Portland turns to total system overhaul after staggering post-COVID-19 decline

Portland has transformed in the last five years following substantial unrest in 2020 after the death of George Floyd and Measure 110, which decriminalized all drugs .

Now, the city is reversing course, transforming its government by expanding its City Council and adding ranked choice voting.

Measure 110, in particular, which was enacted in 2020 to lessen criminal offenses on drug users, has affected the city. Homelessness became a larger problem in Portland, and crime increased in the area.

“These were huge issues,” Carmen Rubio, a City Council member who is now running for mayor, told Politico. “It was a perfect storm.”

Nineteen suitors are running to be the city's mayor, most of which are left-of-center candidates with varying views on how to fix the city's problems. Left-wing candidates believe past policies simply were implemented incorrectly, while moderates believe it was too far-left of a move to begin with.

However, the mayoral race isn't the only highly competitive contest in the area. The City Council race features dozens of candidates, and the number of seats has expanded from four to 12, representing four districts.

Whoever is elected will have a lot to deal with. The county that holds Portland lost 12,000 people between 2020 and 2023 to gun violence, and the city reached an all-time high of 101 homicides in 2022.

Some of the violence could have resulted from the city cutting $15 million from the police department's budget and closing its Gun Violence Prevention Team, both of which were demanded by Black Lives Matter activists.

Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) described parts of downtown as “like Dresden in World War II.”

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“I’ve spent 54 years trying to make Portland the most livable city in the country or in the world,” the retiring Democrat told the outlet. “No one’s going to describe it like that now.”

Portland hopes its new government can fix it.