On Thursday, March 20, Transportation leaders gave the County Board of Commissioners a look at the proactive steps the division is taking to make data-informed, publicly vetted decisions that make the most effective use of tax payer dollars on capital projects.
“We're in unique times.” Multnomah County Department of Community Services Director Margi Bradway said. “I'm proud, though, that in these times given the uncertainty and given the declining resources, I think our department does a very good job of managing risks and then setting priorities with the money we have with a solid policy framework.”
Bradway kicked off the presentation, noting that while transportation funding is a reliable source of revenue, it’s also a declining source.
“For that reason, there's a lot of discussion about how to raise revenues right now. At the state level there is talk of a transportation bill, we are engaged in that discussion,” Bradway said.
The Burnside Bridge replacement, maintenance and operation funding as well as funding for traffic and pedestrian safety are the County’s top priorities for that state bill.
Bradway also said the County’s Transportation Division heavily relies on federal funding, but right now there’s a lot of uncertainty with potential tariffs and how to factor that into cost estimates for projects.
Policy framework
Transportation Division Director Jon Henrichsen then spoke about the core principles and goals that guide the work of the Transportation Division.
“We strive to create a system that will be resilient in the face of ongoing extreme environmental events and that allows people to make choices that reduce emissions,” Henrichsen said. “We plan, design and build our infrastructure to withstand more frequent and more extreme flooding, temperatures that cause roadway and bridge warping and the ongoing threat of large seismic events.”
Henrichsen noted the County is also focused on building a system that creates freedom of mobility for all users, promotes community health and is safe to use while respecting and integrating the rights of federally recognized tribes in the County’s work.
“We want to be good stewards of assets that we're responsible for and manage them with a well planned out and thought out asset-management approach,” Henrichsen said. “We strive to do the maintenance on the system to make it last as long as possible and we plan for large capital replacements and capital maintenance when assets have reached the end of their useful life.”
However, he said maintenance and capital projects are constrained by limited resources which the County works to apply equitably across the system.
Condition of County infrastructure and funding needs
Henrichsen noted that overall, the County’s transportation assets are not in great shape:
- More than one in three County roads — 36% — need complete replacement.
- One in every five small bridges — 20% — need to be replaced. This includes the Stark Street Bridge which just reopened after six months of emergency work to repair its north approach that collapsed in September 2024.
To keep the big bridges on the Willamette River running as they currently are today, it would cost an estimated $840 million over the next 20 years. This estimate does not include the Burnside Bridge replacement.
But funding for those efforts has not kept up. The Transportation Division is currently funded by state, local and County gas tax fees, state and local vehicle registration fees, federal grants and one-time-only funds from the County General Fund.
Last fiscal year, the County’s Transportation’s budget was about $84 million.
“The State Highway Fund that provides all of our operating and maintenance funding and matches for federal grants is in a pretty precarious state,” Henrichsen said. “It dropped off significantly during the pandemic and has not recovered since.”
Gas tax increases that held funding steady under House Bill 20-17 ended last year.
“Our local gas tax has gone from bringing in $7 million a year in 2017 to just $ 5.7 million last year,’’ Henrichsen said. “If legislators don't act to pass a new transportation funding bill this session, we expect that the state highway fund that comes to the County and the City of Portland will begin to drop in future years. Our road system operations and maintenance budget and funds for grant match will be the most impacted.”
Needs Assessment and Capital Improvement Plan
Transportation Deputy Director Jessica Berry then described the Transportation Division’s need assessment, a 10-year look ahead at the anticipated revenue, what it cost to run our programs and what capital projects we need to build to meet our goals. The Division then developed five scenarios:
- Maintaining the status quo with no new funding
- Meeting all transportation needs and what that would cost
- Prioritizing rural roads
- Prioritizing bridges, large and small
- Prioritizing safety, equity and accessibility, with improvements most obvious in the urban east Multnomah County area
Berry noted under the status quo scenario, the Transportation Division is not meeting its current service levels, roads and bridges are in a state of decline and there is a $63 million budget gap.
“If the County were to meet all its current needs and maintain its roads and bridges to the service level the community seeks,“ Berry said. “There is a much larger funding gap and that is $647 million over ten years.”
In the other three scenarios, if one asset is fully repaired or maintained, another asset in the division suffers.
Given that assessment, Berry detailed the Division’s Capital Improvement Plan, touching on County roads first.
The County updated its Roads Capital Improvement Plan in 2020 after a robust public outreach process.
“Safety, equity and asset management were the top priorities along with mobility, resilience and sustainability,” Berry said. “What we heard over and over again is prevent collisions, make it safer to walk and bike, fix the problems before they get worse.”
Berry said the end of that outreach process resulted in 132 projects listed on the Road Improvement Plan, totalling $1.3 billion.
“For the Willamette River bridges also that list is prioritized on criteria that are related very strongly with the needs of the structure, electrical, mechanical, seismic structural needs. You see different projects than you see on the road side of the program,” Berry said. “The focus is very much on safety, access and asset preservation.”
Berry said the Bridge Capital Improvement Plan went through a major update in 2015. In 2020, the County made minor updates to the list with project costs totaling $1.7 billion.
Earthquake Ready Burnside Bridge Project Update
Later on in the presentation, Henrichsen gave an update on the schedule for the Earthquake Ready Burnside Bridge Project.
Despite significant uncertainty at the federal level — affecting infrastructure projects across the country — Multnomah County will continue to push ahead with its project to replace the Burnside Bridge. Design and other engineering work remains ongoing, and the County is committed to building a bridge that can withstand a major earthquake.
But to better navigate this uncertain time, Multnomah County has decided to extend the project’s Design Phase, delaying the start of construction by one year to 2028. This extension will also give the team an opportunity to further refine the design and identify potential cost-savings.
“We felt that the current uncertainty at the federal level surrounding funding and changes to the regulatory environment was too great to continue on the same schedule,” Henrichsen said.
The Earthquake Ready Burnside Bridge Project is Multnomah County’s highest priority transportation project. The County has been working on this project for eight years. Major infrastructure projects take many years to complete across administrations and changes in leadership. With projects of this size, it is common for the project timeline to extend, Division leaders said the County is prepared for this.
Advocating for Transportation Funding
After the presentation, the Board asked questions and expressed support and eagerness to advocate for Transportation funding.
“I'm really interested in – under the different scenarios being discussed by the legislature where that would land us in anticipated revenue versus identified need,” Commissioner Meghan Moyer said.
“The big question is how much will the package include individual large capital projects and how much will the package include maintenance and operations,” Bradway said. “For us if it lands one way or the other I think we're posed to receive funding either way. We are making a specific request around Burnside Bridge which you will see helps our overall budget. If large capital projects are not included or a long list of, then we will pivot to make sure that we bring home as much maintenance and operations funding as possible. We're working closely with AOC on that.”
Commissioner Vince Jones-Dixon sought to understand how the County is carrying out public engagement.
“Outside of going beyond Troutdale, how are we engaging with folks you know in Corbett and unincorporated areas of Multnomah County?” Commissioner Jones-Dixon asked.
“For the needs assessment, that's been an internal exercise looking at what would it look like for us to focus on those areas,” Berry said. “When we developed our Capital Improvement Plans, that engagement extended across the County. So we do specific engagement in each of the areas but in terms of ongoing engagement in our rural areas, especially in Corbett, we have regular meetings.”
Commissioner Julia Brim-Edwards noted transportation projects reach all County districts and expressed support.
“I'm going to be a fierce advocate for the Burnside Bridge Project and the other projects and assist anyway I can,” Commissioner Brim-Edwards said. “I know Commissioner Singleton has a key role to transportation projects but I'm happy to assist because we can't get anywhere and we're not connected to the region without going into other districts and really utilizing the really important assets and we need to have a strong infrastructure for the economy but also for our residents to be able to travel throughout the region. Count me in, whatever I can do to be helpful.”
Commissioner Shannon Singleton wanted to know more about demographics of communities who engaged with the Earthquake Ready Burnside Bridge Project. She also asked what the team will be doing during the schedule extension.
“What you shared about what you shared around pushing back construction – can you tell me a little bit more about what design will continue in this coming year, what activities will take place?” Commissioner Singleton asked.
“One of the things that we're working on hard is evaluating value engineering options,” Henrichsen said. “This gives us a little more time to do that and those are options that we could use to make the project more efficient, a little less expensive possibly. So we're taking some of the time to do that. We're still moving forward with design of detour structures, design of things that we have to do in the parks that take a lot of time and a lot of coordination. The things we have slowed down on are the main bridge package, which will pick back up towards the end of fiscal year 2026”
Chair Jessica Vega Pederson thanked the team for their extensive work and closed with a note of optimism.
“I really appreciate all the work that's gone into putting this presentation, but also really trying to stretch every single dollar we have to fulfill the needs that we know very much out strip the resources that we have,” Chair Jessica Vega Pederson said. “Please count me in and the Board in, in terms of being both advocates for additional resources for Multnomah County and highlighting the importance of projects both big like the Earthquake Ready Burnside Bridge but smaller that are about the ongoing operations and maintenance.”