The Portland Parks & Recreation Bureau’s (PP&R) sudden closure of Pier Park Pool for repairs has alarmed pool advocates. “We’ve received emails from citizens worried that what happened to Columbia Pool might also happen to Pier Pool,” said Keola Morley of Friends of Pier Park (FPP).
The Bureau closed Pier Pool after a water main broke June 27. Contractors have examined the breakage, and have not yet announced if the pool will reopen this summer.
As pool supporters plan their strategy to reopen the pool, they face a new world of City of Portland politics. They have traditionally pressed their case to the elected city commissioner in charge of the Parks Bureau. That is now moot, as under the new City Charter that voters passed two years ago and will take effect next year, elected councilors have no power over PP&R or any other bureau. Under the new Charter, as of Jan. 1, 2025, the newly created City Administrator position will manage Parks and virtually all other bureaus. The Mayor will appoint the City Administrator whom the City Council must then vote to confirm. Mayor Ted Wheeler assumed interim control of all bureaus on July 1 and will retain them until the end of 2024.
Pool advocates hope to get Wheeler’s assurance that Pier Pool, a neighborhood focal remain open. The recent closure has rekindled memories of a previous battle with PP&R to save the pool. Neighbors rebelled when then-Commissioner Dan Saltzman proposed permanently shuttering Pier Pool in 2005, said FPP’s Mary Ann Aschenbrenner. Saltzman singled out Pier because of its relative age and lower volume of swimmers, compared to newer, larger pools in the city. The community resoundingly said no. “Seven hundred local residents signed a petition supporting the pool that we took to City Council”, said Aschenbrenner. She credited then-Commissioner Sam Adams with turning Council opinion around to save the pool.
Then and now, Aschenbrenner claimed, the core issue is Parks’ consistent failure to maintain Pier Pool. As an example, she cited that the pool’s water pump was taken from an 80-year-old, World War II-era Liberty ship. When Parks staff did pool repairs several years ago, they acknowledged the inherent problems with the old water pump, but did not have the maintenance budget to repair it. “That lack of preventive maintenance is malfeasance,” she said.
The North Peninsula Review reported in May 2023 that PP&R had the biggest maintenance backlog of any City of Portland bureau—$600 million. That figure has since increased to $615 million, a number that is twice the $276 million deficit of the Seattle Parks and Recreation department that serves a larger population.
Wheeler is not seeking re-election, and whoever succeeds him, will, with the new City Administrator have management authority over all Portland parks including Pier Park. The three leading candidates to replace Wheeler in the November general election are Commissioners Rene Gonzales, Mingus Mapps and Carmen Rubio. Gonzales and Commissioner Dan Ryan proposed an $800 million bond measure earlier this year to address Parks’ and fire station maintenance, but the idea died after Wheeler, Rubio and Mapps opposed it.
Since then, Rubio has warmed to a bond strategy. “The city has deferred maintenance needs in our parks system…I support a bond to fund those needs, but we won’t be able to do it all at once,” Rubio said. She also supports changing state law to allow a portion of System Development Charges (SDCs) to be used for maintenance, rather than just on new projects. SDCs are fees that the city charges developers for new construction.
Meanwhile, pool advocates are mobilizing. They cite an urgency as nearby Columbia Park Pool remains closed, also due to lack of maintenance. “We’re on the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers here,” Aschenbrenner explained. “Learning to swim here is a critical skill because kids will be tempted to try to swim in the rivers,” she said. “We also have a diverse and low-income population and on free swim days, the line to get into Pier Pool extends around the block,” she added. The FPP has organized an email and letter campaign to Mayor Wheeler and interim City Administrator Michael Jordan.
The Friends of Pier Park have invited all 24 candidates for the new North/NE Portland city council seat in the November general election to discuss Pier Park Pool issues at 6:30 pm, Tuesday, Aug. 13 at Picnic Area H. It is located directly across from the pool entrance near the corner of N. St. Johns Avenue and N. Senaca Street. The path will be marked with balloons. The public is invited.