Minimum Wage – Kate Sykes for District Five

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Wednesday May 21, 2025

ONE BIG THING: Shaping UNE’s Growth in District 5

This week, the Council approved the University of New England Institutional Overlay Zone (IOZ), granting UNE long-term development rights over more than 70 acres in the Deering neighborhood. The zone creates a cohesive plan for UNE’s Portland campus and opens the door for projects like student housing for the medical school, transforming what has long been a commuter campus into a vibrant residential hub. It ensures that future development happens within a shared vision, not parcel by parcel.

Councilor Bullett and I also introduced an amendment—passed unanimously—to expand environmental protections along Capisic Brook, permanently safeguarding water quality and green space in one of Portland’s most climate-vulnerable watersheds.

At the same meeting, I introduced a resolution urging the Council’s Finance Committee to finalize a long-overdue PILOT (Payment in Lieu of Taxes) policy to address the growing footprint of Portland’s tax-exempt institutions.

Why It Matters

The UNE IOZ marks the third major zoning entitlement on tax-exempt land in recent years, following approvals for MaineHealth and the Roux Institute. These institutions now occupy vast sections of the city but are exempt from paying property taxes toward the infrastructure and services that sustain them. They benefit from zoning approvals, public infrastructure, emergency response, and long-term planning, but the cost is shifted onto working people, renters, and small businesses.

According to the City Assessor’s Office, approximately $3 billion in Portland property is currently tax-exempt, representing over 20% of the City’s potential tax base.

Meanwhile, property taxes are climbing. School budgets are growing. State reimbursements are uncertain. We are asking more from Portlanders while allowing some of the city’s largest landholders to grow without giving back.

A PILOT program offers another way, one that treats growth as a shared civic responsibility. It’s a model where prosperity is reinvested in the communities that make it possible, and it works in other cities.

Boston’s PILOT program generates over $30 million annually, using a fair formula based on property value and municipal service use, with credits for real community benefit. Portland has drafted a similar framework, but has yet to enact it.

It’s time to move forward with a model that matches our values and invests in our shared future.

Four Quick Hits

School Budget Passed: We protected vital school programming under fiscal pressure. A win for stability and equity.
Brighton Ave RFP Approved: The Council advanced affordable housing on city-owned land near the Barron Center. The debate, whether to prioritize family or elder housing, revealed how austerity forces us to choose between needs. I look forward to exploring new tools to build public equity in housing through the Social Housing task force so we can build housing for everyone.
Cannabis Loopholes Fixed: Retailers can now prepare non-alcoholic beverages onsite. A simple change that helps small businesses thrive on equal terms.
Minimum Wage Ballot Initiative Moves Forward: The Housing & Economic Development Committee approved a ballot measure that would finally include City workers, ending their exclusion from the 2020 wage hike and taking a stand for wage equity across sectors.

What Comes Next

The minimum wage initiative is a step toward fairness. But already, we’re seeing calls to carve out nonprofit employers, a move that would recreate the very inequity we’re trying to correct.

Let’s be clear: under that amendment, someone washing dishes in a non-profit senior home could be paid less than someone doing the same job in a restaurant—same work, same hours, less pay—just because of who signs the paycheck.

This is the logic of austerity: divide workers by sector, business size, or job title, and ask them to fight over what’s left.

But we know another way.

We can build a city where no one is carved out. Where wages are dignified, housing is abundant, and growth is shared. The work continues, and we’ll keep doing it together.

ksykes@portlandmaine.gov 207-558-5764

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Tuesday April 15, 2025

ONE BIG THING: Portland Adopts Vision Zero

Last night, the Council took a major step toward protecting all Portlanders by unanimously passing the Vision Zero resolution, a commitment to eliminate all traffic fatalities and serious injuries by 2045. This is a victory for anyone who walks, bikes, rides the bus, or simply crosses the street in our city.

What Happened

The Council unanimously approved a resolution endorsing the Greater Portland Council of Governments’ Vision Zero Action Plan. The plan prioritizes safety over speed; people over cars; and acknowledges that traffic deaths are preventable, not inevitable. It commits us to redesigning dangerous corridors, using crash data to target investments, and coordinating across departments to ensure every Portlander—regardless of age, income, ability, or neighborhood—can get around safely.

Why It Matters

We’ve seen a high number of recent pedestrian deaths in Portland—a tragic toll that reflects a transportation system designed for speed and convenience, not for human life. And let’s face it: the risks don’t fall on everyone equally. The less money you have, the more likely you are to walk, bike, or ride the bus. And the less protected you are in those modes, the higher your risk of injury or death. That’s not a coincidence; it’s a policy failure.

This resolution matters for the working-class people of Portland—for kids walking to school, for elders crossing Stevens Avenue, for transit riders navigating Forest Avenue before sunrise.

I’ve heard from many Portlanders who are ready for this change, including Erik in Deering Center:

“Our family gets around Portland by walking, biking, car and bus, and strongly supports Vision Zero… For me personally this means that my kids and I should be able to find a safe walking and biking route to any destination in the City.”

What Comes Next

The Sustainability and Transportation Committee will now begin work on a local implementation plan, identifying high-risk intersections, prioritizing low-speed street redesigns, and ensuring that vulnerable users are protected. Community members can and should stay involved to ensure this work keeps moving.

The Budget Crisis and the Cost of Disinvestment

Last night, the City Manager submitted her FY26 budget proposal to the Council, which includes a 6.2% citywide tax increase, driven largely by the state’s refusal to fully reimburse us for General Assistance (GA) and shelter beds. These are services that Portland provides not only for our residents, but for people from across the region. We’ve built the Homeless Services Center (HSC)—a facility unmatched anywhere else in Maine—to meet a crisis head-on, with compassion and coordination. But now the state is walking away from its share of the cost.

Meanwhile, Cumberland County has not funded jail-based addiction treatment at the level we need it to, leaving our police and our community with no clear path from crisis to recovery. Officers arrest people in crisis only to see them back on the street days later, still suffering—not because anyone failed to do their job, but because the system stops short of care. That’s not on our police. That’s a failure of county investment.

The impacts of this disinvestment ripple far beyond GA. When we’re forced to fill the state’s gap, it comes out of our core services, like public safety, youth programs, parks and street repair. Already, we are falling behind regionally on police and fire department salaries, losing workers to neighboring towns, and watching morale decline. These are the broader costs of austerity that don’t make headlines.

A budget is not just a spreadsheet. It’s a statement about what kind of city we’re being asked to become—and who’s being asked to sacrifice. There will be opportunities to organize and push back. For now, let’s name the truth: Portland has stepped up again and again to do what’s right. But we cannot keep doing it alone.

HEDC Meets Tonight on Workers’ Rights and Housing Justice

The Housing and Economic Development Committee meets tonight to discuss a series of proposals that could reshape housing and labor protections in Portland:

Minimum Wage Referendum: A proposal to let voters decide whether to raise the minimum wage for Portland workers. With the cost of living soaring, a real living wage is a critical tool to prevent homelessness and economic displacement.
Hotel Inclusionary Zoning: A long-overdue policy revision to ensure hotel developments deliver affordable housing for their workforce—not just more corporate profits.
Vacancy Ordinance: A proposal to require owners of empty storefronts to register and maintain them, making it harder for speculators to sit on housing stock while people sleep outside.

PET OF THE WEEK: Meet Archie

We had a very special guest at last night’s meeting: Nine-week-old Archie, the Portland Police Department’s new comfort dog, stopped by City Hall and instantly became a crowd favorite.

Archie is part of a growing effort to bring trauma-informed practices into public safety. He’s here to support community members and first responders alike—and remind us all that a little softness can go a long way.