Last exit

A couple of the guys on the Portland City Council are talking about asking the city's voters one more time to come to their senses and reject some of the crazier parts of the charter reform happy meal that they foolishly passed last November. 

Mingus Mapps and Dan Ryan are floating a proposal that would, like the charter change that passed, get the council members out of managing the bureaus and hire a city manager who would run things day to day. And it would keep the pending change to electing the council from four wards. But unlike the current charter revision, as I understand it, the new proposal would:

• Give the mayor the right to veto council actions, subject to the possibility of council override. Under the current plan, the mayor would supervise the manager and serve as a political heat shield for the council members, but have no say in any of the ordinances and resolutions that the council passes.
• Have just two elected representatives from each ward, rather than three. This is being billed as a money-saving feature, but it might also make it harder for extremist nuts from getting elected to the governing body.
• Change the new "ranked-choice" voting system from the current, untested, Byzantine version that apparently allows a person with 25 percent support to get elected, to a more standard "instant runoff" version. This would further ensure that lunatic fringe people don't get council seats.

Looking over at this story, you can see why Mapps and Ryan are concerned. Sarah Yada Yada and Jo Ann With the Bullhorn are back, and they're "schooling" other dimwits such as the queen of the charter commission, Candace Avalos, to join them in taking over the council through "ranked-choice" maneuvering. Under the current charter revision setup, these people are probably going to get four seats, maybe more, and they'll all get copious amounts of taxpayer money to run their campaigns.

Regardless of whether Mapps and Ryan actually go forward and get their changes on the ballot this fall, Portland is going to have a severe case of buyer's remorse once the new council in session. Last year the voters said that anything is better than what we have now, but they're going to find out that that was an overreaction.

I support what Ryan and Mapps are trying to do, but I'd go a lot further. First of all, we ought to have seven or eight districts rather than just four. Just look at the mess that's about to happen with a sliver of the east side being disenfranchised by being made part of an overwhelmingly west side district. And honestly, one council member per district is just fine. 

As for "ranked-choice" voting, it's a solution in search of a problem. One person, one vote has worked pretty well over the millennia.

And wait 'til you see whom the "ranking" gives us. Especially with taxpayers paying the campaign bills for the weirdos. Portland is, once again, going to be extremely sorry with its hasty choices.