Portland finance committee approves Mount Hood cable budget, supplemental budget, $800,000 cannabis loan and new solid-waste rates

The Portland City Council Finance Committee on Monday recommended approval of several fiscal items, including the Mount Hood Cable Regulatory Commission’s FY2025‑26 fund budget, a final supplemental budget to avoid fiscal‑year year‑end over‑expenditures, an $800,000 temporary loan to the recreational cannabis tax fund and new solid‑waste and recycling rates set to take effect July 1.

The committee voted unanimously to send the Mount Hood Cable Regulatory Commission (MHCRC) FY2025‑26 fund budget to the full council with a recommendation for passage. The commission’s FY26 budget anticipates about $4.7 million in revenues, a beginning fund balance of roughly $6.3 million and roughly $11 million in total resources; staff told the committee the budget packages operating costs, quarterly franchise disbursements, capital allocations for community media centers and about $1 million in community grants.

Why it matters: the MHCRC distributes franchise and PEG (public, educational and governmental) fees that fund two community media centers — Open Signal and Metro East Community Media — and support gavel‑to‑gavel meeting coverage, capital equipment and community media grants that produce local programming.

Andrew Spear, franchise utility program manager in the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, and Douglas Simaralu, MHCRC finance manager, summarized the budget and said both franchise fees and PEG revenues have declined as subscriber counts have fallen. “Subscriber counts continue to decline,” Simaralu said, citing a drop from about 100,000 subscribers in 2022 to roughly 75,000 in 2024. The budget maintains a roughly $1,000,000 community grant allocation for FY26 and increases capital and operating support for Open Signal to cover expanded council and committee coverage.

Julia DeGraw, Portland’s appointed representative and chair of the commission, told the committee the MHCRC voted unanimously to recommend the FY25‑26 budget at its May 19 meeting and that Fairview and Multnomah County had already approved the same budget. “Through the fees collected from the franchise agreements, the commission provides community media centers with the operational and capital funding support that they need,” she…