Portland Mayor Keith Wilson showed up at a Wednesday event in the Central Eastside to throw his support behind Kellie Torres, a longtime parks bureau official running for one of three District 3 City Council seats up for grabs in November. It is the first public move in what Wilson says will be a broader slate of endorsements aimed at breaking the gridlock that has defined the city's 12-member council since it took office last year.
Wilson told the crowd that Torres has given Portland “21 years of community-centered service, decency and professionalism,” and argued the city needs proven leaders like her because, in his words, Portland's recovery is real but fragile. According to The Oregonian/OregonLive, the mayor also said he plans to soon endorse Steve Novick, Olivia Clark and Eric Zimmerman, all sitting councilors seeking new terms this fall. Torres, for her part, said she was honored to have the mayor's support.
Torres served as chief of staff to Councilor Dan Ryan back when Ryan was a commissioner under Portland's old form of government, and her campaign is built around supporting small businesses and entrepreneurs, backing arts and culture organizations, and expanding affordable recreational programs for youths and families. She has picked up backing from the Northwest Oregon Labor Council, the Portland firefighters union, former Portland Commissioner Mingus Mapps and Multnomah County Commissioner Julia Brim-Edwards. Mike Thelin, who co-founded the Feast Portland food festival and hosted Torres's Wednesday event, also leads a coalition of business and community groups pushing for a taxpayer-funded Moda Center renovation.
Why the Council Math Matters So Much
District 3 covers much of southeast Portland and a slice of northeast Portland, one of two districts holding elections this November because of how the city staggered its inaugural council terms. Under Portland's 2022 charter reform, all 12 council seats were filled in the November 2024 election, but Districts 3 and 4 were given initial two-year terms expiring this December specifically so that half the council would face voters every two years, according to the City of Portland. That means six of the twelve seats, including Novick's and Zimmerman's, are on the ballot at once this year.
The stakes are high because the council has split evenly for much of its first term. The body includes a six-member progressive bloc known as Peacock, and the wider council has experienced frequent 6-6 stalemates, per the seed reporting from The Oregonian/OregonLive. Both factions view November's election as a chance to flip one more seat and finally establish a governing majority, since seven votes are required to pass standard legislation and Mayor Wilson himself does not hold a regular vote except to break ties, as previously reported by Hoodline. Wilson used that tie-breaking power on July 22 to save 30 city public safety and support positions after his budget proposal initially called for eliminating nearly 150 jobs to close a $170 million shortfall.
Voting Rules Give Long-Shot Candidates a Real Shot
Portland's multi-winner proportional ranked-choice voting system means candidates in Districts 3 and 4 need just over 25 percent of the vote, not a majority, to win one of the three seats up in each district. Council Vice President Olivia Clark, who represents Portland's west side in District 4, was the only candidate across all four city districts to clear that 25 percent threshold outright in the first round back in 2024, a sign of the political strength she brings into her reelection bid. Candidate filing for the November contests opened June 3, with an August 18 deadline for incumbents and August 25 for non-incumbents, according to city elections rules.
Endorsed Incumbents Carry Their Own Baggage
The mayor's prospective endorsements are not without complications. Zimmerman, who represents Sellwood and Eastmoreland alongside Councilor Mitch Green, received a formal warning letter from the Oregon Department of Justice in July over improper donation-swap arrangements in the city's public campaign matching program during his 2024 run, a matter Hoodline detailed in an earlier report on state warning letters. State prosecutors declined criminal charges, concluding candidates appeared to misunderstand the rules. Novick, meanwhile, is seeking a second council term and previously served as a Portland city commissioner from 2013 to 2017 under the old commission government, making him one of only two current councilors with prior city hall leadership experience.
On the other side of the aisle, Green is running for reelection alongside fellow Democratic Socialists of America members Tiffany Koyama Lane and Angelita Morillo, both also seeking second terms. Green said he has no plans to seek Wilson's endorsement. The party has criticized both Wilson's push to move more people off the streets and into shelters and his support for the Moda Center arena project, a $573 million renovation that the council approved with $120 million in city funding on a 7-5 vote earlier this week, a deal that included a Novick-led amendment raising annual stadium rent to $3.17 million.
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