The city council chambers are a press conference room this morning, as Mayor Tom Potter presents his proposed budget to a pile of reporters, many of his own staffers, and City Commissioner Dan Saltzman (Commissioners Randy Leonard and Sam Adams are conspicuously absent).

Potter had $33 million to play around with, but $113 million in budget requests—which were vetted at community meetings and by pairs of commissioners—he had to cut a lot.

What he is funding falls into a few priorities: Stabilize core services, strengthen public safety, keep businesses thriving, “grow Portland’s reputation as the nation’s most livable city,” and “make Portland welcoming to every resident.”

While advocating for Adams’ street fee proposal—and urging its placement on the November ballot—Potter funded sidewalks along NE Cully to the tune of $1.6 million, echoing his rhetoric last week about transportation priorities. He did not, however, fully fund Adams’ request for nearly $8 million in transportation projects to get going on the street fee proposal’s projects. Only $3.5 million went to transportation.

“Why $1.6 million for the Cully project specifically,” while not funding other transportation maintenance needs, a reporter asked.

“It’s a totally unimproved old county road that doesn’t have sidewalks, doens’t have bicycle lanes… that’s a significant problem,” Potter says, sounding a touch angry. School children who walk along the street arrive at school with dirty shoes. “Those are the kind of things that I think we need to be paying attention to.”

Potter is also cutting money to jail beds for Project 57 (though they’re still getting $1.3 million), in favor of funding treatment.

Potter also offered advice to future mayors and councils, most notably suggesting that the fall BuMP (a budget adjustment that’s often a surplus) be set aside for a rainy day instead of spent on projects and programs, and that one-time funds (like this year’s $33 million) not be used to start new programs that will need uncertain ongoing funding.

“If I knew then what I know now, I would have proposed things differently,” he says, looking back on his past three and a half years.