Portland council advances budget work, moves $2.1 million from tree regulation to parks maintenance and narrows citywide EMS cuts

Portland City Council continued several budget hearings and approved a set of technical and policy changes at a June 10 meeting as it moves toward adopting the city's fiscal 2025-26 budget.

Councilors voted to: continue the state shared-revenue hearing (items 2-4) to a later reading; send an interfund-loan ordinance addressing a Fire and Police Disability and Retirement (FPDR) cash-flow mismatch to a future reading; approve a council carryover package opening attachments A through H for amendment; reallocate $2,100,000 of parks-levy funding away from the urban forestry tree-regulation program into parks maintenance; transfer administration of the tree-regulation program from Portland Parks & Recreation's Urban Forestry to the Portland Permitting and Development Bureau (PP&D) no later than Oct. 1; and adopt a narrower citywide 2% reduction in external materials-and-services (EMS) spending with specific public-safety exemptions.

Why it matters: The votes shift scarce discretionary dollars and program oversight while the council continues technical hearings (state shared revenue, the tax levy ordinance and an interfund loan for FPDR). The decisions will affect parks maintenance, how the city enforces its tree code, and near-term contracting and service budgets across multiple bureaus.

What the council did

- Continued state shared-revenue hearings and related items: Council closed the public hearing on the state shared-revenue items for now and continued the matter for further action when the budget is revisited later in the month. The council noted the state program distributes funds from cigarette, liquor and cannabis taxes under ORS 221.77 and that Portland's proposed share for 2025-26 is roughly $21 million (the budget language shown at the hearing cited the anticipated distribution).

- Tax levy and FPDR interfund loan: The council opened debate on the tax levy ordinance (agenda item 6) and received public testimony; the item was continued to a later reading. Councilors discussed agenda item 7, an ordinance authorizing a temporary interfund loan from the Portland Parks and Recreation System Development Charge Fund to the Fire and Police Disability and Retirement Fund (FPDR) to address a cash-flow gap between the start of the fiscal year and FPDR's tax receipts in the fall; staff said the…