Portland government transition leader Michael Jordan explains the process

KGW’s Straight Talk with Laural Porter

Portland is now less than a year away from abandoning the commission-style form of government that the city has used for more than a century. It's a dramatic change, and the plan that Portlanders approved in late 2022 gave the city only two years to prepare. With half of that time already gone, city leaders are racing against the clock to meet that deadline.

The mayor and commissioners function as the city council and also directly oversee city bureaus under the current system, but the overhaul will split up those roles. The council will expand to 12 members — three from each of four new geographic districts — and it will only set policy. The mayor will no longer be on the council and will instead oversee a professional city administrator in charge of all day-to-day operations.

Jordan previously directed Portland's Bureau of Environmental Services, and before that he was a Clackamas County Commissioner and worked for 11 years at Pacific Power and Light. Jordan was a guest on this week's episode of Straight Talk to help make sense of the new city government structure and provide an update on the progress of the transition process.