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I joined the Council at a time when a major shift was occurring in Salem politics. For many years the Chamber of Commerce, especially its representation from the building industry, had dominated the Council and shifted scarce resources to promote the city's extensive growth. Over the course of three decades, the Council approved virtually all annexations and did little to reduce subsidies for the expansion of infrastructure that were paid out of the increasingly strained general fund. In 1996, however, the people of Salem elected a progressive lawyer, Mike Swaim, as Mayor. Swaim represented an agenda that included opposition to sprawl and promoted "smart growth," a method of growth management that is hotly contested around the country, but especially in Oregon, which has some of the most innovative and restrictive land use laws in the United States.

Over the past quarter century, Oregon has implemented a set of complex land use regulations designed to preserve farm and forest lands by reducing urban sprawl. In a nutshell, every city is surrounded by an "urban growth boundary" (UGB) outside of which urban development is prohibited. Theoretically, urbanization should only occur between the actual city limits and the UGB, and the expansion of the latter can take place only when a city no longer has a twenty-year supply of land available for building. Despite certain flaws, there is no doubt that this system of regulation has slowed suburban sprawl and done much to protect farm and forest lands. The system also raises a whole set of political issues for public debate. For example: How fast should a city "build out" to the UGB? What level of housing density is appropriate? How does one balance residential, industrial, and commercial development with the need for open space and parks? In what geographic area should public investment be focused? To what extent should the public subsidize private development? These are just a few of the issues that lie at the heart of local politics as various interest groups (e.g., developers, environmentalists, etc.), and ordinary citizens debate the impact of growth on their quality of life.

Although he did not have majority support in the council during his first term, Swaim and his supporters brought these issues to center stage. Very importantly his efforts were matched by those of City Watch, a local watchdog group, which aimed to democratize the expansion process by having all annexations placed before the public for a vote. City Watch supporters insisted that a vote of the people should follow a public debate in the Council over the value of annexations, a position that was fiercely resisted by the development industry and its local, Gannett-owned mouthpiece, the Statesman Journal, Salem's sole daily.

The issue came to a head in May of 2000 when City Watch succeeded in having its measure seeking voter approval of annexations placed on the ballot, and both sides mobilized for the mayoral and Council elections. As is often the case with local political issues, the growth issue in Salem and elsewhere makes for strange political bedfellows, and Swaim and City Watch were able to construct a loose electoral coalition that included Democrats, Greens, Republicans, and independents to win a resounding victory. To hold onto his unpaid job, Swaim raised $27,000 to defeat an opponent who raised four times as much. The story was much the same in the council races, in which massive developer contributions could not overcome grassroots organizing and solid door-to-door work. In the end, the annexation measure passed comfortably and Swaim emerged with a 6-3 majority (consisting of 2 Democrats, 2 Republicans, and 2 Greens). This coalition, despite its political diversity, was prepared to implement sweeping reforms not just dealing with growth, but on a wide range of issues.

In the fall of 2000 many of the people who had worked for the electoral victory came together to construct an "Agenda for a Livable Salem."⁵ The purpose of this document was to guide the formation of Council priorities by making a series of specific proposals in a variety of areas. In summary form the most important of these called on the city to:

-- Pay a living wage and require its service contractors to do so.

-- Require businesses with which it contracts to disclose their policies and histories regarding employment, human rights, and environ- mental records as a part of the bidding process.

-- Recognize the right to collective bargaining for all its workers (e.g., unorganized seasonal employees) and require its private sector partners to do the same.

-- Strengthen the authority of the Salem Human Rights Commission.

-- Support the right of farm workers and immigrant workers to unionize, and protect the rights of undocumented workers.

-- Create a Citizen Review Board to ensure the fair treatment of all residents by the police.

-- Promote alternative means of transportation to the automobile, and link transportation and land-use planning more effectively.

-- Protect, preserve, and restore Salem's natural places by working more closely with grassroots organizations such as Watershed Councils and Neighborhood Associations.

-- Protect and restore the urban forest.

-- Pass legislation that would eliminate corruption and conflict of interest from local elections and encourage public participation.

-- Explore and implement progressive forms of taxation.

-- Encourage more public input in the land-use planning process.

By themselves, none of these proposals is particularly radical, but taken together, they represent a powerful push toward creating a city government that conducts itself responsibly, effectively combats discrimination, protects the environment, and promotes economic equality and democratic participation. Despite some very substantial ideological differences, the council majority recognized that these reforms would significantly enhance Salem's quality of life for all citizens. Encouraged and sometimes prodded forward by various groups of "agenda" supporters, who also organized public rallies and mobilized to testify at public hearings, the Council majority generally stuck together in moving the agenda forward. Over the next two years it implemented almost all of it.⁶

In addition to passing living wage and corporate disclosure ordinances, the Council welcomed the city's seasonal workers' effort to unionize, it created Oregon's first environmental commission, and it strengthened protection of the city's waterways. The Council broke new ground by requiring all annexation applicants to tell voters exactly what they plan to do with land that comes into the city and to provide them with a cost/benefit analysis of their development proposals. It significantly raised developers' fees for new infrastructure and, thus, reduced public subsidies for growth. In the area of civil rights, the council created a Citizens' Police Review Board and passed a series of ordinances strengthening protection of minorities. And, finally, it followed through in the sphere of electoral reform by sponsoring a successful ballot measure restricting any councilor from voting on an issue if he or she received of total of $501 or more in campaign contributions over the previous 4 years from any party involved.⁷

 With the important exception of progressive tax reform (more on that below), by any stretch of the imagination the Council lived up to the promises it had made to the community. At a time when national and state politics provided little to inspire or encourage progressive activists to press on, those in Salem could take heart with their local success. Although Mike Swaim decided to leave the Mayor's job and run for the legislature, many hoped that in the upcoming 2002 elections our majority would be returned to office.

The "Counterrevolution" Rears its Head

 They were to be sadly disappointed. The "progressive" slate was trounced in the May elections. Along with our mayoral candidate, two of our Council candidates, including myself, went down to defeat and a third lost in a runoff in the fall. Only one member of the slate won a victory. In the aftermath of our debacle there has been much soul searching about its causes and I don't profess to have "the" definitive answer. I think, however, that the analysis below, which focuses in particular on my own race, incorporates the views of many involved.

There are many reasons why we lost. Some of these, such as tactical mistakes, the quality of our candidates, or the failure to mobilize "our" voters, were at least within our partial control, but others, such as the economic downturn that had hit Oregon especially hard, were not. This time around we certainly did not have a mayoral candidate with the energy of the one put forward by our opponents. Janet Taylor, Salem's "Margaret Thatcher," is an ambitious, well-connected, and well-financed local industrialist who campaigned hard for a full year not against her immediate opponent, but against Mike Swaim and the agenda he represented. She was backed in her effort by the Chamber of Commerce leadership, the developer community, and the Statesman Journal. These institutions, long used to having their way in the City government, were incensed at having lost power and had challenged virtually every economic and environmental element of the agenda.⁸ During the campaign, they worked together effectively to construct and broadcast a message to undermine the credibility of the council and its policies. They themselves had little of substance to offer, but negative campaigning and outright lies did the trick!

In many ways I was well positioned to win my race. As Council President I was closely allied with a popular mayor, and all the major unions supported me. I had an experienced manager, enough money and volunteers, and was willing to campaign hard. I also had an excellent record to run on and decided to keep the campaign positive. Despite the vociferous criticism of the Chamber of Commerce and its allies, most people expected me to beat my opponent, Jim Randall, a marketing consultant with good connections to the Chamber and to the local arts community, whom the press described as a "moderate Republican."

Unfortunately, my campaign underestimated and failed to deal effectively with our opponents' strategy, which aimed to avoid most substantive issues and to criticize the Council along personal and ideological lines. Backed by the Statesman Journal, the Chamber (especially its development interests), and the Republican Party, Taylor and Randall attacked the Council for "not listening" to citizens and for "incivility." Without producing any substantive evidence, they claimed that the Council's policies had had a dire effect on the business climate and had driven away high quality city staff. It had promoted an "ideology," rather than providing jobs and fixing potholes.⁹

After testing the waters with polling, my opponent recognized that my background as a Socialist made me vulnerable to "red- baiting." In public meetings I was asked "Are you now or have you ever been a member of the Socialist Party," and in mailings, in public debates, and on local TV, Randall's campaign constantly repeated that I was a "passionate socialist," while he was a believer in "free enterprise." The Statesman Journal assisted by writing "news" articles describing his family, his career, and his moderate Republicanism as opposed to my being a socialist. Of course, I had no family and no professional career! It was no wonder that Randall's campaign delivered this article to every household in the ward twice.¹⁰

When he did deal with substantive issues, Randall used outright lies or distortions of my views to gain advantage. He focused particularly on my longstanding proposal to reform the city's tax structure by rolling back the regressive residential property tax rate and replacing it with a progressive income tax levied on everyone who lives or works in the city.¹¹ If structured properly, it is my contention that we could raise enough additional revenue (about $12 million) to restore basic services to 1979 levels without increasing the tax burden on the majority of Salem's residents. I initially proposed this reform four years ago to a city task force charged with finding new revenue and was basically laughed out of the room. The extent of the crisis, however, and the failure to find a better alternative have now caused many colleagues to reconsider their views and we are currently looking at potential schedules for public consideration.

Randall misled the voters by simply stating that I wanted to introduce an income tax on top of the property tax. In a state where anti-tax sentiments are very widespread, this lie was a powerful weapon. He claimed that my position illustrated the Council's anti-business agenda, which was responsible for the city's unemployment rate of 9%. Ignoring the fact that almost a decade of rapid growth in the nineties had produced no fiscal surpluses, he proposed as an alternative the annexation and development of a 1,000-acre block of land now outside the City.¹² This kind of growth, he claimed, would "put Salem back to work" and fill the city's treasury.

At a moment when many Oregonians are distrustful of government on all levels, hate to even talk about taxes, and feel threatened by unemployment, such arguments, no matter how unrealistic, score well. In my case, when combined with his use of red-baiting tactics and personal attacks, they were decisive. In the end, I was able to win only about 44% of the votes from among the 51% of the eligible voters who turned out.