© 2024 Paid for by Friends of Tootie Smith, #20116. All rights reserved. Services by burnett media group. Hosting by Hostdoodle.
© 2024 Paid for by Friends of Tootie Smith, #20116. All rights reserved. Services by burnett media group. Hosting by Hostdoodle.
This commission led the fight and was successful in stopping freeway tolling… TWICE, and we will succeed in stopping it permanently. In addition to our ongoing vocal opposition, this commission worked with the Clackamas County Department of Transportation and Development to draft a letter outlining the deficiencies with the I-205 Toll Project Environmental Assessment, especially the inadequate mitigation tactics for local roads for when drivers inevitably try to bypass tolls. This led to the governors decision to pause tolling for two years (I-205 tolling was planned for a January 2024 launch). With overwhelming support from Clackamas County organizations and residents, this commission continued our push to end freeway tolling and took a stand with formal endorsement of IP-4 (Vote before tolls) by a vote of 4-0. When it was clear that they had severe opposition to their tolling scheme, the governor decided to ‘stop’ tolling. Despite a ‘stop’ to tolling, the Governor has made it clear they are still planning to implement tolling and will take a look at it again after the election. They may try, but we will stop them when they do. For now, please sign the IP-4 petition, which would require a citizen vote before a toll is put into place.
Actions speak louder than words, and with my endorsement from the Clackamas County Peace Officers' Association it is clear that my decision to protect our county from the "defund & vilify the police'' movement that destroyed neighboring counties, is more than my opponent (the former Sheriff) did to protect and support our men and women in uniform. With record funding at the time, my opponent and former Sheriff reduced the number of peace officers. Under my leadership, we reaffirmed our commitment to having a fully funded police force with the 2023-2024 county budget, we guaranteed funding to keep every current boot-on-the-ground law enforcement officer, and 65% of general funds were allocated towards public safety.
We decreased the unsheltered homeless population by 65% by implementing a recovery oriented system of care (ROSC) that focuses on the core drivers of homelessness: addiction and mental health. As a commission, we knew we needed to do something different than our neighboring counties, who chose to focus on ‘harm reduction’ and enabling addiction by passing out needles, tents and drug paraphernalia while neglecting to treat addiction and mental health. Since adopting this ROSC, our county contracted with six providers to send 24 outreach workers to the streets each day to work on getting people into housing, and we hired eight more outreach workers to focus on rural parts of the county. From July 2021 to September 2023, 1,199 people were placed into housing, 1,327 were saved from evictions and 150 shelter beds were created or sustained. Households moved into a home with temporary rent support, 223 households received long-term rent assistance, and 591 households were saved from evictions. In total, 2,676 people received assistance that prevented them from becoming homeless.
As a commission, public safety is our greatest priority, and being the safest county in Oregon is proof that our county has not gone down the same destructive path as neighboring counties. While we are the safest county, almost a third of Multnomah County's population reported being victim of a crime in the last three years. The 2023-2024 county budget is the largest budget for public safety in county history, fully funding every single law enforcement position. To ensure justice is served in Clackamas County, our commission took advantage of an extremely rare opportunity of a 50 percent matching grant fund from the Oregon Justice Department to help us build a new county courthouse. This new courthouse is a NEED, not only because it was built nearly a century ago and is nearing being condemned due to safety issues, but also the county has grown almost 10 times the size since it was built. With this new courthouse, criminals will be held accountable and victims will get the justice they deserve.
For as long as I have been on the Clackamas County Board of Commissioners, I have relentlessly pushed back against the ongoing abuses of private and public land use from the regional government (Metro). Metro, the only directly elected regional government and metropolitan planning organization in the United States, governs portions of Clackamas, Multnomah, and Washington Counties. Despite being lumped together, Metro has REPEATEDLY sacrificed Clackamas County’s best interest for the other two counties it governs. Metros agenda-led transportation plans have led to worsening and more expensive commutes and made it far more difficult to improve essential services. Metros' extreme restrictions on land use have directly made housing less affordable by artificially forcing decreased supply and increased costs of building homes. One of the worst offenses came when Metro informed us that it approved a land exchange that expanded Multnomah’s Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) at the expense of usable land in Clackamas County — this was the first time the Metro Council undertook an exchange of this kind. It is clear from the numerous times Clackamas County has gotten the short end of the stick that Metro plays favorites. I am prepared to lead the charge when our residents eventually want out of Metro.
Our commission’s number one priority is public safety, and our results speak for themselves. Under this commission, the county has reduced homelessness by 65%, the four safest cities in Oregon are in Clackamas County and Clackamas County was recognized as the safest county of a population over 90,000. Our commitment to public safety is clear in the 2023-2024 county budget, which allocates 65% of general funds to public safety. It's the largest public safety budget in county history and keeps every law enforcement position. As a commission, we also promise to supplement potential revenue declines for the Sheriff’s Office with general funds because we are committed to a fully funded public safety effort. To ensure we have an efficient and effective justice system in the county, our commission also voted for the new county courthouse. We need a new county courthouse to handle our growing population and guarantee our residents can access the numerous services we provide at the county level including, Social Services, Behavioral Health, Public Health, Juvenile Services, Veterans Services, and A Safe Place Family Justice Center.
Part of our job as a commission is to ensure every tax dollar creates the most benefit for our county. In our recent budget deliberations, we asked all departments to be frugal and reduce costs where they could. We also implemented a new budget system that requires every department to submit a chart of accounts and reconcile their monthly budget. Our decision to change the budget system was so residents could have full transparency on how the county spends money. Compliance with this new budget system is essential for transparency. The Sheriff's office did not comply and attempted to circumvent our updated transparency requirements, so we called for an audit.
When I ran for office, I promised to stop “Portland Creep” from infiltrating Clackamas County, and this commission has done exactly that. While Portland defunded the police, poured millions of dollars into expensive “affordable housing” and aided the destruction of countless lives with its “harm reduction” tactics, our commission chose very different solutions than the 'Portland' model and they are working. We beat the “defund the police'' movement by fully funding law enforcement and passing the largest budget for public safety in county history. The result of these actions speak for themselves as a person is TWICE as likely to be a victim of crime in Multnomah County as they are in Clackamas County. We reduced homelessness by 65% through implementing a recovery oriented system of care to give individuals facing an addiction or a mental illness the support they need. And most importantly, we never gave in and allowed law and order to go out the window the way Portland did. We rejected “Portland Creep” and instead, under my leadership, we governed "The Clackamas Way”, which has resulted in a safer, stronger, and better Clackamas County.