Portland Civic Lab

A few of the things sitting in the record right now.

• Portland changed its form of government.Most people still cannot say who decides what.
• Downtown is being decided.What 5,275 parcels become is on the table now.
• Schools are choosing what to cut.The budget behind that choice runs to 134 documents.

There are always more. Each one gets decided out of documents anyone may read and almost nobody can.

1. Every number has a source.
2. Anyone can hire us. Nobody buys a conclusion.
3. Built to be used, not just read.

• 8 free public tools
• 316 parks, every one mapped
• 5,275 downtown parcels
• 134 documents behind one school budget

as of September 2026

There is no account and no paywall, and each figure links to the document it came from.

Portland Possible

Every parcel, building, and block downtown, and what each one could become, on one map of 5,275 parcels.

5,275 parcels · downtown.portlandciviclab.org

Portland Parks Atlas

All 316 parks, searchable by what you want to do there, with conditions, maintenance backlogs, and the partners caring for each one.

316 parks · parks.portlandciviclab.org

Oregon Governance Atlas

For each bill in Oregon, who controls the next step, drawn from the chamber rules, along with the bargains behind major decisions.

every bill · oregon.portlandciviclab.org

City Council guide

Every upcoming meeting from the official record, what is at stake, and how to testify.

every meeting · council.portlandciviclab.org

Ask Portland

Independent surveys weighted to the whole city, with the raw numbers printed beside the estimates.

raw numbers shown · ask.portlandciviclab.org

Portland Permits

Start with an address. Get the zoning, the permits you will likely need, the fees, and the timelines, before anyone files an application.

one address in · portlandpermits.org

Dashboards

Housing, homelessness, safety, budgets, performance. Twelve question-shaped topics such as "Are we building enough?", "Are people getting housed?", and "Where does the money go?". Every source linked.

12 questions · portlandciviclab.org/dashboard

decisionsdated · sourced

Decisions register

Every open decision in the City's development portfolio: what it is, who owns it, when it is due, and where the record says so. Dates and stages only, no ratings.

dated · sourced · portlandciviclab.org/decisions

Long reads, each with a headline number and a source under each figure.

• Where the next dollar goes$1.51 of the $1.99 levyPortland Public Schools cut teachers while its budget reached $2.77 billion. Both are true. Eleven years of budget books, read to find what decides whether a dollar reaches a student.
• The city budget, traced$8.55B across 1,478 pagesEvery dollar in the City of Portland's annual budget, followed from where it comes from to what it buys, and reconciled to the city's own published totals.
• From sidewalk to lease14 stagesThe fourteen places a person can be between the street and a home. Where the system loses people at each one, what that costs, and what fixing it would take.
• Why the count keeps risingabout 400 net added each monthThe region houses thousands of people a year and the number outside still grows, because more people fall into homelessness each month than get out of it.
• I-5 Rose Quarter$2.1B for 1.8 milesIn September, Portland closed southbound I-5 for five weeks, close to what freeway-removal advocates want permanently. Both sides' predictions were published before it began.
• What libraries are for38% of households hold a cardThe county rebuilt its libraries with a $459 million bond and now has to decide what they are for. Today 38% of households hold a card.
• Every big stage in Portland$1B+ in building bills by 2036Portlanders own the arena, the stadium, five theaters, the raceway and the town square. Repairs could top a billion dollars, and City Hall cannot say what any of them earns or costs.
• Oregon's data center bargain$450M+ a year in tax breaksOregon trades more than $450 million a year in tax breaks for data centers. The case for, the case against, and a test for whether a given deal actually paid off.
• Demolished on a promise5,141 homes promised, zero requiredLloyd Center mall came down on a promise of 5,141 homes. Nothing in the agreements requires a single one of them to be built.
• Who Portland's rules protect120,560 homes by 2045Why Portland's housing and tax rules tend to protect people already inside the system, while renters, new buyers and new homes carry today's costs.
• Who actually runs Portland9 layers of powerA plain-language guide to the overlapping city, county, regional, state, transit, school and health governments, whose boundaries do not match each other.
• The pension on your tax bill$3.9B promised, under 1% savedPortland owes $3.9 billion in police and fire pensions and has saved almost none of it. What that costs you, who receives it, and how it could be fixed.
• Oregon's big housing bet491,347 homes needed in 20 yearsCan building homes out of wood in factories help with Oregon's housing shortage? What mass timber is good for, what it costs, and where projects have failed.
• Is Oregon serious about its economy?a 1,200 job target cut to 800The governor's council wants to replace Business Oregon with a Department of Commerce. The case against the agency, and the asterisks behind the headline numbers.

• MethodologyAbout 46 sources, each with an honesty status: what the Lab trusts, what it does not, and why.portlandciviclab.org/methodology
• Open dataEverything the Lab assembles, as JSON and CSV. No key. CC BY.portlandciviclab.org/open-data
• Public recordsA tracker for the records requests the Lab has filed and where each one stands.portlandciviclab.org/records
• Org chartThe post-2025 charter city, about 7,300 people, on one chart.portlandciviclab.org/org-chart