(Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)
— By BikeLoud PDX Board Chair Aaron Kuehn and Oregon Walks Executive Director Zachary Lauritzen
Fixing Our Streets, the measure to renew Portland’s gas tax (Measure 26-245), will be on the ballot this May. As the leaders of BikeLoud PDX and Oregon Walks, we are voting YES and encourage you to do so as well.
We know that our current car-centric transportation system is unsafe, harmful to our climate, unpleasant to use and live near, and is financially unsustainable. We believe these funds, by improving multimodal routes, will be part of the solution that our community needs. Both our organizations have frustrations with a number of decisions made by the Portland Bureau of Transportation, and we suspect many of you do as well. We have a long way to go to prioritize walkers, bikers, and transit users. And yet, we believe starving PBOT of these funds will only sacrifice some of the best programs they offer.
For the past eight years, this 10-cent per gallon tax funded over $150 million in basic infrastructure improvements for Portlanders to bike, walk, and roll throughout the city, and this renewal will continue to fund multimodal improvements. Some of the main priorities include investing in Neighborhood Greenways with diverters and smoother pavement, Safe Routes To School, and safety improvements to our dangerous busy streets. Plus, PBOT will fill potholes, something every traveler can appreciate.
In the face of PBOT’s budget gap, Measure 26-245 renews the same 10-cent tax we’ve paid since 2016. While maintenance needs continue to grow, the gas tax provides important funding to pursue our goals for multimodal infrastructure. A few dollars a month in local taxes will help maintain streets and make them safer.
This measure is bigger than any one political leader or any one person. You may disagree with any number of decisions made by PBOT leadership over the past months and years. Still, we need to give our future city leadership—especially the soon-to-be-elected 12 member City Council—critical safety and maintenance resources.
That’s why we are voting YES on Measure 26-245, the Fixing our Streets ballot measure.
