Monthly Archives: October 2023

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Lars Larson Got It Wrong On Portland Public Schools


Conservative radio host Lars Larsen missed the mark.

In an Oct. 24 column about the impending strike by Portland Public School teachers, Larson said the district “… spends 15-thousand bucks, per student, per year.” 

He’s off by a mile.

I’m not surprised, though, that he used the $15,000 figure. That number is frequently cited in news stories. It is also close to the number put out by the National Center for Education Statistics, which estimates the per pupil expenditure in Oregon’s K-12 public schools for 2019-2020 was $14,829.[1]

Earlier this year I asked the Portland Public School District if that number still holds. The district said the average of budgeted per pupil expenditures for next year (2023-2024) is actually $11,000 per student. 

“This represents standardized site services. (teachers, principals, counselors, etc,” the district explained. “It does not include services like transportation, nutrition, SpEd, ESL or other central office supports and operations. “

So, is Larson’s number too high? is $11,000 actually the answer?

Nope. 

Now stay with me. 

“Once you include services like transportation, nutrition, SpEd, English as a Second Language Programs (ESL), other central office supports and operations, from a whole system perspective the budgeted per pupil expenditure number doubles and is closer to $22k/student (this is both GenFund and Special Revenue and does not include bond dollars).,” the District told me.

This is getting confusing. Is $22,000 the final number then?

Nope, again.

It’s not so much a lie as an obfuscation, a deceit.  

A lot of things PPS spends money on are not counted in calculating spending per student. When all spending is thrown into the pot, the spending per student jumps up substantially.

Let’s look at the 2022-2023 school year.

PPS served 41,470 students that year. At $22,000 per student, that would translate to total spending of $912.3 million. But the District’s 2022-2023 budget is actually $1.883 billion.

Why the huge difference?

Put simply, the $22,000 doesn’t take into account all funds that support the District each year. The table below, provided by the District, shows all resources available to the district for the school years 2018-19 through 2022-23. 

This table shows that all funds available to the District in the 2022-23 school year actually totaled $1.9 billion. divide that by 41,470 students and per student expenditures comes out to $45,533. That’s right, $45,533.

And that was more than the District spent per student in the 2021-22 school year, even though the number of students served declined.

In the fall of 2021, the District enrolled 45,005 students in grades K-12, a decrease of 1,932 students from fall 2020. The net loss was even greater than the previous year’s loss of 1,716 students.

A recent “Portland Public Schools Enrollment Forecast” by Portland State University’s Population Research Center projected that the District’s enrollment will likely continue to fall throughout most of the forecast’s horizon, declining to a low of 39,123 in 2035-36.  

In the meantime,  Angela Bonilla, president of the Portland Association of Teachers, is arguing , “We’ve been sounding the alarm to the district for nearly a year in bargaining sessions, but Portland Public Schools management has not been willing to fund what our schools need…”

And the beat goes on.

[1] According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the $14,829 of per student expenditures comprise expenditures for the day-to-day operation of schools and school districts for public elementary and secondary education, including expenditures for staff salaries and benefits, supplies, and purchased services. General administration expenditures and school administration expenditures are also included in current expenditures. 

Expenditures associated with repaying debts and capital outlays (e.g., purchases of land, school construction, and equipment) are excluded from current expenditures. Programs outside the scope of public prekindergarten through grade 12 education, such as community services and adult education, are not included in current expenditures. Payments to private schools and payments to charter schools outside of the school district are also excluded from current expenditures. The Center says researchers generally use current expenditures instead of total expenditures when comparing education spending between states or across districts because current expenditures exclude expenditures for capital outlay, which tend to have dramatic increases and decreases from year to year. Also, many school districts support community services, adult education, private education, and other nonelementary-secondary programs, which are included in total expenditures. These programs and the extent to which they are funded by school districts vary greatly both across and within states and school districts.

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Batten Down the Hatches: Portland’s New Form of Government is Going to Cost a Bundle 

In 2022, when Portland voters considered Ballot Measure 26-228 proposing transformational changes to city government, the City Budget Office estimated the cost of implementing the measure would be $910,000 to $8.7 million annually. 

“The range of the cost estimate is dependent on policy decision making outside the charter scope,” the Charter Review Commission said. 

Talk about buying a pig in a poke. To say the least, that left a lot of wiggle room.

Based on discussions to date, you can count on the final number being on the high end.

First, even the City Budget Office’s number is a ballpark estimate at best. As the Office said, “It is essential to note that the figures in this report are estimates and this report does not represent a budget document. Costs associated with council and mayor staffing levels, ranked choice voting implementation, and other election-related costs will only be known after certain operational milestones.”

Unknown’s, for example, are costs associated with the new ranked choice voting system, including voter education and outreach and changes in the Small Donor Elections program that provides candidates who have broad community support and follow program rules with up to a 9-to-1 match on the first $20 of small donations they receive from Portland residents. 

On top of that, according to Willamette Week, an emerging  sticking point is renovation of City Hall to accommodate the City Council’s expansion from a mayor and 4 commissioners to a mayor and 12 commissioners elected to represent four new geographic districts. 

From 5 to 13

Despite nearly a third of Portland’s downtown office market sitting vacant, and companies potentially reducing their footprint in more than 500,000 square feet of leased space that is set to expire market-wide during the balance of 2023, the city has budgeted up to $7.2 million to renovate City Hall to accommodate the council’s expansion. 

That renovation does not take into account the potential cost of establishing an individual office for each of the 12 commissioners within their district.

Meanwhile, Mayor Wheeler has proposed spending $893,000 – $1.4 million to relocate commissioners’ offices to another city building during the City Hall renovation.

Then there’s the need to plan for a City Administrator and that person’s staff. The Administrator will be responsible for implementing the laws approved by the City Council and manage the city’s bureaus. 

Mayor Wheeler has proposed that the City Administrator have an assistant city administrator and five deputies who would each oversee groups of the city’s bureaus. There are currently 26 bureaus, but that could change. Presumably, the City Administrator, Deputy City Administrator and the five deputies would also have administrative assistants of some sort.

Then there’s the issue of paying the mayor and the 12 city commissioners. Their initial pay has been set by an independent salary commission that was appointed in Jan. 2023. 

In June 2023, the salary commission decided to give all of Portland’s elected officials big pay raises under the new governance system.  The annual base pay for all incoming City Council members will be $133,207, $7,513 more than the current rate. The mayor’s annual base pay will be $175,463, a $26,202 raise. The salaries will go into effect in January 2025.

The salary commission was not responsible for proposing how the city should pay the new salaries. The current City Council will have to figure that out. 

Then there will be the staff of the mayor and each of the 12 commissioners. Currently, each city commissioner’s office has eight employees, including the commissioner, a chief of staff, and other aides performing a variety of duties.

Under Portland’s Adopted Budget for 2023-2024, three of the commissioners have a budget for 8 full-time positions and one (Dan Ryan) has a budget for 9 full-time positions::

  • Commissioner of Public Affairs, Rene Gonzales: $724,246
  • Commissioner of Public Safety, Mingus Mapps: $740,085
  • Commissioner of Public Utilities, Carmen Rubio: $775,038
  • Commissioner of Public Works, Dan Ryan: $761,405

In 2022, the City Budget Office assumed each of the twelve new offices would have between 3 and 4.7 full-time equivalent staff members supporting the Councilor and that each district of 3 representatives would have some level of shared staff providing communications and business operations functions. 

Mayor Wheeler has proposed that each of the 12 councilors have two aides and some shared staff. Three of the current City Council members have proposed that each of the 12 Council members have just one staff person and that there be some administrative staff to serve all the council members.

If the number lands at the total envisioned by the City Budget Office or Mayor Wheeler, be prepared to for higher costs with such an elaborate expanded city government and for calls for more staff as the 12 individual commissioners press for more power.

And get ready for more waste as time goes on.

As humorist P.J. O’Rourke put it, “It is a popular delusion that the government wastes vast amounts of money through inefficiency and sloth. Enormous effort and elaborate planning are required to waste this much money.”

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Memo To The Oregon State Bar Association: Police Your Members

Are personal injury attorney J. William Savage and patent attorney Usman Mughal exceptional Portland-area lawyers? They’d like you to think so.

Both trumpet that they’ve been selected as Lawyers of Distinction based upon a rigorous review and vetting process. An advertisement in the Oct. 8, 2023 edition of the New York Times even congratulated them for being among 223 of “The Newest 2023 Lawyers of Distinction”.

Nine more Oregon attorneys were celebrated in another Lawyers of Distinction advertisement in the April 2023 edition of the National Law Journal and the August 6, 2023 edition of The New York Times: 

  • Pamela Blackwell, Portland
  • Joshua Callahan, Milwaukie
  • Alice Cuprill-Comas, Portland
  • Thomas Howe, Portland
  • Nicole Lemieux, Portland
  • Gregory Oliveros, Clackamas
  • Maryanne Pitcher, Medford
  • Phillip Williams, Eugene
  • Kali Yost, Portland 

All-in-all, Lawyers of Distinction currently has 33 Oregon lawyers listed as members on its website.

Impressed?

Don’t be. 

About all that’s required to be named a “Lawyer of Distinction” is to apply yourself or be nominated, fill out some online forms and pay a fee. 

According to the Orlando, FL-based organization’s website, a Charter Membership, for $475 a year, comes with a Customized 14″ x 11″ genuine rosewood plaque. A Featured Membership, for $575 a year, brings the plaque and inclusion in a membership roster published in USA Today, The New York Times, The American Lawyer and the National Law Journal.

Then there’s the Distinguished Membership, for $775 per year, the most expensive choice (described on the organization’s website as “Most Popular”), which brings the rosewood plaque, the membership roster ads and an 11″ tall translucent personalized crystal statue.

Lawyers of Distinction,  incorporated in 2014, is like diploma mills, outfits that claim to be higher education institutions, but only provide illegitimate academic degrees and diplomas for a fee.

The Lawyers of Distinction website describes the application review process as complex and rigorous.[1]

Don’t believe it.

 It’s just pay-for-play. It’s selling badges.  It’s paying for meaningless accolades. Apply, pay the annual membership fee and you’re in.

According to the Florida Division of Corporations, “Lawyers of Distinction Inc.” is a private for-profit company with a principal address of 4700 Millenia Boulevard, Suite 175, Orlando, FL 32839. 

Robert B. Baker, at the same address, is listed as the President in the company’s 2023 Annual Report. 

Robert Baker, President, Lawyers of Distinction

But don’t go to the office address expecting to be ushered into a space with a clean, modern aesthetic that communicates success. The address is only a virtual office. The site offers a “Platinum Plan” for $69 a month and a “Platinum Plan with live receptionist” for $194 a month. 

Robert “Robbie” Brian Baker, a member of the Florida Bar (Bar #992460), is also the founder and owner of Baker Legal Team at 2255 Glades Rd., Ste 330-W, Boca Raton, FL 33431. According to the Baker Legal Team website, he has a degree from Boston University School of Law in 1989 and a B.A. from Ithaca College.  He began his career, the website says, as a prosecutor working as an Assistant District Attorney in Kings County, New York. 

As an aside, the firm’s website has the chutzpah to highlight that it’s a member of Lawyers of Distinction. 

Lawyers of Distinction’s website says it currently has over 5000 members. If 5000 lawyers sign up for the Distinguished category at $775 this year, the organization will rake in $3.9 million. Quite a haul.

In an attempt to fend off bad publicity, Lawyers of Distinction includes on its website a section headed, “Is Lawyers of Distinction A Scam?” But it answers its own question with nothing more than brief testimonials by selected members. 

It’s unlikely that any attorneys have been duped by Lawyers of Distinction, lured into believing they’ve been selected for a rare honor based on their legal work, when all they did was send in a check. They must figure that impressing potential clients is worth the deception.

But that doesn’t leave state bar associations blameless for this decay of honest professional representation.

If the Oregon State Bar Association and its 14,000 members are honestly committed to accountability, excellence, fairness, and leadership in the legal profession, as they claim, they should insist that Oregon attorneys halt falsely advertising themselves as Lawyers of Distinction or holders of other unearned accolades.

Responsible lawyers should maintain the integrity of the legal profession. To do otherwise diminishes the law. 

Accordingly, on Oct. 9, 2023, I submitted an ethics complaint to the Oregon State Bar against all 33 Oregon attorneys listed as members of Lawyers of Distinction. My complaint is that these Oregon attorneys are acting in an unethical manner by misrepresenting to potential and current clients that their selection as “Lawyers of Distinction” is evidence of their legal skills and achievements.

11/13/2024 UPDATE: Oregon State Bar Refuses To Prohibit Deceit and Misrepresentation By Its Members

[1] “Lawyers of Distinction Members have been selected based upon a review and vetting process by our Selection Committee utilizing U.S. Provisional Patent # 62/743,254. The platform generates a numerical score of 1 to 5 for each of the 12 enumerated factors which are meant to recognize the applicant’s achievements and peer recognition. Members are then subiect to a final review for ethical violations within the past ten years before confirmation of Membership. Nomination does not guarantee membership and attorneys may not pay a fee to be nominated. Attorneys may nominate their peers whom they feel warrant consideration. The determination of whether an attorney qualifies for Membership is based upon the aforementioned proprietary analysis discussed above. Membership is not meant to infer any endorsement of Lawyers of Distinction by any of the 50 United States Bar Associations or The District of Columbia Bar Association. Any references to “excellent,” “excellence,” or “distinguished” are meant to refer to the Lawyers of Distinction organization only and not to any named member individually.”

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Narcissism Run Amok: Jaiden’s Journey

We’re creating monsters.

Jaiden Rodriguez

Jaiden Rodriguez, a 12-year-old student at The Vanguard School, a K-12 charter school in Colorado Springs, CO, is enjoying a moment of media fame as he works to make a spectacle of himself .  He was recently reportedly removed from school because an administrator considered a Gadsten flag on his backpack to be associated with slavery and slave trade.

The Gadsden Flag

 The Gadsden flag was designed by independence-minded colonists in the run-up to the Revolutionary War. In the 1970’s, it was seen by some Tea Party adherents and Libertarians as a symbol of ideological enthusiasm for minimal government and the rights of individuals. Some have since associated it with the Confederate battle flag and the Ku Klux Klan. Suffice it to say, it has had multiple divergent personalities.

What has happened next in Jaiden’s case is a sign of the times. 

First, video of Jaiden being removed from class for displaying the flag went viral, thanks to Connor Boyack, president of Libertas Institute, a Utah-based libertarian think tank.

Then the usual public outrage erupted, stirred by impassioned claims Jaiden’s First Amendment rights were violated. 

And, of course, attention-seeking politicians then chimed in.

“This is a direct attack on his freedom of speech,” said Rep. Lauren Boebert, (R-CO),  a conservative firebrand .”Our education system has a deep-rooted problem with liberal bias.”

The Vanguard School’s Board of Directors subsequently allowed Jaiden to return to school with the Gadsden flag still visible on his backpack, calling the incident “an occasion for us to reaffirm our deep commitment to a classical education.”

That should have been the end of it, but Jaiden, spurred on by his attention-seeking mother, is apparently determined to maximize his moment of fame.

With the support of Libertas Institute, Jaiden has begun an online fundraising campaign to buy and ship books produced by Libertas Institute to schools across the country. The tax-deductible contributions will go to the Institute. 

“Connor and his team have some new American history books that teach the ideas of freedom and the founding fathers.,” Jaiden says in his appeal. “They’re so much better than the textbooks we have to use in school that don’t really teach history with any kind of depth.” 

The books, with titles such as “Should the collective control us?” and “Why are free markets important?”, “… empower parents like you to make sure your children have a foundation of freedom—to understand the ideas of a free society that socialists are trying too hard to undermine,” the Institute says. 

Noting that he’s grown more popular at school because of the controversy, Jaiden even has taken to some name-dropping, saying he’s talked with Ben Shapiro, a controversial conservative political pundit. 

In a podcast interview with Shapiro, Jaiden said the Gadsden flag “…was meant as a warning sign not to tread on our rights in the revolution. Which is funny because they tried to tread on my rights and then they found out they [could] not.”

Jaiden went on to tell Shapiro he expected to win a race for student council in a “landslide” due to the controversy and that he was now “Mr. Popular” at his school.

And to top it all off, now this 12-year-old 7th grader says his experience has made him want to be governor of Colorado in 18 years when he’s 30, the state’s minimum age to serve as governor.

We’re creating monsters. 

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Gov. Kotek and Rep. Hoyle: Two Peas in A Pod

Earlier this year, Gov. Tina Kotek and the Democratic Party of Oregon were under pressure to return a $500,000 contribution to the party in 2022 from Nishad Singh, the 27-year-old wunderkind director of engineering at FTX, the disgraced and now bankrupt crypto company.

John Ray III, the new boss of the bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, pushed to get the money back, but the party stalled, likely hoping the passage of time would diminish any public pressure to return Singh’s donation. 

But the pressure didn’t let up. Finally, in June 2023 the party paid the piper, repaying the $500,000 to federal authorities, but not from the party’s coffers. Instead, the money came from the campaign accounts of Gov. Kotek, Sen Ron Wyden (D-OR), Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) and three unnamed Democratic U.S. House members. 

Rep. Val Hoyle, (D-OR), elected to the House of Representatives in Nov. 2022 by Oregon’s 4th Congressional District, could learn something from all this. 

Don’t count on running out the clock on malfeasance.

Hoyle is trying to pull the same delaying tactics in a situation where the state’s Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI) wants her to turn over her personal cellphones so the state can probe them for messages relating to state business Hoyle may have conducted outside public scrutiny when she was Labor Commissioner. In particular, BOLI is interested in any communications related to the controversial cannabis dispensary chain, La Mota.

Hoyle has resisted complying with the state’s request, insisting, instead, that she would review her personal devices and determine what was relevant to turn over to the state. 

Talk about the fox wanting to guard the henhouse.

“She’s obligated to turn over those devices so they can be properly searched,” Ginger McCall, who served as Oregon’s public records advocate during 2018-19, told Willamette Week. “I don’t think that the public should have to trust her to do her own search, because obviously there’s a conflict of interest there on her part.”

Hoyle’s intransigence makes it look like she has something to hide. She’s be wise to learn from the FTX case that stalling won’t work. We’ll shame her until she gives in.