Portland Transportation Bureau Faces ‘Existential’ Cuts

Portland, Oregon’s Bureau of Transportation faces massive budget cuts as a $100 million deficit looms, reports Sophie Peel in Willamette Week.

The bureau’s traditional revenue sources — gas taxes and parking — have booth been declining in recent years, leading to a growing budget gap that has, in past years, been filled with stopgap measures. “This year, director Millicent Williams recently told the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, looks nothing like previous shortfalls.” Federal funding cuts and freezes are also putting state-funded programs in jeopardy.

According to Williams, “her bureau was staring down a $38 million budget gap this upcoming fiscal year that, if it’s not whittled down in a meaningful way, would affect nearly every primary service the bureau provides: street and sidewalk repairs and maintenance, paving, pedestrian safety improvements, and street cleaning.”

Williams noted that cuts on such a scale would endanger the Bureau’s ability to “deliver even the most basic transportation services.”