Salem Political Snark

Salem City Council makes mobile crisis unit a low priority

If the efforts of city councilor Vanessa Nordyke to make a mobile crisis unit a reality in Salem ever come to fruition, she deserves a Perseverance Prize.

Because while the general public really likes the idea of having people other than police officers respond to mental health and other calls that don't require an officer, the Salem Police Department, City Manager, and her fellow city councilors haven't been nearly as enthusiastic. 

Last Monday the City Council dealt the mobile crisis unit proposal another setback when Nordyke's motion to seek $2 million in state funding for a multi-year pilot project failed to pass on a 4-4 vote. (Councilor Phillips was absent, leaving eight of the nine councilors present.)

As reported by the Salem Reporter, those supporting the motion were Nordyke, Jackie Leung, Jose Gonzalez, and Linda Nishioka. Opponents of the motion were Chris Hoy, Micki Varney, Virginia Stapleton and Mayor Chuck Bennett.

It's disappointing that Nordyke didn't have the support of progressives Hoy, Varney, and Stapleton. This was an opportunity for them to take a concrete step toward funding a mobile crisis unit. Instead, only a lackluster motion passed.

Salem city councilors on Monday unanimously voted to seek funding sources for a mobile crisis response team that could respond to some 911 calls instead of police.

But councilors narrowly voted against putting funding for such a project in the city’s list of priorities for the 2023 legislative session.

Only $700,000 is needed to fund a mobile crisis unit for a year. The 2022-23 budget for the Salem Police Department is $54,491,000. So $700,000 is a mere 1.3% of the police department budget. In Eugene, use of the widely acclaimed CAHOOTS mobile crisis response team answered 17% of the Eugene Police Department's call volume.

As I noted in "Police budget should be cut to pay for crisis response team," the CAHOOTS program more than pays for itself.

In 2017, the most recent year shown on the White Bird Clinic web page, CAHOOTS teams answered 17% of the Eugene Police Department's call volume. Yes, 17%. 

That's a big savings, given the much lower cost of CAHOOTS staff compared to police officers. This chart shows that in 2017 CAHOOTS diversions saved the Eugene Police Department $12 million, with the department budget being $51.3 million in that year.

...Eugene is about the same size as Salem. The CAHOOTS budget is about $2.1 million a year.

So it sure seems like one way to pay for a CAHOOTS-style crisis response team here would be to take a couple of million dollars from the Salem Police Department budget. 

Even if the initial savings from a Salem crisis response team was only 1/6 of the savings Eugene had in 2017, a Salem CAHOOTS costing $2 million a year would pay for itself.

Thus the search for funding sources to pay for a mobile crisis response team in Salem should start close to home: in the police department budget. It's extremely likely that somewhere in the $54,491,000 budget there's at least $700,000 to get a one-year pilot project underway. 

Instead, it looks like city officials are going to embark on a quest for grants, donations, and the like. Better than nothing, but way worse than funding a mobile crisis unit out of savings from 911 calls that police officers don't have to respond to.

Why isn't this being done?

Probably because Police Chief Womack wants to continue expanding the department, and a mobile crisis unit threatens his bureaucratic fiefdom. Sadly, half of the City Council is fine with this, leaving people in Salem unable to benefit from having trained mental health workers respond to many 911 calls. 

Councilor Nordyke shared her take on the City Council's action in a Facebook post.

COUNCIL VOTES FOR MY MOTION TO RESEARCH FUNDING SOURCES FOR MOBILE CRISIS UNIT; BUT IN A CLOSE VOTE, COUNCIL VOTES AGAINST MY MOTION TO ASK LEGISLATURE FOR FUNDING

The people of Salem have demanded that the City take action on our homelessness crisis. Mobile crisis units (MCUs) are a crucial part of the solution, by connecting persons experiencing homelessness with services and shelter, and much more. Far too many people are suffering who would benefit from this service.

 

FIRST, THE GOOD NEWS:

On September 26, Council unanimously supported my motion to direct city staff to identify funding sources for a mobile crisis unit (MCU). This vote was not surprising, given the outpouring of support from business owners, mental health professionals, homeless advocates, and concerned citizens urging City Council to pass the motion.

 

AND NOW, THE BAD NEWS:

By a razor-thin margin, City Council voted against adding funding for the MCU to our list of legislative funding priorities. Here’s what happened.

 

Every year, city staff recommend millions of dollars in funding priorities to request from the Oregon State Legislature. Salem City Council reviews the city staff’s recommendations and votes on which funding priorities to take to the legislature.

 

For the 2023 legislative session, city staff recommended funding for an MCU plus several other legislative funding priorities. Unfortunately, their recommendation did not make the final list of $34.1 million dollars in legislative funding priorities.

 

Now, several Councilors (myself included) are concerned about finding the funds to start an MCU. The city staff report states that the annual cost of an MCU is $700,000 per year. That’s less than 0.001% of Salem’s $700 million-plus annual budget. City staff have forecasted a budget deficit for fiscal year 2024. That deficit, however, assumes no major changes in revenue or expenditures.

 

So, I presented a solution to address our budgetary concerns and get the MCU started. I made a motion to add MCU funding ($2 million total, which would cover over two years of running the MCU) to the list of legislative funding priorities.

 

If the legislature approves this funding request in 2023, we could run the MCU for over two years without costing the city a dime.

 

Salem City Councilors Jackie Leung, Jose Gonzalez and Linda Nishioka voted in favor of my motion. Please join me in thanking Salem City Councilors Jackie Leung, Jose Gonzalez and Linda Nishioka for their support!

 

But we were one vote shy of victory. The Council was tied, and under Council rules, a tie means the motion fails. Because of this vote, the city will have to look elsewhere to fund the MCU.

 

There are, of course, no guarantees the legislature would have granted the request even if my motion passed. But there’s one thing we do know: the legislature of 2023 will look very different from the legislature of 2022. Several incumbents are leaving. Several legislative races are too close to call. Nobody has a crystal ball.

 

Refusing to ask the legislature for money is a missed opportunity. If Salem City Council does not advocate for Salem, then who will?

 

Thank you for reading, and for your support.

 

You can bet that I will continue to fight for our most vulnerable neighbors. I must speak up for those who have no voice.

 

Follow me for future advocacy opportunities!

 

For more information about the City Council meeting, watch the Council meeting here: https://youtu.be/8__GMwMNE2Q?t=945

 

Coverage in Salem Reporter: https://www.salemreporter.com/.../salem-city-council-may.../

Wasteful use of fire trucks called out by 350 Salem OR

Sending a giant fire engine out to respond to a medical emergency is like having an Amazon package delivered by a semi-trailer truck. In each case, almost always there's no need for such vehicle overkill. 

But even though just 2% of calls to the Salem Fire Department involved fires, the department is asking for $26 million in the $300 million bond levy on the November ballot to replace worn-out fire trucks. 

The reason, pretty obviously, is that those trucks are being used inappropriately. If a right-sized vehicle was used for medical emergencies, fire trucks would be used for their intended purpose: basically, fighting fires.

350 Salem Oregon is concerned about this. Below is a right-on message that was emailed to city officials on September 11 with the subject line, Council meeting 9/12/2022 re: Wasteful use of planned purchase of new fire equipment

I heartily agree that the Fire Chief needs to answer questions about the issues raised in the message so that voters can be assured that the $26 million earmarked for new fire trucks will be used wisely -- which likely means changes need to be made in how the Salem Fire Department handles medical calls.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To:       The Mayor, City Council, Climate Action Committee and City Manager

From:   350 Salem Oregon

             Phil Carver, Co-coordinator

For the Sept. 12, 2022 meetings of the City Council and Climate Action Committee
Public Comment on $26 million portion of Infrastructure Bond Levy
RE: Wasteful use of large fire equipment in planned purchase 

In response to our oral comment at the end of the August 22 Council meeting there seemed to be a recognition that there is a serious issue the Council should address to help passage of the Bond Levy. Many people have noted the wasteful use of very large fire trucks to respond to medical emergencies, sometimes arriving after the ambulance. Instead the City should have appropriate electric vehicles for such use at every fire station.  

The planned bond levy includes $26 million to replace fire trucks that have been worn out by this inappropriate use. The lack of willingness to address this issue threatens public support for the Bond Levy.

 

350 Salem has submitted a statement for the Marion County voters’ pamphlet for the November election supporting the Bond Levy.  We asked at the Aug. 22 meeting that the Council ask for a formal public response and discussion on this issue from the Fire Chief at the next Council meeting.  Yet there is no such item on the agenda for Sept. 12.

350 Salem brings the information below to the attention of the Climate Action Plan Committee and the Council related to this issue.

 

In 2018 the SFD developed a Salem Fire Department Strategic Plan 2018-2023. Included in the plan was this:

Objective 1-G

Responsibility:

Timeline: 2

Explore alternative non-emergency medical delivery systems.

Benmoussa, George

July 2019- July 2020

Critical Tasks:

• Investigate other organizations' alternative non-emergency medical delivery models.
• Identify which model(s) best serve the needs of the Salem community.
• Identify costs to implement recommended model(s).
• Research partnerships to fund the new delivery system(s).
• Propose implementation and funding requirements to Council and the budget process.

A few months ago 350 Salem made a public records request to ask for the results of this analysis which was supposed to be completed in July 2020. The response received was that this objective was not completed and that the SFD has no plans to complete it.

 

The response cited the City’s projected General Fund budget deficit in future years as the reason they are not going to pursue this objective. This makes absolutely no sense since successful “alternative non-emergency medical delivery systems” would presumably save money rather than cost more money. It would help resolve budget deficits.  

 

Even if the City decides immediately to buy appropriate vehicles with Bond Levy funds for the Fire Department’s response to medical emergencies, we urge the Council to have the Fire Dept. conduct and expand the study above to address both emergency and non-emergency medical problems.

 

It is not clear how often the Fire Dept. response is after or virtually simultaneous with the ambulance. There may be a way to have the ambulance be the only responder if the Fire Dept. response would be essentially simultaneous. Other systems, such as a completely adequate ambulance response, also should be studied.  

 

Summary:

There is no available discussion that would indicate it is reasonable to send huge fire trucks to respond to medical emergencies. The attached Fire Standards of Cover from around 2018 is 140 pages but has zero discussion of types of vehicles used for various purposes.  

 

The most recent data (attached) show 2 percent of responses were for fire emergencies, 73 percent were for medical emergencies and 23 percent were for other uses of vehicles. This indicates huge potential cost savings from not using large fire vehicles for medical emergencies.

 

These are very expensive vehicles to buy, operate and maintain. Much of the planned $26 million cost of the new fire vehicles and the added cost of maintenance and operation will be wasted compared to buying and using appropriate sized electric vehicles for such responses. 

 

At a minimum the Council should demand an explanation for this apparently wasteful practice by the Fire Chief. It is not clear why this discussion is not on the agenda for the Council meeting of Sept. 12. Private discussions of the issue with the Fire Chief do not address the public's concerns over wasting Bond Levy funds on using large vehicles for medical emergencies.

 

 

Download Salem Fire Department Standards of Cover (PDF file)

New plan for commercial air service at Salem airport sounds like old failed plans

Here we go again, the Chamber of Commerce and Travel Salem engaging in another round of fantasies about commercial air service returning to the Salem airport.

Salem's Angry Owl isn't impressed. Neither am I.

Having moved to Salem in 1977, back then there really were airlines flying out of the Salem airport to places people actually wanted to go. Can't remember exactly what they were, but I recall there were frequent flights to the San Francisco and Los Angeles areas, and probably other locations.

Now a Salem Reporter story paints a decidedly less rosy picture of where it might be possible to fly.

Avelo Airlines, a budget carrier based in Houston, Texas, was one of the airlines signing in support of the grant. Paskell said they’ve expressed interest in offering two passenger flights weekly to either Burbank, California — in the Los Angeles area —  or Las Vegas, then growing to offer flights to both destinations.

...In addition to Avelo, Aha!, another budget airline, has also expressed interest in serving Salem with two weekly flights to Reno.

Wow. I'm underwhelmed.

A possibility of two flights weekly to either Burbank or Las Vegas, plus two weekly flights to Reno. All that for a mere $4 million to $12 million in terminal renovations, money that the City of Salem doesn't have.

Like Lucy and the football, periodically there's another effort to have commercial air service return to Salem, which gets some people excited, then the whole scheme collapses like Charlie Brown falling on his butt when Lucy snatches the ball away as he's trying to kick it.

The B.S. already is starting to spew from backers of this new dumb idea. 

The Salem Reporter story quotes Angie Onyewuchi, CEO of Travel Salem, as claiming commercial air service will result in a carbon footprint reduction. That's absurd. Traveling by air is, mile for mile, the most damaging way to travel for the climate. We need to discourage air travel, not encourage it.

Bizarrely, Onyewuchi also says “This critical grant funding moves us closer to launching our first flights and provides a direct connection between Oregon’s spectacular wine country and the world.”

No, it doesn't.

Unless by "the world" she means Burbank, Las Vegas, and Reno, because those are the only direct connections planned from the Salem airport. I suppose with enough extra connections from those places you could get anywhere in the world.

Or you could simply drive to the Portland International Airport and do that much more easily.

Sadly, a majority of the Salem City Council appears to have bought into the hype surrounding this newest commercial air service scheme. When it fails, as it likely will, only Councilor Tom Andersen is going to come off looking wise.

Dissenting from his colleagues, Councilor Tom Andersen questioned the business sense of the effort, and expressed skepticism that the effort would reduce carbon emissions.

Climate Action Plan not getting the respect it deserves

Today was a really hot day in Salem. My car's thermometer said 99 degrees when I headed downtown at 4 pm. When I left at 6 pm, I had a reading of 107 degrees after my car sat on a sunny side of Court Street for a couple of hours.

We need to get used to many more hot days, since the effects of human-caused global warming are becoming more obvious with every passing year. 

To its credit, the City Council pushed for a Salem Climate Action Plan, which was accepted by the council in February of this year. Since, an implementation committee has been meeting to make recommended actions in the plan a reality. 

Unfortunately, the Climate Action Plan isn't being taken seriously enough by City of Salem staff and the City Council. This is deeply disappointing. I expected more, since progressives have a solid 7-2 majority on the council. 

The always-interesting Salem Breakfast on Bikes blogger wrote a terrific post on July 5, "Climate Action Plan Committee: Transportation and Passivity." He follows climate action goings-on much more closely than I do, so much so, his blog features a permanent reminder of the urgent need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. 

If you care about preserving our planet for human habitation, and want Salem to do its part in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, I urge you to read the Breakfast on Bikes blog post about how the $300 million bond measure to be voted on this November doesn't do nearly enough to meet the goals of the Climate Action Plan.

Here's some excerpts to whet your appetite for the entire post.

The approach to the bond - for the next decade, very nearly the period over which we are supposed to reduce our emissions by 50% in 2035, it must be stressed - does not adequately respond to our climate crisis and the need to reduce emissions from driving.

After all, the Climate Action Plan says to "complete Salem's sidewalk network." We should be doing as much expansion of sidewalk and bike lane as we possibly can, not deleting some sidewalk and bike lane to fund other sidewalk and bike lane. These kinds of projects need to be additive. It should be more, more, more, not "balance." Even when there are other funding sources available, "new grant sources," we should push for the maximum on these, not retreat to a false sense of balance.

...As we see with the sidewalk deletions, the bond isn't very well integrated into the Climate Action plan. There is, in fact, a weird theme of "alignment" and passivity in the prospective actions to discussed under agenda item 4, on transportation, at the Climate Action Plan Committee.

On the one hand, making sure the policy actions recommended by the climate plan aligns with other plans is a trivial element of mutual conformance. The multiple plans should be consistent and aligned.

But what is really happening, on the other hand, is that the Climate Plan concepts are being watered down in order to accommodate and align with the weakened concepts in Our Salem and other plans. This is a kind of passiveness and conformity, trying to fit in and not make waves.

And where there are stronger requirements, as seems likely with the Climate Friendly and Equitable Communities rulemaking at the State level, from outside our own process, our Climate Action Plan is going to follow, not lead. (See briefly from May on the CFEC here and here.)

Consistently the Climate Action Plan concepts are framed up as aligning with the demands and standards of other projects. In other words, the Climate Action Plan is wholly in a secondary and subordinate position, always following the lead of other plans, and never primary, never driving action in those other plans.

Generally we are doing the least amount possible, and the Climate Action Plan is just too accommodating. It's too passive.

Hopefully the new City Manager for the City of Salem, Keith Stahley, will be a much more forceful advocate for the Climate Action Plan than the previous manager, Steve Powers, was. Climate was one of Stahley's responsibilities as assistant city manager for the city of Olympia, Washington, where he last worked.

Salem City Council should ban fireworks

Not surprisingly, recently there's been a lot of discussion on Facebook about fireworks, almost all of it negative. Many want a ban on fireworks in Salem.

People find them annoying and dangerous. Pets shake with fear at the loud booms. Wildlife are stressed by the bright lights and scary noises.

Last Fourth of July I wrote "Fireworks should be shunned like cigarettes are." In researching that blog post about the bad side of fireworks, after some Googling I came up with the familiar problems: fires, trauma to pets, scaring wildlife.

I also learned something new. Fireworks are highly toxic. 

Fireworks create highly toxic gases and pollutants that poison the air, the water and the soil, making them toxic to birds, wildlife, pets, livestock — and people — but there are environmentally-friendly alternatives available.

For some strange reason, people around the world have decided that the best way to mark important holidays and events is to have a public fireworks show. We choose to celebrate the birth of a New Year, the freedom of our nation, the triumph of good over evil, by blowing things up.

Most of us are aware that fireworks are dangerous: we either know someone, or know of someone, who ended up in the hospital emergency room due to fireworks, but most people are completely unaware of the more insidious environmental damages and health impacts caused by fireworks.

Our current dog, Mooka, isn't bothered much by fireworks. Last night she barked several times at especially loud booms, even though usually she isn't much of a barker.

But we've had other dogs who were traumatized by them, as I wrote about in a 2013 post, "If you set off loud fireworks, you're terrifying dogs."

Here's a simple fact, lovers of loud fireworks: your enjoyment is being bought at the price of animal pain. Many dogs are terrified of fireworks. So also, I'm sure, are wild animals -- deer, birds, raccoons, etc.

On behalf of our dog, Zu Zu, I just want you to be aware of what you're doing when you set off loud fireworks. I can't inject a sense of compassion into your fireworks-loving brain, though I sure wish I could.

I just want to speak for the stressed-out dogs who can't write a blog post.

And even if Zu Zu could, (she's a pretty damn smart dog) for most of yesterday, July 4, she couldn't have, because she was busy trembling, shaking, anxiously running around the house, hiding in the indoor kennel-with-a-curtain I made for her.

There are lots of dogs like our dog, canines terrified by fireworks.

So I can virtually guarantee that if you live in a populated area, and you're setting off loud fireworks, you're causing severe distress to some dogs. Maybe many dogs.

Given how harmful fireworks are to people, animals, and the environment, why the heck does Salem still allow them? A Facebook post on the page where City Council issues are discussed makes a great case for the City Council banning fireworks. (Kaltwasser is a page administrator.)Nicely said, David Watson. I too am hopeful that the City Council will start a discussion about a citywide fireworks ban. It's definitely needed.

Salem Fire Department is woefully inefficient, fighting few fires

Probably you've noticed that even though structure fires are rare in Salem, huge fire trucks are still frequently seen racing around the city. What the heck are they doing, since they're not fighting fires?

They're doing what government bureaucracies almost always do. If your original reason for being no longer applies, then redefine your mission to avoid becoming irrelevant or having your budget reduced.

So now "fire" departments actually are wasteful ways of responding to medical calls, both emergencies and non-emergencies. Oregon's Phil Keisling wrote about this in his 2015 piece, Why we need to take the 'fire' out of 'fire department.'

It's must reading for those concerned about improving the efficiency of Salem's fire and police departments, which suck up the majority of general fund dollars. Here's how it starts out.

It's arguably the best known, least acknowledged and most inconvenient truth in local government: "Fire departments" -- in the precise meaning of that label -- no longer exist anywhere in America.

Thousands of official entities bear this or a similar moniker. But given what they and their employees actually do, "Emergency Medical, Incident Response and Every-Once-in-a-While-an-Actual-Fire Department" would be far more accurate.

In 1980, according to the National Fire Protection Association, the nation's 30,000 fire departments responded to 10.8 million emergency calls. About 3 million were classified as fires. By 2013, total calls had nearly tripled to 31.6 million, while fire calls had plummeted to 1.24 million, of which just 500,000 of were actual structure fires. For America's 1.14 million career and volunteer firefighters, that works out to an average of just one structure fire every other year.

The parallel with Salem's Police Department is obvious.

With crime rates dropping, most of what police do in Salem doesn't require a cop car or armed uniformed officer. Yet the City Council just authorized six additional police officers, even though solid evidence shows that a mobile crisis response team made up of civilians would provide better services for a high percentage of calls at a much lower cost.

Fellow citizen activist Jim Scheppke shared with me his research about a similar objective in the 2018-2023 strategic plan of the Salem Fire Department. 
Download Salem Fire Department Strategic Plan

Now, I'm not sure what non-emergency means here. Regardless, it's clear that this objective in the Fire Department's Strategic Plan, which was supposed to be completed by July 2020, two years ago, has to do with finding alternative ways to handle medical calls by the department.

Keisling talks about this in his piece.

In 2012, the city of Toronto, over the Fire Department’s objections, changed protocols to deploy ambulances (from a separate government unit) instead of EMT-staffed fire trucks for more than 50 types of medical emergencies. The next year, after city staff recommended a budget that would close four fire stations and cut 84 firefighting jobs--while adding 56 paramedics--firefighter-funded TV ads alleged that the cuts would "put lives at risk."

This isn't just a big-city problem. In 2013, a faculty-led research team for Portland State University's Center for Public Service (which I direct) analyzed two years of 911 calls for three small cities collectively contracting with a nearby city's fire/EMS department. Known medical calls comprised 75 percent of these incidents.

Our team identified a number of lower-cost operating alternatives, such as adding many more ambulances or specially-designed Rapid Response Vehicles (RRVs) to produce faster response times. We learned of one jurisdiction that had strategically purchased a three-bedroom house in a high 911-call generating area near a nursing home for an ambulance and its crew.

Given how strongly fire departments defend their bureaucratic turf, you're not going to be surprised to learn that the progress the Salem Fire Department has made on Objective 1-G above is essentially zero.

When Scheppke asked about progress, he got this response from the department.

Objective 1-G has not been completed and no final report documentation or recommendations have been created.  Some superficial investigation was done initially, however no reports or final recommendations were produced as a result.

But the Salem Fire Department was very successful at getting $26 million for new fire trucks and other equipment put into the $300 million community improvement bond measure to be voted on this November -- because their current trucks supposedly are worn out from all that driving around to non-fire medical calls.

When Scheppke followed up with a question about whether the Salem Fire Department ever intends to pursue alternative ways of handling medical calls, he was told:

The Department does not foresee this objective moving forward given the current budgetary climate.  The objective will be re-evaluated during the next planning cycle in 2024.

"Current budgetary climate" apparently means We're planning to get from the bond measure not only the $26 million for new equipment, but also $14 million for new fire stations, even though we rarely fight fires these days, so we've got no interest in identifying more efficient ways to run the department until we get voters to approve the $40 million that's based on our business-as-usual approach.

OK, but assuming the bond measure passes, city officials should ask some tough questions of the Salem Fire Department before allowing the department to open any additional fire stations or purchase new fire trucks.

Citizens need to know about alternatives to the current wasteful practice of sending fire trucks out on medical calls, and why the department hasn't embraced those alternatives. In other words, the Salem Fire Department should be forced to complete the objective above that was supposed to have been accomplished two years ago.

Better late than never, since probably a large chunk of the $40 million could be spent more wisely than doing the Business-As-Usual thing that the Salem Fire Department prefers, but is a disservice to taxpayers. 

City Council approves protected bike lane from Harritt Drive NW to 17th Street NE

It isn't everything that Salem Bike Vision proposed for a network of protected bike lanes in Salem, but it's a good start.

After all, politics is the art of the doable. Idealism is fine. In the end, though, getting part of what you want is a heck of a lot better than falling on a idealistic sword and not getting anything.

A protected bike lane

So even though I'd hoped for more protected bike lanes to be included in the $300 million community improvement bond measure Salem voters will be asked to approve this November, it was pleasing to watch a video of the June 27 City Council meeting and see that this project was added to the bond measure.

Union Street NE: Summer Street NE to 12th Street NE Buffered Bike Lanes. Extend bicycle facilites on Union Street NE between Summer Street NE and the 12th Street Pedestrian Promenade. This project will link with the currently funded CIP Project - Union Street Family Friendly Bikeway (Commercial Street NE - Summer Street NE).

Councilor Virginia Stapleton championed protected bike lanes on the City Council. She deserves a lot of credit for persevering through the ups and downs of what it took to get a protected bike lane all the way from Harritt Street NW in West Salem to 12th Street in NE Salem.

Here's a transcript I made of two sets of remarks Stapleton made during the council's discussion of this topic. Since she's pleased with how bike lanes fared in the bond measure, I am too.

I would like to move to restore $700,000 to the Peace Plaza improvement by reducing the State Street project by an additional $700,000, and that will then restore the Union Street family friendly bikeway project to its entirety, and also the Peace Plaza.

As many of you guys know, I ran for office, and one of the top priorities that I had was connecting our bike infrastructure.

And this motion here, coupled with the motion Councilor Hoy made at our steering committee task force meeting we had about two weeks ago now, and that really will complete the Union Street connection.

And this is really vital to the bike infrastructure we have here in the city of Salem. If we get this bond passed, and we have the completion of Marine Drive and the State Street project, we will then have a fully protected and connected bike infrastructure from Harritt Drive NW all the way to 17th Street NE. 

This is really critical, I feel, especially for climate change, where in the next thirteen years is when we're going to meet our first benchmark for our climate action goal of a 50% reduction in emissions. Providing these options for alternative transportation is going to be key for us to reach that goal. 

I also want to say thank you to all the people who wrote in and talked about how important bike infrastructure was to them and the goals they have for the future, sharing their personal stories. Some of them were horrific. Some of them were just delightful. It was wonderful to see the breadth and width of the folks who are writing about bikes here in Salem.

Thank you to all of those people. I know that this doesn't complete the task, but it does give us a really great start on what I hope will be a really great future of fully protected and connected bike lane infrastructure in the city of Salem. 

So I hope you all will support me in this motion.

After Mayor Bennett and others offered remarks about the Union Street project, Stapleton said this.

I just want to say thanks to you for your kind words and for the work you have done in the past, and those who went before me on this Union Street project. I think it will be a critical piece of infrastructure for our city. 

And thank you to all of the fellow councilors here tonight who are so supportive. For those of you who are excited about bike infrastructure in this bond, just remember that this project is over $5 million for bike infrastructure. Couple that with all the other projects that we're doing, the bicycle infrastructure within the bond is equalling $15 million in total. 

So this is really a game changer for folks, and I can't wait to see it [the bond measure] hopefully pass, that we can see all this good work come to fruition. 

More evidence that City of Salem staff hate protected bike lanes

Totally predictable. But disturbing all the same.

City staff played games with a survey intended to gauge public support for an upcoming $300 million bond measure by slanting the survey to make it less likely that those responding would say Yes! to the Salem Bike Vision proposal to build a network of protected bike lanes.

City councilor and Mayor-to-be Chris Hoy recognized this game a month ago, as I noted in a May 24 blog post, "Mayor and city staff try to keep Salem from having protected bike lanes." 

Discussion then turned to the public opinion research mentioned in the Next Steps above. This led to more evidence that city staff are trying to prevent Salem residents from enjoying protected bike lanes, even though the authority to decide what projects are included in the bond measure is in the hands of the City Council.

Councilor Stapleton asked Courtney Knox Busch, a City of Salem staff person working on the public opinion research, to describe the question being asked about protected bike lanes. Busch said that she didn't have the exact language before her, but it said something about how people would feel about the bond measure if a change was made to add the protected bike lane project.

Councilor Chris Hoy, who was recently elected Mayor (takes office in 2023), immediately realized how loaded that question would be. After all, Busch and Bennett had just taken pains to emphasize to Stapleton that there was time for her to try to get the Salem Bike Vision proposal added to the project list, since the bond measure didn't need to be finalized until August 8.

So currently there is nothing to be changed in the bond measure, since it hasn't been approved by the City Council yet. Hoy correctly said that the survey question should say something like, "How would you feel if the bond measure includes protected bike lanes."

Busch waffled around in her response to Hoy, offering up a rather lame statement that the survey research company being paid to do the public opinion research knows that they're doing. She assured Hoy and the rest of the council that this wasn't a "push poll" intended to get a certain answer.

OK, but it sure looks to me like Mayor Bennett and City of Salem staff are doing what they can to kill the popular protected bike lanes proposal. Hard to say why. My suspicion is that they've heavily bought into traditional road projects and don't want $10-15 million going to bicycle infrastructure.

Since there's supposed to be a vote on what to include in the bond measure at the June 27 City Council meeting, that agenda item contains pertinent background information. 

Such as, bike lanes were by far the most popular item in a list of projects that could be included in the bond measure, based on public comments/feedback. Councilor Stapleton asked for this information.

But the public opinion survey mistakenly led respondents to believe that the projects to be included in the bond measure already had been decided on -- the exact thing that Councilor Hoy said shouldn't be done in regard to protected bike lanes.

An honest approach to the survey would have been what Hoy suggested. Ask people if they would be more or less likely to support the bond measure if it included protected bike lanes separated from traffic. Instead, games were played, because the question asked was this:

This is infuriating to those of us who strongly favor protected bike lanes. Again, the projects for the bond measure haven't been finalized. That's supposed to happen at next Monday's meeting. So until the bond measure is finalized, obviously it isn't possible to make changes to the measure, because there's no measure to change.

Yet city staff turned the public opinion survey into one of those notorious "push polls" designed to get the answer you want from people by framing the protected bike lanes question as stated above. 

They didn't even phrase the question as "If the City made this change, would you be more likely to vote 'yes' to support the measure, or 'no' to oppose it?" After all, this is just $10 million in a $300 billion bond measure.

Instead, those responding to the survey were asked if they'd vote yes or no on the entire measure, just because protected bike lanes were included.

Again, it's maddening to see city staff putting their thumb on the scale of something as important as protected bike lanes, just because they want to see the Salem Bike Vision proposal rejected for reasons I find difficult to fathom. 

As I said in the previous blog post:

City staff kept saying they don't want the bond measure to be controversial. Well, here's some news for them. If you keep on playing games with Councilor Stapleton and other advocates for protected bike lanes, you're going to end up with a controversial bond measure. 

Which is unfortunate. Given the current rate of inflation, and people being generally downbeat about the state of our economy, convincing voters to approve the $300 million bond measure will be tough enough. 

Not including the popular Salem Bike Vision proposal for a network of protected bike lanes will make the bond measure sales job tougher.

Hopefully the City Council will do the right thing and add protected bike lanes to the bond measure. An online petition I started to support Salem Bike Vision currently has 279 supporters. The comments explaining why they want Salem to have protected bike lanes should convince wavering city councilors. I shared the comments as of June 7 in a blog post that went to city officials.

Here's the comments that were submitted after June 7.

When people want to bike in Minto-Brown park, they often have to carry their bikes in a car or truck to get there. Wouldn't it make a whole lot more sense if they could just bike there safely? Wouldn't it be great if people who want to bike to work -- or have to bike to work -- could do so without taking their lives into their hands? Imagine lightening the load on downtown traffic if more people who want to bike there could do so.

I come from Eugene where the bike paths and lanes make it so much easier for us to get from A to B. In Salem it’s a lot harder and people aren’t as aware of you.

I am a cyclist and often feel very uncomfortable on roads due to the number of cars and lack of cyling infrastructure.

I'd like to be able to ride my bike in Salem without getting killed. I think adding to the already existing running/walking trail system is an excellent boon for Salem. Now that more and more people are emerging from their houses as a result of the pandemic, a bike trail system is just the thing we need to foster camaraderie and promote mental health healing. It's also a great way to safely exercise in the fresh air.

Salem's future looks much brighter with usable bike lanes. I hope city council can make this happen.

I would like to be able to ride my bicycle without constant fear of death. I would like my wife to have opportunities to use her bicycle and feel safe. I would like to be able to commute to work and stores without feeling like I'm navigating a maze. I would like to reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. I would like friendlier and healthier communities. I would like Salem's infrastructure to look toward the future rather than the past. I would like bicycles to be considered a transportation tool rather than a recreational toy. These aren't big or novel asks.

I ride regularly around Salem, but I would love to have a place where my children can ride on the road as well, without having to travel to Corvallis.

Salem is overly dependent on old fashioned, outdated modes of urban development. The bike lanes would enhance the city's reputation for quality of life, encourage alternative transportation use, while also making bike travel safer in this area.

I use my bike to commute to/from work as well as ride for fun almost every day. If the project isn't possible, maybe send out or buy a street sweeper or two for the tons of debris in the existing bike lanes.

I'm tired of riding on the sidewalk because of no bike lane.

My wife rides her bike to work and we like to ride our bikes downtown and would ride so much more if there were safe bike lanes.

I want to feel safe when riding my bike. Bike friendly commuting promotes activity in a city which boosts overall economy.

More bikes in Salem will result in a healthier, happier community. Riding bikes is FUN!!

Salem is not very bike friendly or safe, which minimizes the green initiative for those who would choose to bike instead of driving. My sister has personally nearly been hit by a car multiple times because of the lack of safe places for bikes on the road.

I want to feel safe when riding in my city. Salem has a number of very dangerous locations. Infrastructure and education could go a long ways. Liberty Rd S where it splits from commercial is particularly dangerous. The bike lane ends abruptly forcing cyclist into four lane traffic with cars doing 50+ mph with a steep climb and blind hills.

My daughter rides her bike to work. I want her to be safe, and I don’t want to have to worry about her and the traffic lanes.

All city’s should be going as green as possible. This is a step in the right direction. Plus bikers deserve to be safe for choosing not to drive.

Paint is not protection! The current "good" bike lanes in Salem leave riders inches from passenger cars and trucks - these make riding somewhat more safe than shared streets, but make it difficult to ride with kids or a wider bike trailer. By implementing truly protected lanes, and expanding the network, Salem residents would be able to travel across town safely. This would allow more kids and young people to transport themselves, allow us to start bike bus groups in neighborhoods, and reduce total road traffic.

With infrastructure improvements for bike safety, more people would feel comfortable riding around town. That would help people stay healthy, and there would be less cars on the roads thereby alleviating congestion. Also, e-bike usage is increasing, so more people are willing to ride bikes, but they want to feel safe.

Protected bike lanes will make for a more livable city and improve visiting downtown to support downtown businesses

I want to live in a city that is improving the lives of it's people. Salem will be more functional and our citizens happier if transportation alternatives to the private auto allow more people to feel safe outside their car.

Salem could be a wonderful city for bike transport if there were safe corridors and protected bike lanes. As it is, the city is totally oriented towards car transportation and safe biking is not possible. I felt much safer on my bike when I lived in Chicago than I do here, and it shouldn’t be that way.

I commute by bike to work downtown every day and would love to be able to bike more places with better and safer routes

I bike around town and my son would like to bike around more. This would make it safe to do so. So many trucks are so jacked up they can’t even see a biker in front of or next to them and are likely to run us over unless we have our own lane.

Making the city more bike friendly would encourage people to get out of their cars.

I, as many others in this city, ride bikes. I have been riding bikes for nearly my whole life. For many, riding bikes is a luxury, a past time, an extracurricular. For some, a bike is a primary mode of transportation. Those who utilize a bicycle as transportation on a daily basis know about the uncertainty of safety, the close calls, and the unmanaged roads making the morning/afternoon commute an existential crisis. The roads of this great city should be shared by all utilizing them properly, regardless of the mode of transportation. Chances are, bike infrastructure will not change because most have the warped understanding that bikes are just extra. Not necessary. But I ask you to look again. Consider the safety of your fellow man who has no other option but to bike. When you see that man covered head to toe in fluorescent colors, soaked from the rains, and being taunted by drivers to “get out of the way”, consider making his life just that bit easier. Please provide every biker the peace of mind, so they may once again enjoy their commute, their ride, their leisure. Thank you.

Bike cities make for safe and healthy cities!

It would drastically improve the quality of life for the public, bring more business downtown and lighten the auto traffic saving everyone time and lessen pollution.

I ride my bike around town all the time. I would rather not be killed. Cars are dangerous, a major contributor to climate change, and make cities worse places to live. Cars need to be de-centered in our urban planning. Creating safe bike lanes is an easy, obvious step with nothing but upsides.

Both my children work downtown and they have to pay to park. Having safe biking lands would make biking to work more of an option

I like not dying

I'd love to have a better reason to ride downtown! It's the perfect place to bop around on a bike, and parking is a pain and so cramped.

(1) Bike travel shrinks your carbon footprint (2) Biking is great exercise (3) A safe bike path/lane would encourage bike travel (4) A bike friendly town brings bike tourism (5) Profit

Increased accessibility for anyone who doesn't own a car, can't own a car, and/or doesn't want to spend money on gas or parking. Also, can decrease congestion downtown.

I would like Salem to be more accessible for biking as I currently feel pretty unsafe biking anywhere in the city without proper bike lanes. This would cut down on traffic for those using cars while improving the quality of life for people who choose to bike around.

The absolute worse thing about downtown Salem is cars. Everything we can do to get people out of their cars would only improve the downtown.

I bike and have been hit by folks not paying attention to bicyclists.

Salem isn't really one of the best-run cities in America

The City of Salem Facebook page was all proud about Salem supposedly being one of the best-run cities in America. Not surprisingly, Mayor Bennett said it showed how wonderfully the folks at City Hall are doing.

I'm not nearly as excited, for reasons I'll describe below.

First, this isn't a scholarly bit of research conducted by an organization with impeccable credentials. It's a report by WalletHub designed to drive clicks to their web site, where I assume they do something involving being a hub for people with wallets.

Second, it might make sense to speak of the "best-run city government," but the idea of a "best-run city" is absurd, since a city is too complex for any single entity to run it.

The methodology used in the report makes this clear.

But I bet nobody at the City of Salem paid much attention to the methodology. Instead, they rushed to get some P.R. benefit from the report. I'm geeky enough to enjoy looking at methodologies, though. Here it is.

Of the six key categories, two are completely, or almost entirely, outside of the control of city government: Education and Health.

Each category is weighted equally, 16.67 of the total, so one-third of the criteria for determining a well-run city has virtually nothing to do with what the City of Salem and City Council are doing.

In fact, Financial Stability is the only category that is entirely under the control of city government, since it has to do with the Moody's City Credit Rating and Long-Term Debt Per Capita.

What about the other three categories?

Well, the most important scores in the Safety category have to do with crime rates, which are only loosely connected with how policing is done in a city, and motor vehicle fatalities per capita, which also has little to do with city government.

Economy has more to do with what transpires at the City of Salem, but not a whole lot, being primarily a private sector matter.

Infrastructure and Pollution involves roads, public transit, walking/biking, parks, air and water pollution, greenhouse gas emissions per capita, and traffic congestion. I'd say roughly half of this category is under the control of city government. 

So my rough estimate is that only about a third of the scores that gave Salem a ranking of 18 out of 150 cities actually had to do with how well city government is performing. Thus this report is pretty much meaningless when it comes to assessing how well the folks at City Hall are doing.

A last methodological problem is that the overall ranking of a city was calculated by dividing the Quality of City Services (which we've seen mostly has nothing to do with city government) by the Total Budget Per Capita (which has everything to do with city government).

Thus the ranking was basically, an apples divided by oranges thing -- essentially meaningless. 

A middle-aged white guy will be the next Salem City Manager

So after four months of searching the country for candidates to be Salem's next City Manager, the folks at City Hall came up with three middle-aged white guys. 

My intuitive reaction when I saw the image below on Facebook was, Oh, no! And this is coming from an old white guy.

Look, I have nothing against middle-aged white guys. I can remember being one myself a mere couple of dozen years ago. It just seems wrong for city officials to conduct a nationwide search and end up with three candidates who don't reflect the vast majority of people in Salem.

Women and people of color, including a large and growing Latino population.

The broader issue here is whether the City Manager should be viewed as merely a bureaucrat who keeps the machinery of city government humming along as smoothly as possible, or that plus a dynamic leader committed to making Salem a vibrant cutting-edge 21st century city -- not just a backwater between the more rapidly flowing cities of Portland and Eugene.

I definitely favor the latter option, but I strongly suspect that city officials are looking for more of a beancounter City Manager than a shake-things-up City Manager. 

They should keep in mind that the City Manager is by far the most powerful person in city government.

The unpaid Mayor is primarily a figurehead. The eight unpaid councilors, along with the Mayor, supposedly set policies via their City Council votes, but in practice they're powerless to do anything without the support of city staff, who are under the control of the City Manager. The Mayor and councilors have no staff of their own.

So it's ridiculous when I hear people say, "The City Manager is a non-partisan position." Not true.

If the new City Manager disagrees with a policy of the City Council he (it won't be a she) has many options to slow walk that policy into a semi-death, even while outwardly proclaiming to the Mayor and councilors that he's totally on board with the policy.

City staff are adept at manipulating the City Council to act in ways favored by staff. The City Manager is #1 in the city staff pecking order. So he is the #1 manipulator. Again, in a sneaky fashion, because no one becomes the Salem City Manager unless they've mastered the art of getting their way from elected officials while acting like a humble servant of those officials.

This is one reason I think an important criterion for selecting the next City Manager should be their personal political perspective. 

Salem is a left-leaning city.

Currently there are seven progressives and two conservatives on the City Council. Salem has voted for the Democratic presidential candidate in the past three elections. We have a Salem Climate Action Plan. Diversity and inclusivity are core values expressed by the progressive City Council majority.

When a president of the United States is elected, we take it for granted that the president will choose cabinet heads and other top officials who share their political perspective. It would make no sense for a conservative president to have a cabinet full of liberal department heads, or for a liberal president to have a cabinet full of conservative department heads.

Likewise, Salem's liberal-leaning City Council should choose a City Manager who is comfortable with progressive policies, rather than a conservative City Manager who isn't big on reducing carbon emissions, building safe bike lanes, having many police calls handled by a mobile crisis unit, and other actions that appeal more to the left side of the political spectrum.

Let's stop pretending that the City Manager isn't a political position. It is, masquerading as a bureaucratic position.