Portland City Council has joined the growing list of officials pressing Portland Public Schools to slow its plan to close up to 14 schools.
Council members Tiffany Koyama Lane and Elana Pirtle-Guiney sent a letter Friday to the school board and Superintendent Kimberlee Armstrong, asking the district to "pause and revise its timeline for final school closure decisions" until it provides more detail about the proposed changes and hears from community members about their impacts. All 12 city councilors signed the letter.
The district, Oregon's largest, announced two scenarios on Oct. 5 that would close either 11 or 14 schools, pointing to declining enrollment. Enrollment has dropped 11% since the 2019-20 school year. The proposals also include converting several K-8 schools into elementary schools and relocating dual-language programs. Students, parents, teachers and community members have protested the changes through letters, rallies and other actions since the announcement.
In their letter, Koyama Lane and Pirtle-Guiney tied the city's fortunes to those of its public schools. "The City's investments in affordable and family-sized housing, community centers, safe streets, and neighborhood development are closely connected to the availability of strong, accessible public schools," they wrote. The councilors also asked the district to share information about the "financial instructional, transportation, and neighborhood" impacts of its proposals.
Koyama Lane, a Portland teacher, has spoken out against the closures for weeks. "I want to find ways the City Council can use our platform to engage the community and bring us together to get our questions answered and to use the data wisely for the best possible outcomes for our City in the long-term," she wrote in an Instagram post earlier in the week.
School board vice chair Rashelle Chase-Miller responded to the letter Friday afternoon, noting that its arrival days before Tuesday's election, in which several council members are on the ballot, was notable. "It's a bit frustrating to see other local electeds weighing in on a situation that .. It feels like they haven't been keeping pace with, or really very interested in, until this moment," she said. "When our schools have been in crisis for years."
The councilors are not the only elected officials raising concerns. Earlier this month, Gov. Tina Kotek sent Portland school officials a letter asking them to "take the time to get this right." On Friday, Republican gubernatorial candidate and state Sen. Christine Drazan released a video featuring a parent whose daughter plans to attend Sellwood Middle School in Southeast Portland next year, one of the schools proposed for closure. In the video, Drazan urged parents to keep pushing for a delay. "When I'm in office, I'm not going to stand for this," she said. "I'm going to work with Republicans. I'm going to work with Democrats. We're going to solve this problem. We're going to keep your local neighborhood schools open."
Earlier this week, council member Mitch Green filed an emergency "Save Public Schools" resolution that included calls to Kotek, the district and the city, but it failed to get the nine votes needed to appear on the council agenda. According to Green's chief of staff, Maria Sipin, he still plans to introduce a similar resolution urging the state to prioritize funding for Portland schools. Green said in an Instagram post that more than 1,000 community members had contacted the City Council asking for a pause.
The funding question is complicated. Leaders in both Portland and Salem-Keizer Public Schools, another district weighing closures, say budget problems are separate from declining enrollment. Portland projects a $65 million deficit for next year's budget, while Salem-Keizer projects a $46 million gap. District leaders say closing schools helps stretch limited funding, and it is unclear whether additional state money would prevent closures.
Still, the closure debate appears to have spurred interest in overhauling school funding in Oregon, possibly during next year's legislative session. "This isn't just about PPS or any single school district; we need a sea change in Oregon to understand and support the power of our public dollars to invest in the infrastructure that keeps us all healthy and connected to one another and the world," wrote state Sen. Khanh Pham, D-Portland, in a Facebook post from a Southeast Portland PTA meeting.
