Sigh I sent this letter to Sam Adams, City Council and Amy Ruiz. I already submitted it to another post, but would now like to address it to Dan Savage as well since Dan was married to Amy Ruiz and was her boss and shows a strong personal connection to Sam's office. Dan, I really wish you would have disclosed that from a journalism ethics standpoint.

"This is an open letter to City Council, Sam Adams and his staff, with a special emphasis specifically aimed at Amy Ruiz. My wise mother once told me. "We all make mistakes. It's not that you make mistakes, it's how you handle those mistakes that matters."

Mayor Adams, what we've witnessed the past week is someone who has not been able to rise to the challenge of those mistakes and take leadership. Instead we have witnessed an office that hides, cowers at home, acts immaturely and inappropriately in public and a Mayor's office that can not seem to pull itself together.

Imagine if this was a real crisis in the city. How are citizens now to believe you could handle one? Your actions this week and the actions of your staff are eroding public trust in your office and ability to govern this city. It's not about the sex or your personal life. It's about putting city work first over drama, emotions and hurt feelings. It's about remaining calm and carrying on, putting your duties and obligations to the citizens who elected you, showing up to Council, taking charge and it is about pulling together your office and bureaus to get critical work accomplished. It's not about the sex or your personal life. It is about honesty, transparency in government and rational work decisions and actions.

Sam, you have had an opportunity here. An opportunity to show strong character. An opportunity to put city work first, roll up your sleeves and move forward. You have had an opportunity to let your staff, in your absence, show that they can handle a crises and rise to the occasion in a professional manner, once again, putting the much needed work of the city first before your own personal issues and dealings.

What we are seeing instead is nothing short of a soap opera and political chaos. It needs to end. Now. Members of your staff are playing into and encouraging this soap opera, rather than conducting themselves in a professional manner that works towards cohesiveness and a rebuilding of trust both within the diversities of the City and within Portland as a whole. This is extremely damaging.

The decision to hire Amy Ruiz brings to light troubling indications of larger problems within the Mayor's office and I fear the ramifications of this hire will have many negative consequences to come. The decision to hire Amy has been a slap in the face to many within Portland's strong, highly educated and highly experienced policy, planning and sustainable professional community and to all the qualified people that did apply for her job. Amy's lack of experience illustrates hiring of personality over qualifications and skills. Her hiring, while she was still reporting on City Hall for the Mercury (but not disclosing as such) shows both a lack of journalistic ethics but more importantly a lack of public political ethics and understanding. Amy's public statements such as, "I have no experience in policy, planning, or sustainability" show a naïveté in how her actions will be perceived and how she needs to win the respect and trust of bureaus and others who actually do have experience in said arenas. Her strong friendship (and previous marriage) to Dan Savage, then participating at a Pro-Sam rally yesterday where Savage was the main presenter shows that she has no idea on what is appropriate, professional and becoming behavior as a high profile city staff member. Amy appears stuck in the idea that she is working in a government version of an alternative weekly newspaper, not helping communicate and advise on important policy decisions in the city. Amy is simply not qualified for the job, and her resume, her actions during the hiring process and her actions this week show that. You need staff that can quickly gain the respect and trust of your bureaus in order to be given full information, in order to be included in conversations and in order to be involved and understand highly complex, highly technical and highly nuanced discussions and decisions. Instead you have a policy advisor who has no clue or experience on how to navigate the complex channels of city government, and bureaus that are already shutting her out. That's bad for the City of Portland. Fix it. Now.

I witnessed many bad hiring decisions similar to Amy's while I was a long term employee at the City. I witnessed people hired due to connections, hired due to friendships, and hired due to personality. I saw leadership at the City erode and staff who were unable to get their jobs done due to these hires. I saw an bureaus and agencies like the PDC slip into chaos and dysfunction. Bad hires are bad for the City of Portland. Haven't we learned anything?

We are at a critical time in the City of Portland. We are facing a large economic crises and looming funding crises, and we now have a political crises on our hands. We have bureaus and agencies such as Planning, BHCD and PDC who have been in flux and in some cases stagnant for several years. We are now over 6 years behind schedule in updating crucial city plans and in implementing these plans. You have come in with a strong, yet extremely ambitious agenda that requires top level leadership and mobilized top of the line staff who can quickly get the job done now, in the next 100 days and moving forward. This week, if anything, has shown your office has some serious problems in their abilities, and I remain concerned that relationships within the city and morale within bureaus is rapidly eroding even more. Fix it. Now.

I am not asking you to resign. I voted for you and I will continue to have faith that you can pull yourself together. However, you had better move on it quickly and show the city that you are serious about leadership, transparency and can do what it takes to fix things, mend wounds and move forward. You need a staff that can help you, not staff that is a hindrance.

I am asking Council to consider these issues and guide you as appropriate. I am asking you to step up to the plate. I am asking you to replace staff members that are a liability and not an asset to getting work done, including Tom Miller who made the decision to hire Amy in the first place. I am asking you, I am appealing to you, as someone who cares deeply about this shared place we call home. I am appealing to you as someone with years of professional experience in Portland City Government.

Please Mayor Adams, make us the City that Works, not the city that lets drama and incompetency lead.

Thank You,


An Ex-City Employee"