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Seeks to represent: District 4 (Westside and parts of Southeast)
Age: 60
Pronouns: He/Him
Job: Self-employed as a driver
Fun fact: His grandfather was President Dwight Eisenhower’s speech writer.
Of all the City Council candidates running this cycle, Chris Henry is most familiar with seeking elected office. He’s done so more than a dozen times, for offices federal, statewide and local. Henry works as an Uber driver but drew the support to qualify for Small Donor matching Funds. Henry is a member of the Green Party and is most focused on clean energy and climate infrastructure, emphasizing in particular the need for the city to prepare for the Cascadian subduction zone earthquake. Henry has sat on a number of boards of progressive nonprofits, including Oregon Voter Rights Coalition and Honest Elections Oregon. Here’s what he’d do in office.
Why are you running for office?
I am running for office to give working people a voice and ensure long-neglected issues like earthquake preparedness are given the attention they need. For over a decade, I have worked with Honest Elections Oregon to curtail corporate influence in politics through winning campaign finance reform for Portland, Multnomah County, and Oregon. Now that our work has secured matching funds for the City Council election, we have the potential to seize this political opportunity and enact the progressive policies the majority of Portland supports. The next steps should be to clean up corruption at City Hall and democratize our economy.
What are your top three priorities if elected?
My top priority is to help Portland get Cascadia ready! If you think the housing crisis is bad now, wait until the big one hits. Oregon’s top scientists reported in 2018 that hundreds of thousands of people will be displaced due to the destruction of countless homes. We need a systemic overhaul to get ready. My second priority is to make PGE a public utility district so we can decentralize the grid at a neighborhood level and build systemic resilience. Third, we need to restructure our finances. I support establishing a Green Public Bank to invest in critical projects.
How would you foster economic growth in Portland?
With a Green Public Bank, we will have the institutional vehicle we need invest in consistent green economic growth in Portland. By taking our money back from Wall Street, we can invest in a green jobs program, urban agroforestry, expanded public transit, green manufacturing, and earthquake retrofitting for homeowners, apartment buildings, and major infrastructure. This can all be financed through loans for small businesses and grants for nonprofits. Combined with policies to support economic justice—like a $25-an-hour minimum wage—we can stimulate economic activity and provide an attractive future for working families in Portland.
The city of Portland is facing budget cuts next year. Where would you cut money from the current city budget? Please point to a specific program, bureau or place.
It is appalling that Portland is currently paying over $100 million a year to Wall Street, just as interest on loans! This is a huge corporate handout that should immediately be ended. With a Green Public Bank as our financing vehicle, we would free up all of these resources to be invested in Portland and for the benefit of Portland instead. I would also seek to greatly reduce the budget for the planned water purification boondoggle, which has unnecessarily quadrupled to $2 billion over the last five years. Decentralized water purification could be accomplished cheaper, and would be more earthquake resilient.
Where is the city currently wasting money, or is using money in a way you think is inefficient or unnecessary? Where is the bloat?
At a recent candidate forum, I spoke with a whistleblower who worked for nearly 15 years at Portland Parks & Recreation. She told me that the excuse of budget cuts was used to fire many park workers involved in essential maintenance, while upper management protected their hugely bloated salaries at the expense of the workers and parks. I would seek to conduct a comprehensive review of all city departments to identify and correct any such instances of bloat, while improving pay equity and strengthening protections for essential workers.
What is the Joint Office of Homeless Services doing wrong, and what do you see as things that can right the ship?
Although the Joint Office of Homeless Services has made tremendous strides recently in helping our homeless residents get rehoused and access needed services, there are still major challenges facing the department. One of the biggest issues is a shortage of legal support, especially eviction defense. Many people who need the office’s services are not receiving the legal representation they need to access them. As a city councilor, I will seek to increase resources available for public defenders, and remove unnecessary legal hurdles that keep our residents from accessing essential services. Housing must be enshrined as a human right.
Is the tax rate in Multnomah County (with Portland Clean Energy Fund, Preschool for All and supportive housing services taxes) too high, or at an appropriate level? If too high, what do you suggest be done about it?
The “hidden” taxes which I’m the most concerned about are the exorbitant rent costs and utility rate hikes the city is currently permitting through a lack of regulation. To remove these hidden taxes we should establish rent control and make PGE a public utility district. This would facilitate our transition to a decentralized renewable grid with greater neighborhood autonomy, lower prices, and resilience for when the megaquake hits. I also support lowering income taxes for the 99% to provide relief for working people.
What is the first piece of policy you would bring to the City Council?
I would immediately move to revoke Zenith Energy’s land use compatibility statement. City Hall should never have allowed it in the first place, and the city auditor’s recent finding that City Hall allowed Zenith to illegally lobby them behind closed doors is appalling. Multnomah County’s own research demonstrated in 2020 that the fossil fuel tanks of the CEI Hub pose a massive risk to the health and safety of our community. Keeping so much fuel on the banks of the Willamette on earthquake liquefaction soil is insane. Zenith is the biggest culprit here and must be stopped.
Beyond policing, what measures would you take to improve public safety in Portland neighborhoods, and where would you get the money for it?
Firstly, we need to fully fund non-policing community response, such as Portland Street Response. Secondly, we should invest in green streets to revitalize and beautify our more neglected neighborhoods, especially downtown. Many studies show that simply having more trees and flowers around improve people’s mental health and can help deescalate conflicts. Third, we must address the root causes of crime and poverty to ensure public safety. This will require more robust job training programs, especially for youth, and meeting residents basic needs like health care and housing. We can ensure the money needed for this with a Green Public Bank!
What experience can you point to that you believe would make you a prudent policymaker on the City Council?
What is more prudent than earthquake preparedness? My working-class background includes pouring concrete on the Northridge bridges after the Los Angeles quake of 1994. I know what it takes to repair our infrastructure—and that includes political infrastructure, too. My experience encompassing two decades of grassroots campaign finance advocacy has all been geared towards combatting the corrupting influence of corporate donations which constantly get in the way of prudent policy choices. Today, corporate interests like Zenith Energy would rather you pay with your life than they pay with their money to get Portland ready for the Cascadia megaquake.