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Portland City Workers' Strike Reaches Day 5 as Mediation Resumes Amid Budget Crisis
About 800 Portland municipal workers remain on strike over wages and cost-of-living increases, with state mediators meeting city and union negotiators for the first time in nearly a week as the city faces a $160 million budget gap.
PORTLAND â Hundreds of city workers braved steady rain Friday to continue picketing outside City Hall and the Portland Building as their strike entered its fifth day, with state mediators convening city and union negotiators for the first time in nearly a week.
Members of the City of Portland Professional Workers Union, or CPPW, walked off the job Monday after nearly a year of unsuccessful contract talks centered on wage and cost-of-living increases. The action marks only the third strike by Portland city employees in 25 years.
The union represents about 800 analysts, program coordinators and other administrative specialists across city agencies â more than 10% of Portland's 7,500-person workforce. CPPW President Kari Koch said Friday that roughly 80% of represented members have participated in the strike, which has drawn honks of support from passing drivers and what she described as an outpouring of public backing.
"We're willing to stay out here as long as it takes to get a fair wage deal," Koch said during a brief break in mediation Friday morning.
The union planned a noon press conference with representatives from nearly a dozen other labor unions. City officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The labor showdown is unfolding against a difficult fiscal backdrop. This spring, elected leaders eliminated about 140 city jobs, closed homeless shelters and scaled back public safety services and programs to close a $160 million budget shortfall. Officials expect another eight- or nine-figure deficit next fiscal year.
"City negotiations must balance the needs of individual bargaining units with the broader responsibility to maintain a fair, sustainable, and equitable compensation structure across the city, while remaining fiscally responsible and accountable to taxpayers," city spokesperson Alison Perkins said earlier this week.
According to figures released by the city, Portland has offered CPPW about $9 million in wage and benefit increases above scheduled annual cost-of-living adjustments through December 2027. City officials say the union has proposed about $19.8 million in new wages and benefits.
Koch disputes the city's analysis of the union's proposal, saying it factored in wages for about 100 vacant positions and jobs cut in this year's budget that CPPW did not include in its final offer of $9.3 million.
Annual salaries for CPPW members currently range from $62,000 to $173,000, according to city figures. Koch said about half of the union's members earn less than $100,000 a year and only a small fraction are at the top of the reported pay range.
The strike has drawn attention to the widening tension between Portland's strained finances and the demands of its workforce, a dynamic playing out in cities across the country as pandemic-era aid expires and costs rise. For a city already contending with visible homelessness and reduced services, the walkout by administrative staff threatens to slow permitting, program delivery and other routine functions residents rely on.
Mediators from the state Employment Relations Board are expected to continue working with both sides. It remains unclear how long the talks will last or whether either party will move from its latest offer.