I've been busy getting up to speed and preparing for the upcoming budget process.
Dear Friends and Neighbors,
I think a lot about home during the holidays (I am just back from visiting my sister and mom in my hometown of Denver. Go Nuggets!).
We grew up in the suburbs in a series of houses that my parents owned (we moved a lot). They were never big houses, but they were always ours. I say ours, but really they weren’t all the way ours because we always had a mortgage. And my parents were definitely punching above their weight. We often went without electricity or water or heat for a few days or even a week, because the mortgage and food always came first. And, despite having pretty good County jobs, there was just more need than there was money.
But my parents knew that making it in the white suburbs was a ticket out of just barely getting by, at least for my sister and I. It was isolating at times. I was often the only Black kid in the classroom, my family the only one on the block, in the neighborhood. A certain amount of cultural isolation was the price my family paid for good schools. And it instilled in me a belief that Black and brown families shouldn’t have to choose between opportunity and community—that every kid deserves a good education and a sense of belonging.
At the age of 24, in an era when practically anyone could get a mortgage because no one in our government was minding the store, my partner and I bought our first house (three years after my younger sister bought hers - she will not let me forget). And while my parents helped pack up boxes, they didn’t have generational wealth to gift us to buy those homes. Indeed wealth often flows up the family tree for people of color.
Still, they gave us so much love. And we always had a roof over our heads and food in our bellies. In a time when we let so many of our neighbors go without either, it makes me grateful for both.
I am writing this newsletter as your Commissioner here in that very same house we bought 18 years ago. In North Portland. In Multnomah County’s District 2.
In these two short months as your Commissioner, I’ve been busy getting up to speed meeting with my colleagues, department directors and constituents. Throughout these many, many meetings, one thing is very clear to me: Multnomah County is full of smart, committed public servants who care very much about the work we do. This includes both front line workers addressing the short-term crises and unpredictable emergencies we face and the very many folks who work behind the scenes to keep the ongoing public services that we rely on humming along.
This is not to say we don’t have work to do. The basic needs of too many of our neighbors are not being met, and we have important decisions ahead to address a series of crises with effectiveness and urgency. Over the coming months, I intend to dive deep into the budget process to make sure District 2 (North and Northeast Portland) is well represented and engaged - and that we advance a more just, equitable, and inclusive county for everyone.
I look forward to hearing from you about your own priorities for the County.
Until then, I am wishing you and yours happy holidays and a joyful new year!
Thank you, Jesse
During these last 2 months I have had the opportunity to continue and build upon the work of my predecessor Susheela Jayapal while representing our shared values.
Reimagining Justice In Cully
In October, Commissioner Jayapal, Multnomah County’s Local Public Safety Coordinating Council (LPSCC), and community based-organizations announced we had earned a 3 year, $2 million federal grant. The goal of this grant is to empower residents in Northeast Portland’s Cully neighborhood to craft a neighborhood alternative to existing law enforcement models for low-level crimes. This grant was secured following a series of community conversations that began years ago in Cully, where neighbors expressed a desire to develop their own unique solutions to their public safety concerns.
This December, I was grateful to receive unanimous support from my colleagues to appropriate just over $300,000 of the $2 million award from the federal Bureau of Justice Assistance. This will begin the first year of planning and community engagement that will guide the Reimagining Justice Cully initiative.
It provided a moment for me to reflect on my own past, as I recalled getting arrested as a 15-year old for stealing a baby bottle and some Christmas labels from an Albertsons grocery store back in 1995. What I did was wrong. So was the arrest.
The Cully neighborhood is such a dynamic community with a long history of organizing for the betterment of its residents without displacement. I believe this project can help build the kind of neighborhood where Black & Brown folks—and others treated differently—can create safety without fear of unfair incarceration. At its core, this project is a chance for community members to identify what will make them feel safe, with the County supporting that work - not leading it. This model allows us to lean into our values of equity and community involvement.
On Friday of this same week, we got to work with our lead community partner, North American Youth and Family Center (NAYA), who hosted our first planning meeting.
JOHS IGA Negotiations between Multnomah County and City of Portland
For decades, Multnomah County and the City of Portland have jointly been responsible for homeless services. The Joint Office of Homeless Services (JOHS), created in 2016, sought to make that joint responsibility more focused, efficient and integrated. Our jurisdictions are currently in the process of negotiating a new Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA) for the Joint Office of Homeless Services (JOHS). Earlier this month I took part in a joint session between our two governments that was focused on continuing but recalibrating this partnership to include more urgency, collaboration, and measurable outcomes.
During the session, I advocated for service providers to be included in the new JOHS implementation committee. When 80% of our dollars are going directly to service providers, and we don’t actively engage them on the implementation side, we're missing an opportunity to better understand why we might not be meeting some of our intended outcomes. I also remain committed to ensuring our frontline workers are being paid a living wage and that we are building up the needed workforce to address our challenges.
I hope this IGA process will lead to a change in our conversation around tackling homelessness. There’s a tenor right now in our community that seeks to scold each other, rather than seek to understand. I am optimistic that this IGA represents a shift. And I know we can work productively together across our county, region, and state for both what is achievable today and the promise of tomorrow.
Budgets represent our values, and I will be entering the upcoming budget process holding the values of inclusion, equity, and solution-focused policy at the forefront. We have important decisions to make to act with urgency to address our many regional challenges.
I’ll be engaging with constituents to look at how we can humanely, effectively address our homeless crisis, keep more people from becoming homeless through continued rent assistance, and growing our recovery and culturally-specific services.
We will continue to keep you updated with ways you can engage in Multnomah County’s budget process, as well as District 2 specific engagement plans.
