Portland's Bike Plan and Mayor Potter

So, my confidence in Mayor Potter has pretty much zeroed out.

Why?

He has decided to end funding for the current update to Portland's Bicycle Plan (called the Platinum Bicycle Master Plan because of its aim to make Portland into a Platinum-rated city for bicycling).

You see, the last time Portland issued a Bike Plan was in 1996.

It's now 2006, and a new effort is underway to update the plan.

$50,000 was allocated towards this effort in the current budget, and $100,000 was requested in next year's budget.

Potter decided to nix this request.

The BTA responded with the largest outpouring of community activism since Potter assumed office -- over 300 calls & emails on the issue:

Potter has decided to stay the course, and cut funding for the bike plan -- despite community opposition to this decision.

At this point, the next steps are to email the other four Commissioners, and ask them to support an amendment to the budget to add back in the $100,000 in funding for the Bike Plan.

Here’s who:

Commissioner Erik Sten:
erik@ci.portland.or.us

Commissioner Sam Adams:
commissionersam@ci.portland.or.us

Commissioner Dan Saltzman:
dsaltzman@ci.portland.or.us

Commissioner Randy Leonard:
rleonard@ci.portland.or.us

And, of course, if you're registered in Multnomah County (specifically, in Portland), vote against the charter amendment on the May 15th, 2007 ballot. Potter has shown that he can't be trusted. His strong-mayor initiative is thus a very bad idea -- he doesn't need and shouldn't have any more power than he already does.