Portland officials Friday offered a detailed overview of the city’s growing budget gap and preliminary steps to close it through hundreds of potential job cuts and deep reductions across agencies and programs.

The city faces a combined shortfall of more than $150 million between its general fund — which primarily supports police, fire, parks and homeless services — and reductions to other core municipal services such as transportation, permitting and water and sewers, according to newly released budget documents.

City Administrator Michael Jordan, who oversees Portland’s vast bureaucracy under its new form of government, delivered an initial set of recommendations on how to shave $35.4 million from an estimated $93 million general fund gap, documents show.

He also suggested an additional $65 million in potential cuts outside the general fund. City officials said there was an estimated $7 million overlap between the general fund and non-general fund figures.

All told, the budget recommendations include eliminating about 275 jobs across the city as well as reductions to everything from community center and sports facility hours to road maintenance to emergency preparedness programs.

“There aren’t really any good choices,” Jordan told reporters during a press briefing at the Portland Building. “It’s about where you will find the money to balance the budget.”

The city administrator stressed that his suggestions were “intended to serve as a starting point for further consideration” among Portland elected leaders and the public in the coming weeks and months.

Mayor Keith Wilson is scheduled to propose a budget for next fiscal year in early May.

Jordan did not recommend any cuts to public safety, but acknowledged that Wilson and the City Council could consider slashing up to $35.7 million from police, fire and 911 operations as they seek to balance the budget.

“We just didn’t recommend them because we’re pretty sure that most people in Portland want to maintain public safety, generally speaking,” he said.

Jordan’s recommendations do include reducing $22.1 million in spending at the Transportation Bureau by eliminating nearly 100 positions and cutting back on pothole repairs, safety improvements and basic road maintenance.

To balance up to a $23 million parks shortfall, he suggested slashing grants to community partners, eliminating summer programs for children and closing one of the city’s 11 community centers.

Budget documents also show the city’s Permitting & Development Bureau would need to reduce expenditures by $16.7 million to bring its spending in line with revenue.

“We need to make sure that every cut we make — and there will certainly be many painful ones — sets us up to be a stronger city moving forward,” Council President Elana Pirtle-Guiney told The Oregonian/OregonLive on Friday.

Pirtle-Guiney also struck a mildly optimistic tone when she noted that the city’s projected general fund shortfall had shrunk to $93 million from more than $100 million in mid-January.

“We’re in a very slightly less bad position,” she said. “It’s not enough to help us much with this budget. But it tells me Portland is moving in the right direction.”

A number of factors have contributed to the city’s large general fund gap this year, including health insurance rate hikes for employees, a series of recent union contract negotiations and Wilson’s $28 million shelter expansion proposal he says is needed to dramatically reduce the number of people sleeping on the streets.

Portland is also slated to lose about $40 million in federal pandemic aid and other one-time funding sources that have paid for programs in recent years ranging from homeless camp sweeps to gun violence reduction initiatives to trash and graffiti removal.

Adding to the city’s grim financial outlook: Declining property tax revenue, rising material costs and inflation.

Portland’s budget for this year was about $8.2 billion, with $732 million in discretionary general funds. Roughly 70% of the city’s general fund budget goes to just four agencies: the police and fire bureaus, Portland Parks & Recreation and the homeless services agency jointly run by Portland and Multnomah County.

“Although nobody wants to cut any of those things, the math is unavoidable,” said Councilor Steve Novick, who co-chairs the City Council’s public safety committee. “Unless we’re going to raise taxes, those services are at risk.”

— Shane Dixon Kavanaugh covers Portland city government and politics, with a focus on accountability and watchdog reporting.

Reach him at 503-294-7632

Email at skavanaugh@oregonian.com

Follow on X @shanedkavanaugh or on BlueSky @shanedkavanaugh

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