City staff summarize 2025 legislative session: shelter funding, housing investments and contested surveillance bill

City state‑relations staff and Public Safety Service Area leaders briefed the Community and Public Safety Committee on key outcomes from the 2025 Oregon Legislative Session that affect Portland, highlighting new shelter funding, housing and behavioral health provisions, police academy funding and a contentious surveillance bill that failed in the House.

Evan Mitchell, the city’s state relations manager, said the session produced a new statewide funding framework for shelter and temporary alternative shelter sites and safe‑rest villages; Mitchell said the city expects to work with the state housing agency (OHS) to draw down $26 million for temporary alternative shelter sites in the coming biennium. He also said the legislature allocated about $135 million statewide for short‑ and long‑term rent assistance—a reduction from prior years—and roughly a half‑billion dollars for affordable rental housing and…