Portland Copwatch has suggested offering $150,000 to council to match the funds put up by the Portland Business Alliance as part of the mayor’s Street Access For Everyone (SAFE) group—in exchange for the sit/lie law, which heads to a second vote in council next Wednesday, having passed muster with council on Wednesday this week. Here are excerpts from a letter by Dan Handelman of Portland Copwatch to City Council this morning:

It is pretty clear from the Portland Business Alliance (PBA) testimony that they are the driving force pushing for this law…

The PBA has offered $150,000 over the next two years to fund the Day Access Center and the alternative plans to expand it—namely showers and lockers for those without homes. These are clearly much needed amenities that came from discussions with the community.

However, the only homeless people who testified on Wednesday were strongly against the ordinance. The homeless community newspaper Street Roots submitted written testimony against the ordinance. Sisters of the Road Cafe testified against the ordinance. Perhaps it is worth considering that putting the day center, showers, and bathrooms in place are good public policy ideas and can exist without the Sit/Lie ordinance.

Or maybe if we want to see changes made to the ordinance, Portland Copwatch and other grassroots organizations need to offer to pay the City $150,000. It is starting to look as if that is how public policy is defined in a City that professes its concerns about lobbying and “special interests”—money talks.

How can Portland profess to be a city where the community is involved in public decision-making, while bargains are struck in private subcommittee meetings between special interests and the powers that be?

If people want to contact City Council between now and next Wednesday, when the ordinance will officially be voted on, there’s still time—perhaps to raise the money necessary to call off the vote! concerns.