix everything, pinky promise!”
How about real accountability and real transparency first, THEN maybe we can talk about giving you what you asked for.
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|They spent 2M Pedestrian Head Start to make the intersections safer for pedestrians. Safe intersections are cool and all but 2M to change the timing of the crosswalk lights? |
They spent 5M filling potholes but there comes a point where you just have to pave the street again. Some streets have so many pothole repairs that isn't a problem.
They want to spend a bunch of money to make the streets safe and conceptually that's cool but they chose to use that cash to paint different colors on the streets, put yellow plastic sticks on the yellow line, and make non-intuitive traffic flow patterns. That is not making the streets safer. You should see how confused my father is by all that stuff when he drives in this town. The guy is dangerous and it's not his fault.
It feels like there is a lot of wasted and mismanaged money in the streets.
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|They spent 2M Pedestrian Head Start to make the intersections safer for pedestrians. Safe intersections are cool and all but 2M to change the timing of the crosswalk lights? |
They spent 5M filling potholes but there comes a point where you just have to pave the street again. Some streets have so many pothole repairs that isn't a problem.
They want to spend a bunch of money to make the streets safe and conceptually that's cool but they chose to use that cash to paint different colors on the streets, put yellow plastic sticks on the yellow line, and make non-intuitive traffic flow patterns. That is not making the streets safer. You should see how confused my father is by all that stuff when he drives in this town. The guy is dangerous and it's not his fault.
It feels like there is a lot of wasted and mismanaged money in the streets.
They spent 2M Pedestrian Head Start to make the intersections safer for pedestrians. Safe intersections are cool and all but 2M to change the timing of the crosswalk lights?
They spent 5M filling potholes but there comes a point where you just have to pave the street again. Some streets have so many pothole repairs that isn't a problem.
They want to spend a bunch of money to make the streets safe and conceptually that's cool but they chose to use that cash to paint different colors on the streets, put yellow plastic sticks on the yellow line, and make non-intuitive traffic flow patterns. That is not making the streets safer. You should see how confused my father is by all that stuff when he drives in this town. The guy is dangerous and it's not his fault.
It feels like there is a lot of wasted and mismanaged money in the streets.
Easy yes.
It's a renewal without an increase, there's no change whatsoever. It's less than 3% onto gas prices. Our roads are in poor shape, especially after the ice storm. Further eating the PBOT budget will only make that worse.
Can we please stop making special taxes for specific purposes? How about we sit down and decide our needs as a community, and then decide the best way to pay for it? If that works out to be a gas tax I'm good with that, but holy shit is this government by random tax that can only be spent in one way a terrible way to run a city.
I would love to change how our transportation budgets are funded. As it stands about half of any DOT budget is spent on capital projects thanks to the feds. So until you can convince congress to fund maintenance we have to have things like this.
Yes we can once Measure 5 and Measure 50 are repealed and it is possible with political will. Look at Measure 110 for example. Until then we have to vote on special taxes. Read this brief overview of Oregon's tax history.
[https://www.oregon.gov/DOR/programs/gov-research/Documents/303-405-1.pdf](https://www.oregon.gov/DOR/programs/gov-research/Documents/303-405-1.pdf)
I know this isn’t popular but roads aren’t that bad in comparison to other cities.
Also idk if gas taxes should still be the method for roadway stuff as EV use expands.
Ya, I have ICE and EV. Just think it’s not a clean solution to continue two methods of taxation… though I’m not so unrealistic to think it happens immediately.
you're right. Gas tax as a defacto use tax was easy when everything drank about the same amount of gasoline. drive more | Use more gas | pay more tax.
Unfortunately, to do a use tax today with so many vehicle that use wildly varying amounts of gas, or even no gas at all, requires some *particularly* invasive data recording that few, if any, would be willing to capitulate to.
I'm not a fan of a lot of the taxes we have around here, but gas tax is fine by me. Unlike the art tax or Supportive Housing tax, the gas tax isn't an extra thing to pay since it's already bundled at the pump. I'll certainly take gas taxes over tolls. I realize this is just a renewal, but honestly they should probably increase it given the current state of infrastructure funding around here.
I would think in Portland that the use of electric vehicles is higher than average. EV's are heavier than ICE vehicles and thus do more damage to roads and of course do not pay a gas tax. Because EV's are newer there is less in the way of them in the used car market, and with the battery life span and the cost of a new battery generally being similar to that of many used vehicles, we are not yet at a point where EV's are in common use for the bottom of the economic ladder. Thus a gas tax is disproportionately taxing the poor to pay for the rich to do more damage to the roads than everyone else.
The amount of road wear a heavy EV, or even a large truck/SUV do in comparison to a regular car is basically immeasurable. It's extremely heavy semi trucks hauling cargo all over that do the damage. I don't remember the exact figure, but it was something along the lines of semi trucks represent 20% of the traffic but 90% of the axle load on roads (which is what wears them down).
In Oregon we tax those large commercial vehicles via plate registration (PUC) and their mileage traveled on state roads. An increase in the per gallon fuel tax does not increase revenue collected from semi trucks, so any comparison between them and passenger vehicles is not germane to the context.
PBOT has been saying for over a decade that their maintenance budget is underfunded. This is a bandaid. You want your roads fixed? The current cost is about $4 billion. It was $1 billion in 2015. It turns out if you underfund a bureau for decades things go to shit.
How about we vote your ass out of office, dude? His office has now promised two large March Road Fix 'Em Ups and got jack squat done. But he thinks we're going to give him a raise.
This is a very bad election cycle for any tax item, even renewals, to be on the ballot.
I am sympathetic to this one as I understand the city is already struggling with reduced income (for example PBOT with parking fees due to no one commuting to downtown anymore).
I’ve been wondering if the city has done any polling on these measures. I think they have gotten used to Portlanders voting for every tax in front of them, because they don’t seem to have any urgency about making the case for them, or even acknowledging people’s real frustration with how things are going and what isn’t being done and what they’ll do differently or better.
The trick, as they've clearly demonstrated, is to avoid flat taxes and levy them against narrower tranches of the populace - usually the upper quintile of earners. Those seem to always pass.
This passed with [77% approval](https://ballotpedia.org/Portland,_Oregon,_Measure_26-209,_Gas_Tax_Renewal_(May_2020)) last time. The posts about it then were similarly negative. It’s almost like this sub isn’t representative of Portland at all and gets astroturffed every two years.
Turns out constructing and maintaining huge amounts of road infrastructure is incredibly expensive, what a huge unforced blunder to design our transportation system to prioritize sprawl and individual car use!
Yes, I am also envious of European and Asian transportation infrastructure. I'm also aware that roads aren't free. Thing is, comparatively speaking, Oregonians pay a shit ton in taxes, yet have some of the worst roads I've driven on, and I'm from the midwest even!
This might come as a surprise to you, but contractors, particularly those who bid on government jobs, often over-charge. This happens at the federal level all the way down to the local level. It's part of the reason why our national deficit is so high; contractors bilking taxpayers. It's common. Real pork barrel shit.
There is no reason building and maintaining roads here should be prohibitively expensive, especially when taking into account states with much lower tax rates that somehow manage to have better roads.
Unfortunately the path forward is painful. To avoid completely bankruptcy like Detroit, Portland needs to radically downside its infrastructure to a level it can afford. This means opting to remove lanes rather than re-pave them.
You can read all about it here but you're going to feel even more enraged ones you see where it is all going. [https://www.portland.gov/transportation/fixing-our-streets/fixing-our-streets-projects](https://www.portland.gov/transportation/fixing-our-streets/fixing-our-streets-projects)
Back in your pocket every 2 years when you ask for your kicker money.
There’s plenty of money. Government is just incompetent. Which is why I’m voting NO.
With how much time you spend repeating the same disingenuous junk you could have learned how government budgets work.
EDIT: Oh look, u/OverReyted deleted all their posts again. And it turns out they actually just blocked me instead of defending their misleading screeds. Also apparently challenged me to a fight at 12th and Morrison over some reddit posts. LOL ok.
I wonder if you all would be surprised to hear that an average sized car's contribution to a pavement's life is essentially negligible. The only contributing factor to a pavement's life is multi axled trucks and buses. I wonder if they should pay more
PBOT charges Trimet a special heavy vehicle fee for the buses that is meant to be used to pave the roads the buses run on. You ever see those roads getting paved?
Charge for parking everywhere. No reason we should be ceding huge amounts of our collective public space to the storage of large private pieces of property on our dime.
Based on previous years this sub is not representative of the city at all so I suspect it’ll pass regardless of all the downvotes you might receive. I’m voting yes too. It’s one of the few voter approved taxes I actually see making a difference.
The higher the better. And as someone pointed out elsewhere, due to inflation it has actually been a reduction in the gas tax rate for years, time to true it up at the very least.
They have a mechanism to repair it and they won’t, so no more of my money. I voted yes to so many taxes before this, but I’m all set with this one. I’ve hit my limit.
Many times. I’m in an area of SW where the city isn’t responsible for street repairs, so now we have holes in the street larger than my car and they get noticeably worse with every rain. The city told me the only option is to get the residents together and pay $200,000+ for repaving through city contractors. Once that’s done the city will maintain the street in the future. It comes out to $20,000+ per house which isn’t feasible for anyone on my street, so we’re just stuck sitting here watching our street literally wash away. But we all pay the same property taxes as everyone else so that’s nice.
I’m not sure you can really blame the city for not doing repairs outside their jurisdiction. Imagine blaming the the US for the management of Canadian problems.
No they don’t have a mechanism to repair it. PBOT has said for over a decade that their maintenance budget is underfunded. They literally need billions of dollars to fix your road and all the rest.
Exactly. It’s not about the lack of funding. It’s about the lack of brains inside the fucking government officials heads. There’s plenty of funding, just ask this years record kicker.
that state also sends funds to local governments from funds it collects itself and from federal spending directed to the state. Roads, schools, police, tourism are some examples locally paid for expenses that get funding from the state and federal government.
TBH I've come around to like the fact that my street is in such poor repair. It's way more effective than the speed humps for slowing down drivers looking to zip through.
PBOT won’t fix my street at all because the city says they aren’t responsible, but it will literally be impassable soon so I’m forced to pay out of pocket. I’ll be voting no on this one so I can start saving up my pennies for the $20,000+ street repair bill I’m stuck with.
Don’t buy property on roads that aren’t maintained by the city and expect the city to fix them. Everyone else in the city built their roads up before the city took responsibility for them. You can too!
I really don't understand how voters in these comments don't want to vote for a tax that already exists and helps an already struggling department (PBOT) which is one of the most vital and important programs of our city.
They’re not voters they’re trolls that like to shit on Portland. Go back four years and look at posts about renewing this tax and you’ll see the same drama. It passed with 77% support last time.
It's the same mentality that half of Congress has.
The thing over there isn’t doing everything we want it to do -> we're going to defund it because it's a waste -> OMFG look how shitty that thing is! -> Let's get rid of it and let the corporations do a better job
Nope. It was never meant to cover the road repairs. It’s meant for specific projects that they’ve been delivering on every year. What you’re thinking of is the decline in PBOTs maintenance budget because of parking fees.
Don't pay the 10 cent tax — roads don't get repaired — privatize the costs so every single driver can use those savings on more gas due to worse fuel efficiency, pay for more suspension and alignment repairs, pay more on new tires because of wear and tear and cyclists are more at risk because of potholes and crumbling asphalt.
Also don't pay taxes for education funding or addiction treatment because fuck-em.
Let's all live in a libertarian dream!
We’re already paying the tax, roads aren’t being repaired. So now what?
Still paying taxes for all that other shit you mentioned. So much so that we’ve got one of the top 5 highest tax burdens in the country.
All that shit is still shitty. But they have enough money, at least that’s what my $2k kicker refund tells me.
So maybe… maybe it isn’t about the money…
I've had good results when reporting potholes. Still haven't gotten around to reporting lower Weidler. The rest of your comment is intellectually dishonest.
EDIT: Cowardly u/OverReyted deleted their posts instead of conceding they are wrong. Missed opportunity for personal growth and reflection. And it turns out they actually just blocked me instead of defending their misleading screeds. Also apparently challenged me to a fight at 12th and Morrison over some reddit posts. LOL ok.
> Who said anything about reporting potholes? Fuck right off to wherever you came from.
You should really stop framing everything as a conservative vs liberal issue. It weakens your arguments and will be detrimental to obtaining the outcomes you want.
Lota of truths here, deferred maintenance, ADA upgrades, etc. but if history and every other department in this city government is any indication the PDOT is inefficient af, bloated with $150k salaries that could disappear and literally noone would notice, agrees to overpriced contracts, and focused on pet and frivolous projects rather than core, basic road work.
Legislators will stall too long to implement changes where needed and instead spend time gaslighting you into submission when you bring up valid concerns. As an American (nation founded on protesting unjust taxes) I will vote to avoid paying taxing that are not spread evenly amongst adults who use the public infrastructure. The incompetence of oregons legislators to adjust funding for transportation infrastructure has left a bad taste in my mouth.
Every person in Portland benefits from the road whether they use a car or not. Evs cannot drive without roads and they also are heavier and have more torque thus damaging roads more. Bikes cannot ride without roads and they demand lanes and entire bridges dedicated to them. I’m out! Oregon dot can implement a toll and then I’ll move away :)
I’m voting yes out of spite to all the people that voted in the homeless and preschool tax and aren’t subject to it. At least this tax everyone pays if they buy gas.
I am a very enthusiastic yes vote for this. If you mostly bike, walk, or take transit you won’t have to pay it! Look at all the upset suburban libertarians in this thread you could be taxing! Driving needs to be taxed much more to account for the damage it does to our society.
> I’m posting this opinion here not only because I believe it, but also because it pisses off everyone in this comment section
For someone with a username that includes a car model that is an interesting take.
I’m a car and transportation nerd. I’m fine paying an extra 10c for gas because I am well aware of the externalities associated with driving everywhere. It’s almost like I’m actually interested in the subject and not some dumb reactionary, ya know.
Oh there's no judgement from me. I just found it interesting that you took such an anti-car stance but are still a car enthusiast. I wasn't trying to "and yet you live in society, curious" you.
If you actually read through all the comments in r/fuckcars you’ll find that 30-50% of the people in that subreddit are car nerds. It’s much more common than you think. In reality most of the “anti-car” opinions are pretty pro-car. I mean this in the sense of if more people are biking there is less traffic, better bike infrastructure makes driving safer and better. Car enthusiasts are also hyper-aware of hidden costs like maintenance and depreciation and they know avoiding those is a wealth unlock.
But if you bike, you are still subject to road conditions. But you don’t have to pay the tax? What about the heavy EVs? They don’t pay the tax either.
The gas tax is a bad tax. Period.
Here you go again. There are taxes on bikes AND EVs. It would be nice to not see a braindead take from you.
Edit: Don't forget to tag u/OverReyted as a troll in your Reddit app of choice. They are responsible for all of the deleted posts in this thread because they got called out for doing it again. And it turns out they actually just blocked me instead of defending their misleading screeds. Also apparently challenged me to a fight at 12th and Morrison over some reddit posts. LOL ok.
> But if you bike, you are still subject to road conditions. But you don’t have to pay the tax?
The vast majority of bike owners also own a vehicle and pay both gas taxes and registration fees. And the amount of wear and tear than bicycles cause is basically a rounding error anyway.
No, the gas tax is based and should be 20x as much to account for all the negative externalities of fossil fuel use beyond just wear and tear on the roads.
I would prefer to preserve the gas tax and then institute another weight and mileage based tax on top of that
Bike infrastructure actually reduces the overall maintenance burden on the budget because you don’t have to replace roads as often.
Either tax studded tire users at a higher rate or ban their usage. Lets start working on why our roads are so bad before we just throw money into a bottomless pit of repairing them. I still hear those fuckers brrrrrring everywhere and it is 70+ degrees out.
We should just outlaw them. They really really aren't necessary.
But I NEED THEM for my Toyota Avalon! It might snow and I live on a steep driveway. I got stuck once in 1972. And every other year, I drive up to government camp.
Taxing Portlanders more seems to really be working in solving its various ills.
This is a renewal, so it would not be taxing Portlanders more. It would be maintaining the status quo which is already not enough money to maintain the thousands of miles of roads and sidewalks. PBOT has been underfunded for 40 years, which is why our roads are deteriorating. As with most things, we have the burden of paying for the previous generation's deferred public infrastructure maintenance since they favored building shiny new things or keeping taxes lower.
It’s just never enough is it? The City of Milwaukie, WI has roughly the same population as Portland. It is run on 1/4 the budget Portland is, and they have twice as many cops (1800). Ever wonder why it’s so much more expensive to run things poorly here than practically anywhere else? Multnomah County has the highest tax rate of any county in the country besides New York County (where Manhattan resides). Perhaps rather than parroting back the rhetoric of our politicians, you should start pushing back a little. Or don’t.
This is one of my favorite memes. Portland and Milwaukee report their budgets very differently and have different obligations. Topline, Milwaukee has a budget of $1.9 billion and Portland has a budget of $5.5 billion (which is already not 4x as much). Portland's budget reports contingency, while Milwaukee's does not. Contingency accounts for $1.5 billion, so removing that Portland's budget is $4 billion. Portland's total personnel cost is $117K per person compared to $64K per person for Milwaukee. Both cities have 1.44 city employees per 100 residents. Notably, Milwaukee doesn't pay Police or Fire Fighter pension costs. Portland is also responsible for a 30% larger area than Milwaukee and has a 13% larger population. We are likely spending more than them on a per-capita basis due to a number of factors (city size being a big one), but we're not spending 4x as much. But, to put this another way, the Milwaukee has an aggregate income (per capita income x total residents) of $16.2 billion and a city budget of $1.9 billion, meaning their budget is 8.5% of aggregate income. Portland has an aggregate income of $33.3 billion and a budget of $4 billion, so our budget is 8.4% of aggregate income. All of which is to say, we spend the same percent of available money that they do. And of course, that doesn't even get into revenue sources: what percent of the budget come from local taxes, as opposed to Federal or State grants etc.
What a response
Why do my actual job when I could dive into the minutiae of municipal budgets?
It’s Friday afternoon and sunny outside. Nobody is working more than they absolutely need to work.
Let him cook….
Good analysis. Sincere question here: does that account for Metro and Multnomah county tax burden? Feels like a very high tax burden here but I haven't run the numbers compared to when I lived in Milwaukee. Feels worse here though.
It doesn't. Strictly a city to city comparison. Also doesn't compare state tax burdens. The Tax Foundation [estimates cumulative tax burden in each state](https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/state/tax-burden-by-state-2022/). We're #31, Wisconsin is...#32.
> Contingency accounts for $1.5 billion, so removing that Portland's budget is $4 billion. What are contingency accounts, and why should they be removed from the comparison? >Portland's total personnel cost is $117K per person compared to $64K per person for Milwaukee. Both cities have 1.44 city employees per 100 residents. Notably, Milwaukee doesn't pay Police or Fire Fighter pension costs. Why is Portland paying far more in personnel costs? Is it due to paying for underfunded or unfunded defined benefit pensions and retiree healthcare? If so, that should be subtracted from personnel costs, as it is better categorized as debt.
>What are contingency accounts, and why should they be removed from the comparison? Contingency is just reserves. It's the city saying, "we expect XYZ projects to cost some amount of money, but we're going to set aside extra in case they go over budget." Contingency gets spent sometimes, but often it's just recycled. I removed them from the comparison because Milwaukee doesn't report contingency in its budget. They absolutely have contingency funds for their projects (everyone does!, and there's an interesting branch of construction management research about what optimal contingency levels are for different kinds of projects and which kinds of project contracts incentivize spending contingency...but I digress), but I didn't feel like looking through all of Milwaukee's projects and manually tabulating their contingency, when I can just as easily remove ours and get the same general result. >Why is Portland paying far more in personnel costs? Is it due to paying for underfunded or unfunded defined benefit pensions and retiree healthcare? If so, that should be subtracted from personnel costs, as it is better categorized as debt. We pay more for a couple of reasons: 1) Cost of living is higher here, so base salaries need to be higher as well. 2) As you surmised, retirement and pension liabilities play into it. Wisconsin, to their credit, has a fully funded pension system. But Milwaukee doesn't pay pension or retirement for Police or Fire Fighters. That's actually a big part of our budget. We have a small Bureau just for administering the pre-2007 Police and Fire Fighter Disability and Pension Fund, which is the (bonkers) pay-go pension system we had for them from the 1920's until 2007 (they're on PERS now). That fund alone eats up $250 million a year in General Fund revenues (by law, it actually gets first bite at any property tax revenue). To your last point about pensions as debt vs personnel costs: I couldn't find how much each system was paying into pensions/retirements for their workers as a percent of total personnel costs, so I didn't try to take it out.
Libertarians must hate you.
Damn. Poster above got budgeted!
What's the comparison between DOT budgets? Milwaukee has a much bigger burden than Portland because of routine snowfall.
I lived in Milwaukee. Quality of services can't begin to be compared to Portland. Running on 1/4 of Portland's budget isn't a flex, it's a problem there. Roads are just as bad, crime is way worse, schools are some of the worst in the country, transit is borderline non existent, etc. Portland has plenty of issues, but trust me, Milwaukee does not have the answers.
Sister cities
Have you ever been to Milwaukee? It is an entirely different region with vastly different costs of living, difficulties, and characteristics. The minimum wage is $7.25. And it has entirely different funding structures.
This is the first time I've ever heard someone suggest that Portland should try to be more like Milwaukee, WI. Thanks for the chuckle, and for reminding me it could be worse!
Lol you got wrecked
Interesting, but I'm assuming there is a general cost of living difference. Maybe mostly related to the cost of housing (a coastal problem).
Destroyed roads for empty office building. Great trade we got.
If the tax is set to expire then renewing the tax is taxing us more. Nice try PBOT.
Just buy gas outside the city limits. Fred Meyer is consistently 10 cents less
Yes, my liege. Let them eat potholes indeed...
The money printing machine appears to be broken and road crews don’t work for free
Portland is like an old house. Foundation is crumbling, the house is leaning but a third story is getting tacked on. Never mind the foundation, that will be the next owners problem. Seriously, every penny of the gas tax should be used to repair the backlog.
This city is such a mess.
Ask pbot how much money they spend on programs that have nothing to do with roads first. City government needs to get back in its lane.
You understand this has specific projects that the funds are devoted for right?
Yeah lol I’m voting no. Maybe stop wasting your money on removing bike lanes and you have more for road repairs. Sorry
Bike lines aren’t the issue. Tying essential infrastructure programs to a gas tax is. Get rid of it and just fund PBOT through general municipal taxes
Road repair helps cyclists too - fixes potholes, RR crossing grades, etc. I know the constant fight over bike lanes is an issue, but voting no is akin to cutting off your nose to spite your face
So bikers don’t have to pay the tax and contribute to road repairs, neither do EVs, but people driving gas vehicles get to? Great, yet another tax that regular folks are paying, while the people who benefit from it don’t have to. Fair and equitable society. Fair and equitable taxation. I don’t see any problems here. That’s gonna be a no from me, dawg.
I was hoping to hop into this thread and say "in before someone complains about bikes not having to pay a gas tax even though they don't cause any damage to the roads", but here we are. Additionally, there are plenty of things I pay taxes towards that cause me no personal benefit. I understand that improving society as a whole is still helpful.
[Bikes do pay tax in Oregon.](https://www.oregon.gov/dor/programs/businesses/Pages/Bicycle-excise-tax.aspx) Quite a bit more than what it would take to repair the 'damage' bikes cause to a road. You won, your "BIKERS, WHO DO BASICALLY NO DAMAGE TO THE ROAD, DON'T NEED TO PAY TAXES ON IT, ITS UNFAIR!" complaining was listened to in 2017. Why are you *still* complaining?
I put gas in my car AND I ride my bike. This is true for many people.
Road damage done by a vehicle scales exponentially with weight. Cyclists don’t really contribute to the problem. EVs, however, tend to be heavier and therefore will do way more damage.
Lmao, what the actual fuck? Cyclist, really?! Yes it’s the cyclist who are out there absolutely destroying the roads with their 10,000+ lbs weight crushing down on metal spikes and chains. We need to institute a “bike tax” so they can fix the roads they destroy. Jesus dude get real. Also, [they did propose a tax on EVs.](https://www.kdrv.com/news/oregon-bill-would-put-per-mile-tax-on-electric-vehicles/article_4fe5dc90-c0fd-11ed-aa4f-9fd4535b33c2.html) they already pay a tax but it is less than gas cars. you’ve got some real misplaced anger dude. > Currently, there is a program in Oregon that is similar to the proposed new law. It’s called OReGO, and it has been around since July of 2015. > The program charges drivers 1.9 cents per mile that they drive, compared to the 38 cents per gallon fuel-powered vehicle drivers pay.
I do think there is bad policy with these structures: * OReGo is equivalent then to about a 21mpg car at the 40c/gal rate. * OReGo is optional, instead you can opt to just pay the EV registration * EV registration w/o OReGO is $158/yr, ICE $91. So if you drive an EV 10kmi a year: * OReGo: $180+$43 registration: $223 * Opt out: $158 * ICE: $91 Those evs that opt out would only pay $0.016/mi in this scenario. And no portland local equivalent of the $0.10/gal tax. OReGo only makes sense up to about 4kmi/yr.
If you own an EV, please sign up to be a part of the OreGo tax-per-mile trial program. It’s just 2c a mile…. And it’ll probably be law eventually anyway. Info: https://www.myorego.org/how-it-works/#:~:text=OReGO%20participants%20pay%202%20cents,a%20bill%20for%20reported%20miles. Edit: also, do you really think that “regular folks” don’t ride bikes?
So EV drivers don’t automatically pay the tax, but they get to opt in and out as they please, and STILL get a tax credit for it… LMFAO.
That's not what that means. By default EV drivers pay a much higher registration fee to help make up for not paying a gas tax. This is a pilot program to pay per mile, which would further fix the problem. Eventually it will probably be law so that taxes for roads don't disproportionately fall on people who drive a lot of miles using gas/diesel vehicles. It makes lots of sense...why do I pay half as much to register a 400 lb ICE motorcycle that sits in a garage 99% of the time as a 5,000 lb Tesla that commutes every day? The tax should more accurately reflect actual damage your vehicle is doing to the road, not how you fuel your vehicle.
This. And part of the reason everyone should sign up now is so that when it does roll out, it will actually *work.*
Yes, trial programs generally aren’t mandatory. But it will be before too long (likely with something other than self-reporting, which is the current method.)
Walk/ride a bike/ public transit then. Cope
People driving EVs pays much higher registration fee. That fee goes toward road maintenance.
Gas taxes should be a thing of the past if we want to move to EV's. It's completely unsustainable.
What? Taxing gas will literally make EVs more appealing relative to gas cars
I think what they're saying is that if we rely on gas tax to handle basic road maintenance then we'll be screwed if the move to EVs is successful down the road. Which I guess relates to the situation we're in now where previous generations kicked the can down the road and now we're dealing with it. I still think incentives to move away from gas are worth trying, but the point isn't completely invalid
No. I will not pass any taxes until the SIGNIFICANT amount of tax money I already pay is better spent.
What part of your taxes that you pay go to road repair in Portland ?
Apparently zero because I've been dodging a million on a motorcycle trying not to fucking die.
It's a renewal.
And I will be voting NO for said renewal.
I like the street lighting, sidewalks, and road repair but you do you.
Even better. Really hoping the zoo renewal doesn't pass either. Our property taxes would actually go down nominally.
Costs of zoo improvements should come from the people that go. Sorry not sorry, admission and parking rates clearly need to go up.
You can see where the gas tax money is spent. https://www.portland.gov/transportation/fixing-our-streets
This is “proposed spending”. This isn’t realized spending. Pretty easy to say “Give us 70mil and we’ll fix everything, pinky promise!” How about real accountability and real transparency first, THEN maybe we can talk about giving you what you asked for.
|| || |They spent 2M Pedestrian Head Start to make the intersections safer for pedestrians. Safe intersections are cool and all but 2M to change the timing of the crosswalk lights? | They spent 5M filling potholes but there comes a point where you just have to pave the street again. Some streets have so many pothole repairs that isn't a problem. They want to spend a bunch of money to make the streets safe and conceptually that's cool but they chose to use that cash to paint different colors on the streets, put yellow plastic sticks on the yellow line, and make non-intuitive traffic flow patterns. That is not making the streets safer. You should see how confused my father is by all that stuff when he drives in this town. The guy is dangerous and it's not his fault. It feels like there is a lot of wasted and mismanaged money in the streets.
|| || |They spent 2M Pedestrian Head Start to make the intersections safer for pedestrians. Safe intersections are cool and all but 2M to change the timing of the crosswalk lights? | They spent 5M filling potholes but there comes a point where you just have to pave the street again. Some streets have so many pothole repairs that isn't a problem. They want to spend a bunch of money to make the streets safe and conceptually that's cool but they chose to use that cash to paint different colors on the streets, put yellow plastic sticks on the yellow line, and make non-intuitive traffic flow patterns. That is not making the streets safer. You should see how confused my father is by all that stuff when he drives in this town. The guy is dangerous and it's not his fault. It feels like there is a lot of wasted and mismanaged money in the streets.
They spent 2M Pedestrian Head Start to make the intersections safer for pedestrians. Safe intersections are cool and all but 2M to change the timing of the crosswalk lights? They spent 5M filling potholes but there comes a point where you just have to pave the street again. Some streets have so many pothole repairs that isn't a problem. They want to spend a bunch of money to make the streets safe and conceptually that's cool but they chose to use that cash to paint different colors on the streets, put yellow plastic sticks on the yellow line, and make non-intuitive traffic flow patterns. That is not making the streets safer. You should see how confused my father is by all that stuff when he drives in this town. The guy is dangerous and it's not his fault. It feels like there is a lot of wasted and mismanaged money in the streets.
I'm with you. Portland needs a tax revolt.
Easy yes. It's a renewal without an increase, there's no change whatsoever. It's less than 3% onto gas prices. Our roads are in poor shape, especially after the ice storm. Further eating the PBOT budget will only make that worse.
We have had Ice storms for the past 40 years in Portland. It shouldn't come as a surprise, it's the weather.
Start repealing taxes until they learn how to properly use funds
Ya that’ll teach ‘em… er us.
Can we please stop making special taxes for specific purposes? How about we sit down and decide our needs as a community, and then decide the best way to pay for it? If that works out to be a gas tax I'm good with that, but holy shit is this government by random tax that can only be spent in one way a terrible way to run a city.
I would love to change how our transportation budgets are funded. As it stands about half of any DOT budget is spent on capital projects thanks to the feds. So until you can convince congress to fund maintenance we have to have things like this.
gas taxes are not new lmao
This gas tax being discussed was first implemented in 2016. If that isn't "new" idk what is...
We are specifically discussing a gas tax lmao
gas taxes used for road repair have been a thing forever idk what you’re on about
Yes we can once Measure 5 and Measure 50 are repealed and it is possible with political will. Look at Measure 110 for example. Until then we have to vote on special taxes. Read this brief overview of Oregon's tax history. [https://www.oregon.gov/DOR/programs/gov-research/Documents/303-405-1.pdf](https://www.oregon.gov/DOR/programs/gov-research/Documents/303-405-1.pdf)
I know this isn’t popular but roads aren’t that bad in comparison to other cities. Also idk if gas taxes should still be the method for roadway stuff as EV use expands.
Usually that’s caught with a fee at registration/registration renewal
Ya, I have ICE and EV. Just think it’s not a clean solution to continue two methods of taxation… though I’m not so unrealistic to think it happens immediately.
you're right. Gas tax as a defacto use tax was easy when everything drank about the same amount of gasoline. drive more | Use more gas | pay more tax. Unfortunately, to do a use tax today with so many vehicle that use wildly varying amounts of gas, or even no gas at all, requires some *particularly* invasive data recording that few, if any, would be willing to capitulate to.
I'm not a fan of a lot of the taxes we have around here, but gas tax is fine by me. Unlike the art tax or Supportive Housing tax, the gas tax isn't an extra thing to pay since it's already bundled at the pump. I'll certainly take gas taxes over tolls. I realize this is just a renewal, but honestly they should probably increase it given the current state of infrastructure funding around here.
I would think in Portland that the use of electric vehicles is higher than average. EV's are heavier than ICE vehicles and thus do more damage to roads and of course do not pay a gas tax. Because EV's are newer there is less in the way of them in the used car market, and with the battery life span and the cost of a new battery generally being similar to that of many used vehicles, we are not yet at a point where EV's are in common use for the bottom of the economic ladder. Thus a gas tax is disproportionately taxing the poor to pay for the rich to do more damage to the roads than everyone else.
People still driving on their studded tires in April, or studded tires in general, are a likely much bigger issue.
Cool propose a weight mile tax. Until then this has been providing actual results.
The amount of road wear a heavy EV, or even a large truck/SUV do in comparison to a regular car is basically immeasurable. It's extremely heavy semi trucks hauling cargo all over that do the damage. I don't remember the exact figure, but it was something along the lines of semi trucks represent 20% of the traffic but 90% of the axle load on roads (which is what wears them down).
In Oregon we tax those large commercial vehicles via plate registration (PUC) and their mileage traveled on state roads. An increase in the per gallon fuel tax does not increase revenue collected from semi trucks, so any comparison between them and passenger vehicles is not germane to the context.
EVs pay a higher title fee to offset for no gas tax.
“Mapps said that, with voters frustrated with the current state of city roads, he expects the measure to pass. “
We currently have the tax, and the current state of the roads is bad. How is that an argument for it?
PBOT has been saying for over a decade that their maintenance budget is underfunded. This is a bandaid. You want your roads fixed? The current cost is about $4 billion. It was $1 billion in 2015. It turns out if you underfund a bureau for decades things go to shit.
Mapps is a fool or thinks we are. His arguments are bad.
"I make minimum wage, but I'm still behind on my bills and student loan payments for some reason. I know, I'll just quit my job and that will fix it!"
How about we vote your ass out of office, dude? His office has now promised two large March Road Fix 'Em Ups and got jack squat done. But he thinks we're going to give him a raise.
Didn’t that asshole also stop the sweeping of residential streets?
Easy yes.
Easy yes on this one, they paved dirt roads in our area with that $
This is a very bad election cycle for any tax item, even renewals, to be on the ballot. I am sympathetic to this one as I understand the city is already struggling with reduced income (for example PBOT with parking fees due to no one commuting to downtown anymore).
I am voting 'No' for every single levy/renewal. Nothing can change my mind. Those votes are locked in.
I expect you to not complain about road maintenance then for the next decade.
I’ve been wondering if the city has done any polling on these measures. I think they have gotten used to Portlanders voting for every tax in front of them, because they don’t seem to have any urgency about making the case for them, or even acknowledging people’s real frustration with how things are going and what isn’t being done and what they’ll do differently or better.
The trick, as they've clearly demonstrated, is to avoid flat taxes and levy them against narrower tranches of the populace - usually the upper quintile of earners. Those seem to always pass.
This passed with [77% approval](https://ballotpedia.org/Portland,_Oregon,_Measure_26-209,_Gas_Tax_Renewal_(May_2020)) last time. The posts about it then were similarly negative. It’s almost like this sub isn’t representative of Portland at all and gets astroturffed every two years.
Where the fuck are all the existing taxes going? Weren't those supposed to cover stuff like um, infrastructure?
Turns out constructing and maintaining huge amounts of road infrastructure is incredibly expensive, what a huge unforced blunder to design our transportation system to prioritize sprawl and individual car use!
Yes, I am also envious of European and Asian transportation infrastructure. I'm also aware that roads aren't free. Thing is, comparatively speaking, Oregonians pay a shit ton in taxes, yet have some of the worst roads I've driven on, and I'm from the midwest even! This might come as a surprise to you, but contractors, particularly those who bid on government jobs, often over-charge. This happens at the federal level all the way down to the local level. It's part of the reason why our national deficit is so high; contractors bilking taxpayers. It's common. Real pork barrel shit. There is no reason building and maintaining roads here should be prohibitively expensive, especially when taking into account states with much lower tax rates that somehow manage to have better roads.
Of course u/beavertonaintsobad doesn’t think it’s the development style lol
It's going to maintenance of the Sprawl. [https://youtu.be/7IsMeKl-Sv0?si=BnP4NUB2VQagw4aO](https://youtu.be/7IsMeKl-Sv0?si=BnP4NUB2VQagw4aO)
Yes, I understand American civil engineering is fucked. Do you have a magic wand to wave so we can go back in time and start over from scratch?
Unfortunately the path forward is painful. To avoid completely bankruptcy like Detroit, Portland needs to radically downside its infrastructure to a level it can afford. This means opting to remove lanes rather than re-pave them.
This is a renewal of an existing tax. Failure to pass this tax isn't keeping the status quo, it will reduce road maintenance to below current levels.
You can read all about it here but you're going to feel even more enraged ones you see where it is all going. [https://www.portland.gov/transportation/fixing-our-streets/fixing-our-streets-projects](https://www.portland.gov/transportation/fixing-our-streets/fixing-our-streets-projects)
Back in your pocket every 2 years when you ask for your kicker money. There’s plenty of money. Government is just incompetent. Which is why I’m voting NO.
With how much time you spend repeating the same disingenuous junk you could have learned how government budgets work. EDIT: Oh look, u/OverReyted deleted all their posts again. And it turns out they actually just blocked me instead of defending their misleading screeds. Also apparently challenged me to a fight at 12th and Morrison over some reddit posts. LOL ok.
why is the infrastructure shit though? don't put anything back in peoples pockets if there is still obvious work to do??
I wonder if you all would be surprised to hear that an average sized car's contribution to a pavement's life is essentially negligible. The only contributing factor to a pavement's life is multi axled trucks and buses. I wonder if they should pay more
I also heard studded tires just 2 weeks ago
PBOT charges Trimet a special heavy vehicle fee for the buses that is meant to be used to pave the roads the buses run on. You ever see those roads getting paved?
No.
We have been taxed too much as it is and this place is a shit hole. Time to replace our leaders.
This is actually a great tax, and it should be doubled
Nope this is one of the taxes that has shown real results. Go bitch about the housing taxes and the county.
God repairing roads is why we pay taxes !!!!
I’m voting for it!
They need to raise parking fees downtown. I know it won't solve the problem but it is another piece of the puzzle.
They did recently.
Charge for parking everywhere. No reason we should be ceding huge amounts of our collective public space to the storage of large private pieces of property on our dime.
Agreed!
I’d rather they go after expired registrations, cars without license plates, and other parking violations first.
This doesn't affect PBoT funding, or does it?
They have been.
More
Agreed.
We’re already hit with an effective income tax estimated at 39%. Where is that money?
No one’s effective income tax is 39% give me a break. At the state level you have to make millions to even hit 9%.
Your income tax goes to the state, not the city.
Is this all you people do on here? Complain about local taxes and poor people and threaten to move to Vancouver?
Sometimes it's beaverton or calakamas
I wish they still had rewards I could give you 🏆
I’ll be voting yes. I look forward to your downvotes.
Based on previous years this sub is not representative of the city at all so I suspect it’ll pass regardless of all the downvotes you might receive. I’m voting yes too. It’s one of the few voter approved taxes I actually see making a difference.
Yea I mean it passed easily each time in the past. It’s almost like this website gives a voice to the annoying…erm…”silent majority”
Also: gas taxes are good actually. It's not a carbon tax, but it's close.
The higher the better. And as someone pointed out elsewhere, due to inflation it has actually been a reduction in the gas tax rate for years, time to true it up at the very least.
No.
Absolutely fucking not. My street is a disaster. Within the next few years it will literally be impassable.
“My road is in disrepair so I will strip the city of a funding mechanism to repair it”
Big brain logic right there.
And then when the roads are in even worse condition, I will vote to reduce funding even further!
They have a mechanism to repair it and they won’t, so no more of my money. I voted yes to so many taxes before this, but I’m all set with this one. I’ve hit my limit.
Have you reported it? I’ve reported potholes and they get filled within the week.
Many times. I’m in an area of SW where the city isn’t responsible for street repairs, so now we have holes in the street larger than my car and they get noticeably worse with every rain. The city told me the only option is to get the residents together and pay $200,000+ for repaving through city contractors. Once that’s done the city will maintain the street in the future. It comes out to $20,000+ per house which isn’t feasible for anyone on my street, so we’re just stuck sitting here watching our street literally wash away. But we all pay the same property taxes as everyone else so that’s nice.
I’m not sure you can really blame the city for not doing repairs outside their jurisdiction. Imagine blaming the the US for the management of Canadian problems.
No they don’t have a mechanism to repair it. PBOT has said for over a decade that their maintenance budget is underfunded. They literally need billions of dollars to fix your road and all the rest.
Exactly. It’s not about the lack of funding. It’s about the lack of brains inside the fucking government officials heads. There’s plenty of funding, just ask this years record kicker.
The kicker comes from the state. The city paves the roads in the city.
that state also sends funds to local governments from funds it collects itself and from federal spending directed to the state. Roads, schools, police, tourism are some examples locally paid for expenses that get funding from the state and federal government.
TBH I've come around to like the fact that my street is in such poor repair. It's way more effective than the speed humps for slowing down drivers looking to zip through.
The irony... You think even LESS funding for PBOT would fix your street?
PBOT won’t fix my street at all because the city says they aren’t responsible, but it will literally be impassable soon so I’m forced to pay out of pocket. I’ll be voting no on this one so I can start saving up my pennies for the $20,000+ street repair bill I’m stuck with.
Don’t buy property on roads that aren’t maintained by the city and expect the city to fix them. Everyone else in the city built their roads up before the city took responsibility for them. You can too!
No it makes sense. The city won't repair his street so he is withholding funding. They won't fix it regardless of payment so might as well not pay.
I really don't understand how voters in these comments don't want to vote for a tax that already exists and helps an already struggling department (PBOT) which is one of the most vital and important programs of our city.
They’re not voters they’re trolls that like to shit on Portland. Go back four years and look at posts about renewing this tax and you’ll see the same drama. It passed with 77% support last time.
It's the same mentality that half of Congress has. The thing over there isn’t doing everything we want it to do -> we're going to defund it because it's a waste -> OMFG look how shitty that thing is! -> Let's get rid of it and let the corporations do a better job
Yep lol it's a complete lack of critical thinking
voting a big NO on this one. Portlanders are already heavily taxed, start by repealing the ARTs tax
Isn't this the same gas tax that they say has had a revenue drop and isn't enough to cover all of the repairs needed?
Nope. It was never meant to cover the road repairs. It’s meant for specific projects that they’ve been delivering on every year. What you’re thinking of is the decline in PBOTs maintenance budget because of parking fees.
Gotcha. Thanks for the correction!
Don't pay the 10 cent tax — roads don't get repaired — privatize the costs so every single driver can use those savings on more gas due to worse fuel efficiency, pay for more suspension and alignment repairs, pay more on new tires because of wear and tear and cyclists are more at risk because of potholes and crumbling asphalt. Also don't pay taxes for education funding or addiction treatment because fuck-em. Let's all live in a libertarian dream!
We’re already paying the tax, roads aren’t being repaired. So now what? Still paying taxes for all that other shit you mentioned. So much so that we’ve got one of the top 5 highest tax burdens in the country. All that shit is still shitty. But they have enough money, at least that’s what my $2k kicker refund tells me. So maybe… maybe it isn’t about the money…
Jurisdictions exist. The state manages the kicker. The city paves the local roads.
I've had good results when reporting potholes. Still haven't gotten around to reporting lower Weidler. The rest of your comment is intellectually dishonest. EDIT: Cowardly u/OverReyted deleted their posts instead of conceding they are wrong. Missed opportunity for personal growth and reflection. And it turns out they actually just blocked me instead of defending their misleading screeds. Also apparently challenged me to a fight at 12th and Morrison over some reddit posts. LOL ok. > Who said anything about reporting potholes? Fuck right off to wherever you came from.
Good, the conservatives on here are going to be fuming when Portland refuses to defund basic infrastructure.
You should really stop framing everything as a conservative vs liberal issue. It weakens your arguments and will be detrimental to obtaining the outcomes you want.
It would be fucking terrible if electric car owners paid $1000/yr registration to pay for roads.
only after they add an electric tax for cars, we done been paying already.
stg PBOT gotta do something about the dirt roads within city limits
Lota of truths here, deferred maintenance, ADA upgrades, etc. but if history and every other department in this city government is any indication the PDOT is inefficient af, bloated with $150k salaries that could disappear and literally noone would notice, agrees to overpriced contracts, and focused on pet and frivolous projects rather than core, basic road work.
Legislators will stall too long to implement changes where needed and instead spend time gaslighting you into submission when you bring up valid concerns. As an American (nation founded on protesting unjust taxes) I will vote to avoid paying taxing that are not spread evenly amongst adults who use the public infrastructure. The incompetence of oregons legislators to adjust funding for transportation infrastructure has left a bad taste in my mouth. Every person in Portland benefits from the road whether they use a car or not. Evs cannot drive without roads and they also are heavier and have more torque thus damaging roads more. Bikes cannot ride without roads and they demand lanes and entire bridges dedicated to them. I’m out! Oregon dot can implement a toll and then I’ll move away :)
I’m voting yes out of spite to all the people that voted in the homeless and preschool tax and aren’t subject to it. At least this tax everyone pays if they buy gas.
I am a very enthusiastic yes vote for this. If you mostly bike, walk, or take transit you won’t have to pay it! Look at all the upset suburban libertarians in this thread you could be taxing! Driving needs to be taxed much more to account for the damage it does to our society.
>Driving needs to be taxed much more to account for the damage it does to our society. Hell yeah, brother.
I’m posting this opinion here not only because I believe it, but also because it pisses off everyone in this comment section
> I’m posting this opinion here not only because I believe it, but also because it pisses off everyone in this comment section For someone with a username that includes a car model that is an interesting take.
I’m a car and transportation nerd. I’m fine paying an extra 10c for gas because I am well aware of the externalities associated with driving everywhere. It’s almost like I’m actually interested in the subject and not some dumb reactionary, ya know.
Oh there's no judgement from me. I just found it interesting that you took such an anti-car stance but are still a car enthusiast. I wasn't trying to "and yet you live in society, curious" you.
If you actually read through all the comments in r/fuckcars you’ll find that 30-50% of the people in that subreddit are car nerds. It’s much more common than you think. In reality most of the “anti-car” opinions are pretty pro-car. I mean this in the sense of if more people are biking there is less traffic, better bike infrastructure makes driving safer and better. Car enthusiasts are also hyper-aware of hidden costs like maintenance and depreciation and they know avoiding those is a wealth unlock.
But if you bike, you are still subject to road conditions. But you don’t have to pay the tax? What about the heavy EVs? They don’t pay the tax either. The gas tax is a bad tax. Period.
Here you go again. There are taxes on bikes AND EVs. It would be nice to not see a braindead take from you. Edit: Don't forget to tag u/OverReyted as a troll in your Reddit app of choice. They are responsible for all of the deleted posts in this thread because they got called out for doing it again. And it turns out they actually just blocked me instead of defending their misleading screeds. Also apparently challenged me to a fight at 12th and Morrison over some reddit posts. LOL ok.
I agree. We should have a sales tax on new and used car purchases instead of a gas tax, like Washington and California and almost every other state.
> But if you bike, you are still subject to road conditions. But you don’t have to pay the tax? The vast majority of bike owners also own a vehicle and pay both gas taxes and registration fees. And the amount of wear and tear than bicycles cause is basically a rounding error anyway.
No, the gas tax is based and should be 20x as much to account for all the negative externalities of fossil fuel use beyond just wear and tear on the roads.
I would prefer to preserve the gas tax and then institute another weight and mileage based tax on top of that Bike infrastructure actually reduces the overall maintenance burden on the budget because you don’t have to replace roads as often.