Editorial: Measure to change Portland city government needs to prove its viability

Portland’s century-old “commission” form of government is a mess.

We all know this. Elected officials and civic organizations have increasingly called out the dysfunction of a system in which the mayor and city commissioners act as both legislators setting city policy and executives running their individual city bureaus. Over the years, this “commission” form of government has put City Council members with little expertise in charge of key city operations and fostered a lack of shared accountability for problems relating to bureaus under other members’ purview. It’s no wonder that Portland is the only large U.S. city to still have such an antiquated form of government.