The Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) is facing three of its most daunting challenges ever, and they’re all happening at the same time: the bureau’s budget is structurally unsound and they face major cuts and layoffs if nothing changes; their reputation (and resulting staff morale) is in the toilet as distrust of government continues to grow and PBOT has alienated many of its allies due to various avoidable controversies, and; PBOT faces hard questions about the record number of people who continue to be killed on our roads year after year — despite a much-ballyhooed commitment to Vision Zero.
So when the current PBOT Director Millicent Williams gets interviewed on Oregon Public Broadcasting’s Think Out Loud show, we should all pay attention.
Williams joined venerable host Dave Miller on Monday’s program and he asked her questions about all three of the aforementioned challenges. You can listen to the entire interview on OPB’s website, or check my edited version of the main takeaways:
Dave Miller, OPB:
Last year, the highest number in three decades despite so much focus on safety on Vision Zero. How do you explain this?
Millicent Williams, PBOT:
It’s a really hard question to answer. There are any number of factors… The increase is not unique to Portland. I attribute it to a number of things… Some of the width of the roadways are also challenges. And and we focus on education and ensuring that people understand what their responsibilities are as they’re traversing the city… We have to make sure that we’re enforcing, we have to make sure that we’re causing people to slow down, we have to ensure that we’re considering some of the other societal challenges that we have right now… It’s a staggering number, but one that we can trace back to certain things: distraction, intoxication, or otherwise impaired — all those things are our factors.
Dave Miller:
Traffic deaths dropped something like 10% last year, while they went up in Portland. Do you think something is different in Portland?
Millicent Williams:
The way that the city is designed is different. The way that the population has grown is different… As we see the population continue to grow and shift the way that people are using the roadways is shifting. We anticipate that we’ll continue to need to address those challenges in really systematic ways… The numbers do reflect a difference in the ways that cities are built and designed. We have a really intricate network of streets and sidewalks and roadways that sometimes lend themselves to people showing up in ways that are less than helpful… We’re really working to make sure that we’re educating users of all modes in ways that help us to bring those numbers down, but I do think a lot has to do with the way that the city is populated, the way the city is designed, and the size of the city.
Dave Miller:
What are you doing to focus on particularly vulnerable populations?
Millicent Williams:
We use an equity matrix to help to inform where we make investments and build projects, because we recognize that every community needs to be served and served well… As it relates to those who are unhoused, I think the challenge we have as a city, and as a county, and as a country, is to make sure we’re treating people with dignity, and helping them to find options that move them away from the roadway… I don’t want to suggest that I’m blaming anyone for their condition or their situation; but what we can do is work hand-in-hand with community members to make sure that we are providing them with safe passage, that they have wide enough sidewalks, that they are able to go to places that are safe and clean and protected from potential vehicular traffic that would potentially be a fatal crash for them.
Dave Miller:
Your bureau did a number of surveys of Portland residents and PBOT employees and different constituent groups this year… What’s your top priority?
Millicent Williams:
My top priority is making sure that as the leader for the Bureau of Transportation, we’re serving all communities well. I do think it is important for us to be able to, quote unquote get “back to basics” — make sure that the city is clean, that is well maintained, that we are promoting livability and the ways that we’re promoting and delivering our work… We receive significant funding from outside of the city — federal funding, state funding and other funding to do that innovative work — but it’s important to me that that innovative work have has as its foundation, safe passable roads, clean bike lanes, connected sidewalks, crossings that are connected from one side to the other, that there are signals in place, there’s lighting in place. Those are things that are important to me. I’ve been saying here lately: “We’ve got to get things done, we’ve got to get them done right, and we’ve got to get them done well.”… Maintenance is safety, maintenance is asset management, maintenance is livability… And so we have to focus on all of those things… So that we can do some of that more futuristic thinking about how we can transform our city for what’s coming ahead.
Dave Miller:
What do you see as a long-term solution [to the budget problems]?
Millicent Williams:
… If we do our jobs, well, we do put ourselves out of business. If we create the opportunity for people to use different options to get around town, we do kind of make the gas tax null and void. So we do have to look at alternatives to ensuring that we’re funding the bureau and we’ve had a series of conversations internal to the bureau with city partners about what we might do differently… parking management, we’re going to be looking at VMT, vehicle miles traveled, as an option for funding and how we attach fees to that, there is a utility licensing fee that was established 35 years ago. Right now the transportation bureau is not receiving any of that funding. However, if we have the opportunity to begin to recoup some of the funding — the percentage of that funding that has been reallocated to other interests in the city — we would be able to fill at least some of those gaps…
Dave Miller:
Soon after you became the head of PBOT, the bureau got a lot of flack for an effort to revert a section of protected bike lane on Broadway… There were a lot of bad feelings from from cyclists and other members of the community at the time. What are you doing to build back trust?
Millicent Williams:
That was a challenging moment for me personally, and for the bureau. I recognize that it did cause harm. One of the things that I’m doing is connecting directly with the folks who are most affected, continuing to have the conversations and continuing to show up and be in the spaces that are important. I don’t fear having conversations. I don’t fear conflict and I recognize that we won’t always agree on things. But the way that we get to resolution is through coming together, and so that’s what I’m committed to doing. That’s what the bureau is committed to doing.
And I know I have plenty of work to do to continue to restore the faith and trust. But that’s what I’m here to do.
What are your takeaways from this?
To me, it was notable she mentioned a possible VMT tax. The idea of charging Portland road users by the mile was one of the considerations in PBOT’s 2021 Pricing Options for Equitable Mobility report, but I don’t think we’ve heard it offered as an actual possibility in this type of higher-level context. Is PBOT actually working on it? I also love that she mentioned the ULF revenue that other bureaus have stolen away from PBOT over the years. It’s long overdue for some of those funds to come back to transportation.
I also think her explanation of a “back to basics” mindset is noteworthy. That’s a sensitive topic, because in the past I think most folks have seen maintenance spending and new project spending as a binary, zero-sum conversation. As in, we either take care of roads, or we improve the network. It’s clear Williams is putting herself squarely behind taking care of the roads first, so it remains to be seen how she’ll balance the necessity for doing “innovative work” (which in my opinion could be a euphemism for big bike and bus projects) at the same time.
And finally, her response to what is causing all the deaths was interesting to me. I felt like most of her answer was blaming users of the road, and didn’t make any suggestion that how the roads are designed could play a factor. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, as I think given the terrible conduct of more people these days we do need to shift the narrative toward personal responsibility a bit more, but to reverse bad trends Williams must confront the fact that some of PBOT’s decisions play a role in creating the dysfunctional traffic culture she points her finger at.
— Listen to the full interview here.