Fast Stats

• Population: 167,642
• Percentage of residents registered to vote: 74%
• Largest population of color: Asian (8.9%)
• Median household income: $84,000
• Percentage of population with a bachelor’s degree: 55%
• Nathan Vasquez’s vote share in May: 46%

Sources: City of Portland; John Horvick, DHM Research

A Land of Optimists

Only about 9.1% of people in District 3 surveyed by the Oregon Values and Beliefs Center think Portland is getting a lot worse. That’s an incredibly low percentage, says executive director Amaury Vogel—about half of any other district. Vogel says there are a couple of factors that might explain the relative optimism. For starters, she says lots of people who live in Southeast Portland travel downtown for work. A recent OVBC survey showed that those who regularly visit downtown hold rosier views of the city. Another explanation: District 3, like District 4, is pretty liberal. But where District 4′s residents are typically older and wealthier, District 3′s are younger, don’t make as much money and are still relatively well-educated. That combination tends to inoculate them from grouchiness.

Original Hotcake House

1002 SE Powell Blvd.

The Original Hotcake House isn’t open 24 hours these days, much to Steven Johnson’s dismay. Over a tall stack of pancakes, the local pastor says a lot has changed in Portland over his 17 years living here.

Johnson, 68, says he’s a big believer in the future of Portland’s government. He’s an outlier among most diners at the Hotcake House on this Wednesday morning: He knows who he’s casting his vote for in City Council, though he declines to name the candidates.

“Portland is one of the places where it can be proven that politics can help people,” he says. “I think we’re going to see in the next 10, 20 years that Portland will be one of the places leading the way, that shows some other folks how to solve [homelessness]. Because people here have a heart.”

But there’s a catch. “I’m totally optimistic, but I feel completely inept to help,” he says.

This seems to be the prevailing sentiment at the Hotcake House, where voters outline their problems with the city but aren’t sure what solutions at a government level would look like.

For Zachary Wegner and his friends, the homelessness problem is top of mind. He’s on the fence between caring for those around him and wanting some law and order. He says he pays to live in a nice part of Portland and would like to be able to walk around past a certain time at night.

The 23-year-old admits that if he were put on City Council, he wouldn’t know where to start with implementing policy. He’s joined by Matthew Rayl, 32, who says he consumes a few local news stories a day but doesn’t know how he’d tackle homelessness as a council member. He’s not even sure what policies the city has tried or discussed.

Nathaniel Young has an idea. The 24-year-old is clear about what Portland did wrong in addressing addiction and will be looking for a candidate with a tangible solution. He works the night shift at a homeless shelter not far from the diner and talks to the people he serves all the time.

“All the other places that have implemented decriminalizing drugs and everything, they have rehab centers and they have really good programs for people to quit,” he says. “We don’t. Portland does not. We’ve got a couple places that are good for detox, but they’ll detox you and they’ll kick you out and that’s it.”

Even if most of the patrons aren’t sure what the solutions are, most were confident they want council members with a proven record of getting things done. Many of them weren’t aware of the new council structure and ranked choice voting, and were more focused on the qualities individual candidates could bring to the table.

Johnson says he hopes the people elected to represent District 3 will abandon party politics or impressing a certain crowd, and instead earnestly collaborate.

“If we could have a candidate that really didn’t smear anybody else, that maybe even lifted up people with opposing points of view, and wasn’t doing it in a tactical way…that’s what I look for in a candidate,” he says.