Council boosts PBOT budget with increase to Uber and Lyft fees

A sharp exchange about transit, a councilor’s rideshare regret, and a substantial bump for Vision Zero and the transportation budget were among the notable moments from a marathon, 12-hour Portland City Council meeting Wednesday.

The 12 councilors were tasked with approval of an $8.5 billion budget. Using Mayor Keith Wilson’s proposal as a starting point, councilors filed over 120 amendments prior to the meeting. Only about 30 amendments were discussed and/or voted on (I haven’t seen the final list), and there’s more budget action to come on June 11th; but Wednesday’s meeting gave transportation reformers plenty to sink their teeth into.

While a successful bid from Councilor Angelita Morillo to swap $2 million in proposed Portland Police Bureau funding for parks maintenance grabbed most of the headlines, council also passed an increase to rideshare (also called transportation network company, or TNC) user fees that will have a substantial impact to the Portland Bureau of Transportation budget. And Councilor Jamie Dunphy helped Councilor Tiffany Koyama Lane make good on her promise to boost spending on the Vision Zero program. 

Let’s start with the new rideshare fee.

People currently pay a 65 cents per ride fee to use a rideshare company like Uber or Lyft in Portland. Eyeing those 8 million annual rides, Mayor Wilson proposed doubling that fee to $1.30, a move that would raise $5.1 million in additional revenue for PBOT. Councilor Steve Novick (with councilors Morillo, Green and Dunphy as sponsors) put forward a motion to raise the fee to $2.00 per ride for an estimated total of $5 million in additional transportation revenue.

Novick said the change was necessary because, “We know the transportation bureau is starved for money…and I think we should use every dollar we can to address our failing streets.” Then Novick shared regret over his role in allowing rideshare companies to operate in Portland at all — when he cast one of the deciding votes during his former council tenure 10 years ago. “I actually now believe that that was a mistake,” Novick shared. “At the time, some environmentalists thought that [Uber and Lyft] would reduce the use of cars… Instead, it just resulted in more cars in the streets and more carbon emissions. And I think as long as they’re out there, then we should use it to raise money for transportation.”

The most vocal opponent of the increased fee was Councilor Eric Zimmerman. He said he’s uncomfortable passing on the higher costs per ride to end-users. Then Zimmerman tried to make the case that Portland needs to maintain cheap access too Uber and Lyft because the state of TriMet is so bad it’s not an option for many people. He said he’s heard of Portland State University students who unenrolled for classes because they planned to take transit to class, only to become uncomfortable due to safety concerns while riding it:

“A number of students were taking Uber and Lyft in, and they didn’t prefer it, but because of the situation on TriMet — which is, as some people in this dais have said, our largest homeless shelter — where dangerous behavior happens every single day, where TriMet has had to hire over 200 safety specialists in order to make the trains and the busses barely palatable… I don’t want to raise taxes on individual Portlanders, particularly when the other alternatives are pretty crappy right now.”

“I don’t know why it’s always the men that are, like, six-feet tall, they’re terrified of being on the bus. It’s really not a big deal.”

Those remarks sparked an immediate response by Councilor Angelita Morillo:

“As the only person here who’s dependent on transit — because I don’t have a car, I don’t have a license, and my mom only knew how to drive a motorcycle, so we never learned how to drive — I don’t know why it’s always the men that are, like, six-feet tall, they’re terrified of being on the bus. It’s really not a big deal. I ride the bus all the time. I’m five-foot-two and 130 pounds, so I think we will all survive it. People love the bus. I see people fall in love on the bus, and the reality is that we need this funding for our budget.”

When it came time to vote, the fee increase passed 8-4, with councilors Olivia Clark, Dan Ryan, and Loretta Smith joining Zimmerman in opposition.

With the rideshare fee increase in the bank, Councilor Jamie Dunphy put his amendment on the table that would use that new revenue to fully fund recent cuts to PBOT’s Vision Zero work. The past two city budgets have axed contributions from the city’s Recreational Cannabis Tax Fund to PBOT to the tune of $677,664 ($400,000 last year and $277,664 this year). The bulk of that money was used to fund Vision Zero-related projects and programs. Dunphy proposed an amendment to use a portion of the new rideshare fee revenue to restore those cuts.

Speaking in favor of the move, Councilor Koyama Lane said, “We need to show Portlanders that we’re serious about this. These are our streets. We have a responsibility to make them safe for everyone. We need to make Vision Zero whole.”

Because Dunphy’s amendment initially sought to decrease General Fund dollars going into PBOT (knowing that new rideshare fees would be available instead), some councilors expressed concern that only Vision Zero would be funded, while “livability” needs like dismantling derelict RVs and other programs wouldn’t get as much funding. So Dunphy split out that part of the amendment and it will be discussed it at their June 11th meeting.

The amendment ultimately passed 8-4, with councilors Ryan, Novick, Zimmerman, and Smith all voting “no”.

Another notable amendment, Councilor Loretta Smith’s attempt at a bond issuance and financing plan for the Sidewalk Improvement and Paving Program (SIPP), failed by a vote of 4-8. Surprisingly, a chief architect of the program, Councilor Mitch Green, voted against it. He said he felt the plan was “premature” and wants to wait for more financial analysis around the cost of the debt.

Council didn’t discuss any of the Mayors proposed parking fee increases.

From here, councilors can still make tweaks to amendments and there will be another bite at the budget apple on June 11th — one week before it must be adopted on June 18th.