Opinion
UCP Candidate Survey
By the Urbanist Coalition of Portland
The Urbanist Coalition of Portland (UCP) is a local political group working on housing, transportation, and complete neighborhoods. They surveyed all of the Portland City Council candidates about where they stand on UCP’s issues.
The full scorecard and candidate responses are available on their website: https://www.urbanistportland.me/policy/2026-portland-local-voter-guide.
Highlighted questions and samples of candidate responses are below.
At-Large
Does Portland need more housing? If so, how much? What kind? Where should it go? What steps should we take as a city to get it built?
Brunelle: Yes – a lot. Surrounding communities are building many times as many homes as Portland, and this is a serious problem: we are building suburban sprawl that will have expensive negative effects on transportation, environment, and governance cohesion in the decades to come. Portland needs to build more affordable and workforce homes along transit corridors and in Portland’s denser areas, as well as where land is available within city limits.
Snyder: Yes. I don’t think there’s any unit quantity limit at this moment, as housing is critically needed. I believe the focus needs to be on increasing housing supply with a focus on affordability: to various levels of AMI, LIHTC eligible, “missing middle”, and senior. […] With our land use code recently revised, I believe we have more pathways for growth and density.
Boykin: Yes, Portland needs significantly more housing, and the data backs that up. […] I would pursue city-backed gap financing for those large stalled projects; build housing on land the city, the school district, and local hospitals already own; and pilot an IZ-free zone on underused industrial land for a fixed ten-year term, with the neighborhood closest to it helping set the terms before any zone is drawn.
Do you support Portland’s Reimagining Franklin Street project to narrow Franklin Street making it safer, easier to cross, more pleasant for pedestrians and cyclists, and freeing up opportunities for housing development? If so, what priorities would you have for the project?
Brunelle: Yes. Franklin, designed to be a “car sewer,” has created an unsafe, impassable barrier for our community. Traffic needs to be slowed through street routing and engineering. […] Streets must be reconnected across Franklin to rebuild neighborhood interconnections that were severed by urban renewal. Cars must not be the priority – humans must be.
Snyder: I do support Portland’s Reimagining Franklin Street project to narrow Franklin Street. I think we always need to be open to change that responds to how we live now; and by narrowing Franklin Street Portland will recoup land for much needed housing and for the development of neighborhood nodes supportive of a more residential and pedestrian lifestyle.
Boykin: Yes, I support Reimagining Franklin Street. […] Narrowing Franklin Street, making it safer to cross, and freeing up land for housing is not just smart planning to me, it is repair. […] What would it take for you to believe a street built to move cars faster could become a street that brings a neighborhood back together?”
District 4
Does Portland need more housing? If so, how much? What kind? Where should it go? What steps should we take as a city to get it built?
Bullet: Portland needs more multi-family housing, specifically in our transit-oriented development zones, and preferably with community spaces and useful for the everyday person, affordable retail stores on bottom levels. […] Changing the Inclusionary Zoning policy will help, as will increasing our partnership with Maine State Housing and whoever is voted in as the new governor.
Viola: Yes. Portland hasn’t grown its housing supply at the same rate as the region. […] We need more housing at every level, not just towers downtown or sprawl at the edges. The City should streamline internal processes like permitting to make it easier and quicker to build, shift more projects to minor site plan review so they move faster, and remove barriers like the 25% IZ law.
Do you support Portland’s Reimagining Franklin Street project to narrow Franklin Street making it safer, easier to cross, more pleasant for pedestrians and cyclists, and freeing up opportunities for housing development? If so, what priorities would you have for the project?
Bullet: I fully support Reimagining Franklin Street. My priorities are dense family housing, very safe pedestrian and bike lanes, recreation space with lots of tree canopy, bus shelters for stops in both directions, and smart, safe, slow vehicle lanes with lights and intersections or traffic circles that make it almost impossible to violate traffic laws.
Viola: Yes. Franklin Arterial displaced housing and neighborhoods to prioritize car travel. My priorities would be building housing back into the corridor, prioritizing transit, pedestrians, and cyclists, expanding Lincoln Park, and planting trees for shade and traffic calming.
District 5
Does Portland need more housing? If so, how much? What kind? Where should it go? What steps should we take as a city to get it built?
Delgado: Yes. While I don’t have an exact number of new units to be built, I am a firm believer that an over-supply of housing is more beneficial than an under-supply.
Chretien: Yes. We need 5,000 units in the next 5 years. I favor building on all fronts: market rate, social, workforce, low-income. […] The city should aggressively solicit plans for new buildings and sponsor a bond measure to jump start social housing construction.
Lopez: Yes, we do. We need more workforce housing. We have the Jill Duson Fund […] I don’t believe the city should take the role of a developer or rental company. […] We need to work with planning, environmental and urbanist [groups] to create that perfect plan to have Portland grow with longevity and sustainably for our citizens of today and tomorrow.
Do you support Portland’s Reimagining Franklin Street project to narrow Franklin Street making it safer, easier to cross, more pleasant for pedestrians and cyclists, and freeing up opportunities for housing development? If so, what priorities would you have for the project?
Delgado: I would consider it. I would like to talk to city planners to see if they would have any other proposals such as changing a lane to be a bus lane. […] However, if the plan goes through, I would like to place a priority on wider sidewalks, safe crossings, and ensuring walkable and bike-safe infrastructure in the area.
Chretien: Yes. As long as it is beneficial for all Portland residents, including District 5 folks. That is, the plan must consider how it affects access to Commercial Street and the Old Port for residents who cannot walk from their homes to Gritty’s.
Lopez: No, I don’t. I think expending that amount of money and having a vital road lost [during] construction is not the best use of our budget. I believe new signals, lights and a better design to provide safety. […] Also, we should not let traffic move on red lights on Franklin.
Candidate grades on housing, transportation, and city projects are from UCP and not The West End News. WEN has not endorsed any candidate in this year’s city council election.
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