As reported last week by The Oregonian and Willamette Week, Governor Brown has indicated a willingness to work with Portland Public Schools to find funding for the relocation of Harriet Tubman Middle School. We’re grateful to see the Oregonian speak extensively to Adah Crandall, a former Tubman student and current Grant High School sophomore, about her concerns that PPS and the Governor need to be as worried about carbon pollution as they are about air pollution. The official No More Freeways statement is below:

“For years, No More Freeways has elevated community voices concerned about the pollution ODOT’s proposed freeway expansion would bring to the Albina neighborhood, and we’re thrilled to see Portland Public Schools join us in fighting for their students’ unambiguous right to clean air. It’s difficult to imagine ODOT’s expansion providing restorative justice to the Albina community when it’s evident the pollution from the extra lanes will give nearby residents even more asthma, dementia and cancer. Moving Tubman might allow ODOT to outrun poor air pollution for students, but it will be impossible for students to outrun the rising oceans or wildfires exacerbated by the freeway expansion’s bloated carbon emissions. We implore Governor Brown to demand an Environmental Impact Statement to fully understand the impacts ODOT’s proposed freeway expansion would have on our community, our lungs, and our planet. As smoke fills our state and drought threatens our waters, nothing less than an EIS is acceptable to current and future generations demanding action commensurate to the scale of the climate emergency.”

This past weekend, the Pacific Northwest was hit with an unprecedented, lethal climate disaster. The temperatures above 115 degrees melted wires, buckled roads, and led to the deaths of hundreds of Americans and Canadians. As of July 1st, Multnomah County is reporting 65 deaths, a number that’s almost certain to rise over the days and weeks ahead.

This same weekend, the Oregon Legislature also voted to approve HB 3055, which would give ODOT a blank check to bond against toll revenue indefinitely to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on freeway expansions. 40% of Oregon’s carbon emissions come from transportation. Paying for freeway widenings off of tolling is like paying for coal plants with the revenue from a carbon tax – the whole point of the funding mechanism is that it’s supposed to disincentivize certain activities and create a stable revenue system to spend on building new infrastructure that helps retire the socially bad behavior.

Governor Brown has an opportunity to cement her legacy as either an unapologetic champion for climate action by vetoing this bill and demanding ODOT focus on preparing for a low-carbon future, or just going down in the history books as yet another politician unwilling or unable to stand up to the powerful interests, agencies and institutions that profit from the destruction of our communities, our state, our planet.

Governor Brown’s wouldn’t be standing alone by staking a position against this bill. Freshman Representative WLnsvey Campos voted NO on HB 3055B, saying “As someone who deeply believes that it is urgent we act to halt climate change with all possible avenues, I could not in good conscience vote in favor of an infrastructure bill that doesn’t address the biggest threat of our lifetime.” House Speaker Tina Kotek, an original champion of the bill, also ultimately voted against the legislation, citing concerns about the need for ODOT to right-size their projects. Senators Michael Dembrow and Kathleen Taylor also voted against the measure after receiving emails from dozens of constituents over the last week pleading for desperate climate action.

There is undoubtedly a need to invest in infrastructure to alleviate traffic congestion as we (hopefully) leave the pandemic in the rearview. ODOT’s freeway expansions will not do a damn thing for congestion.

There is undeniably a need for economic stimulus and job creation from building infrastructure. The state could create 70% more jobs by investing in road maintenance, as well as biking, walking, and transit investments instead of freeway widening.

We urgently need to address the state’s horrific epidemic of traffic violence, with over 400 Oregonians dying every year on our streets. ODOT’s urban freeways, however, are among the most safe facilities we have – and the agency is responsible for decades of divestment on orphan highways like TV Highway, McLoughlin Boulevard, SE Powell and N/NE Lombard that are the location of the overwhelming majority of traffic fatalities in the Portland region.

Finally, with the state bracing for unfathomably grim wildfires this summer, as well as increased flooding, rising oceans and droughts in the years to come, it’s unconscionable to give ODOT a blank check to spend all of their money on freeways that will only cause more carbon emissions. ODOT could be spending hundreds of millions of dollars on passenger rail, frequent bus service, light rail, sidewalks, bike lanes, intercity buses, transit electrification – all of which would address congestion for our growing state and create more jobs while lower carbon emissions.

HB 3055 is a step in the wrong direction. As Governor McCall once said, “Some highway engineers have a mentality … that would run an eight-lane freeway through the Taj Mahal. That is our problem.” This is an opportunity to push Governor Brown to channel Governor McCall and leave a similar legacy – that Oregon will take immediate action to reduce our transportation-based carbon emissions and be a national leader in decarbonizing our transportation system.

No More Freeways’ letter to Governor Brown demanding a veto on HB 3055:

No More Freeways’ testimony to the Oregon Senate opposing HB 3055:

What to write in testimony:

1. Who are ya? Include your full name, and if you feel comfortable, give your address as well.
2. Be specific with the bill number: Make sure you mention in the first line or two that you’re writing in to oppose HB 3055, the ODOT Freeway Slush Fund.
3. Personalize the letter! If you already wrote your legislator, congrats – you can recycle virtually the same language for the Governor. You don’t have to be a policy expert on the legislation to have an opinion; in fact, for the majority of the people writing in, personal stories and experiences are likely more important to share at this point. If you’re feeling climate anxiety as these wildfires pick up, be sure to mention you’d rather see legislative commitment to greening our transportation system! If you’re furious about ODOT’s abdicated responsibility on the orphan highways, demand that they push for the slush fund money to go towards fixing up 82nd Avenue, TV Highway, Barbur, and McLoughlin and other dangerous roads before we widen other streets. If you are a transportation geek and want to see more money for road maintenance, bike paths, better transit service, high speed rail, commuter rail – share your story! This is our chance to show Governor Brown that every day Oregonians are eager to see leadership on chipping away at the freeway industrial complex – the grey old deal – and investing in a more equitable, sustainable future.
   
   EXAMPLES
   • I am writing you to ask you to vote against HB 3055; climate leaders don’t widen freeways, and I’m concerned this bill gives ODOT a blank check to widen freeways in clackamas county when we instead need to be building a low-carbon transportation system running off of transit, biking and walking.
   • Please vote no on HB 3055 – there isn’t a single freeway expansion anywhere in North America that has ever solved traffic congestion, and ODOT’s proposals to spend hundreds of millions on the I-5 Boone Bridge and I-205 Oregon City project are robbing us of the opportunity to invest in better transportation systems that actually address congestion. We don’t know what commuting patterns we will have post-pandemic, and we certainly don’t need to throw away hundreds of millions of bucks on infrastructure that has never solved congestion.
   • I don’t believe ODOT should be trusted with the hundreds of millions of dollars in Bond funding that would be allowed until HB 3055. Why should current and future generations be on the hook to pay for these massive freeway expansions that don’t serve their needs and are actively frying the planet that they stand to inherit? Please direct ODOT to spend toll-revenue on fixing up orphan highways, which frequently maim and kill Oregonians biking, walking and driving on these dangerous arterials.
   • The state is literally on fire right now, we are recovering from a lethal climate disaster, and we’re prepared for a miserable summer of wildfires – we should probably stop giving ODOT blank checks to widen freeways when 40% of Oregon’s carbon emissions come from transportation. Please listen to Sunrise PDX and No More Freeways and vote no on HB 3055 until the ODOT freeway widening slush fund is removed from the omnibus bill.

4. If you don’t mind, feel free to send us a copy of the text you sent to the Governor – we love seeing all the wonderful testimony! (info at no more freeways pdx dot com)

5. If you really want to help us, post this link on whatever platform of social media you use to discuss your climate anxiety. Facebook, twitter, instagram, nextdoor, what have you – if you want to help us make sure the Governor understands the importance of vetoing this bill, we need as many voices as we can get reaching out to her office and pleading with her to show an iota of climate leadership during these unprecedented times.

FRIDAY JUNE 25 UPDATE: HB 3055B has passed the Oregon House, but it’s not too late to email your Senator. They are expected to vote on this bill in the next 48 hours – please drop your Senator a line!!!

HERE’s the official No More Freeways testimony about why HB 3055B is bad fiscal, climate, and transportation policy.

About a month ago, we put out a call-to-action to ask your help to write testimony for the Joint Committee on Transportation to oppose HB 3065, which included language for Speaker Tina Kotek’s ODOT freeway slush fund to write the agency a blank check to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on widening I-205 near Oregon City and I-5 near Wilsonville. Your response was overwhelming, with testimony coming in from all over the state to articulate why you think that the legislature should avoid continuing to feed the beast of the freeway industrial complex. Our efforts got written up in Oregon Public Broadcasting (with some great quotes from SunrisePDX’s Cassie Wilson; check out her new op-ed in BikePortland!)

While HB 3065 died in committee, all of the legislative language that would give ODOT the right to bond against projected future tolling revenue to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to widen I-205 and I-5 in Wilsonville has been snuck into HB 3055. This bill is ODOT’s omnibus legislation for the session, and includes a handful of positive elements like authority for urban counties to set lower speed limits and further policy language for figuring out congestion pricing and tolling.

What’s bad about HB 3055: The bill increases ODOT’s short term borrowing limit from $100 million to $600 million, and allows ODOT to roll over any short term borrowing into long term bonds, and repay those bonds with any available money, including federal money. Combined with other language in the –15 amendment, the net result is that ODOT has been directed to borrow money to cover the unfunded freeway expansion mandates leftover from the 2017 legislative session, and is allowed to back up that borrowing with any money available, and to pledge any and all toll revenue that it might receive from tolling I-5 and I-205, essentially destroying any hope for variable tolls that would drop to zero off-peak, that might be imposed solely for managing traffic.

Instead, any and all toll revenue will be poured into freeway expansion. While the state burns from unseasonably early wildfires, the state legislature could recognize that 40% of Oregon’s carbon emissions come from transportation and that the state simply must immediately invest in public transportation instead of further freeway expansions to hit our carbon emission reduction goals. The legislature could demand that ODOT to fix up deadly orphan highways, invest in frequent train service through the Willamette Valley, give TriMet funds to electrify buses, promote basic road maintenance or give local municipalities the revenue for Safe Routes to School. All of these investments would lower our carbon emissions, reduce air pollution, provide mobility options for the communities who need them the most, and make our streets safer. Instead, the legislature is once again giving ODOT a blank check, this time for two massively large freeway expansions in Clackamas County, as we await to see just how unfathomably terrible our wildfire season will be this summer.

It’s increasingly apparent to us at No More Freeways that a major reason that ODOT continues to aggressively pursue freeway expansions all over the Portland region is that the Oregon Legislature dictates that they do so. While there’s plenty of need for new leadership at the Oregon Transportation Commission, within ODOT’s upper-brass, and other regional and statewide transportation entities like TriMet, the state legislature is the body most responsible for allocating massive sums of money and setting the tone for our climate-arsonist practices of spending billions on freeways instead of directing revenue to transit service, fixing up ODOT’s orphan highways, basic road maintenance, and investing in commuter and high speed rail.

With the legislative session winding down, emailing your legislators about your concerns about the freeway slush fund included in HB 3055 is essentially your last chance to heckle your elected officials about the urgent need to stop widening freeways for almost the next eighteen months.

HB 3055 has been approved by the Oregon House, but still might fail in the Oregon Senate, which is why we need you to contact your Senators today.

If you want to tell your elected officials to turn off the spigot that funds the freeway industrial complex, we need your help.

TELL YOUR LEGISLATOR: OPPOSE HB 3055. NO MORE FREEWAY EXPANSIONS.

We need *you* to contact your State Senator and encourage them to vote NO on HB 3055 until the language for the freeway expansion slush funds are removed. Here’s how you can do that:

Step 1: Look Up Your Senator

If you don’t know your State Senator, use the handy State Capitol website to look up who represents you in Salem. The bill has already passed the Oregon House (kudos to Speaker Tina Kotek, Rep Brad Witt and Rep Wlnsvey Campos for opposing the bill!) but we can still kill it in the Senate.

Step 2: Send them an email!

You don’t have to write an essay, unless you want to. But if you’ve never written your legislator about an important bill, here’s some tips:

1. Who are ya? Include your full name, and make explicit that you live in their district and that you’re a constituent (if you feel comfortable, you can say which specific neighborhood you live in)
2. Be specific with the bill number: Make sure you mention the bill number you’re opposed to (in this case, HB 3055) in the email header as well as the first 1-3 sentences of your letter.
3. Personalize the letter! You don’t have to be a policy expert on the legislation to have an opinion; in fact, for the majority of the people writing in, personal stories and experiences are likely more important to share at this point. If you’re feeling climate anxiety as these wildfires pick up, be sure to mention you’d rather see legislative commitment to greening our transportation system! If you’re furious about ODOT’s abdicated responsibility on the orphan highways, demand that they push for the slush fund money to go towards fixing up 82nd Avenue, TV Highway, Barbur, and McLoughlin and other dangerous roads before we widen other streets. If you are a transportation geek and want to see more money for road maintenance, bike paths, better transit service, high speed rail, commuter rail – share your story! This is our chance to show legislators that every day Oregonians are eager to see leadership on chipping away at the freeway industrial complex – the grey old deal – and investing in a more equitable, sustainable future.
   
   EXAMPLES
   • I am writing you to ask you to vote against HB 3055; climate leaders don’t widen freeways, and I’m concerned this bill gives ODOT a blank check to widen freeways in clackamas county when we instead need to be building a low-carbon transportation system running off of transit, biking and walking.
   • Please vote no on HB 3055 – there isn’t a single freeway expansion anywhere in North America that has ever solved traffic congestion, and ODOT’s proposals to spend hundreds of millions on the I-5 Boone Bridge and I-205 Oregon City project are robbing us of the opportunity to invest in better transportation systems that actually address congestion. We don’t know what commuting patterns we will have post-pandemic, and we certainly don’t need to throw away hundreds of millions of bucks on infrastructure that has never solved congestion.
   • I don’t believe ODOT should be trusted with the hundreds of millions of dollars in Bond funding that would be allowed until HB 3055. Why should current and future generations be on the hook to pay for these massive freeway expansions that don’t serve their needs and are actively frying the planet that they stand to inherit? Please direct ODOT to spend toll-revenue on fixing up orphan highways, which frequently maim and kill Oregonians biking, walking and driving on these dangerous arterials.
   • The state is literally on fire right now – we should probably stop giving ODOT blank checks to widen freeways. Please listen to Sunrise PDX and No More Freeways and vote no on HB 3055 until the ODOT freeway widening slush fund is removed from the omnibus bill.

4. If you don’t mind, feel free to BCC us – we love seeing the letters that you send in! (info at no more freeways pdx dot com)

Click here to submit testimony!

House Bill 3065 is a bad bill that would dramatically hurt our ability to solve traffic congestion, reduce carbon emissions, and rob us of money we need for other urgent transportation priorities across the state of Oregon. The crappy legislation, pushed by Speaker Tina Kotek, received a chilly reception in March (OPB has a great run-down of the previous meeting), and this weekend we learned that the bill has new amendments that will be getting a hearing in front of the legislature’s Joint Committee on Transportation this Tuesday morning at 8am. We need your help pushing back against letting Speaker Kotek give ODOT a mammoth, unaccountable freeway expansion slush fund we’ll pay for for decades.

About the bill:

The -8 Amendments of House Bill 3065 aims to institute a large tolling program that ODOT would spend the next couple decades bonding against to build billions of dollars of freeway expansions at the Rose Quarter, the Abernethy Freeway Expansion in Oregon City, and the Boone Bridge Freeway Expansion near Wilsonville. Future generations will be paying off the debts of these massive expansions for decades, as well as paying for the project with worse air pollution and higher carbon emissions, all for a couple of additional lanes of freeway that won’t fix congestion. While there are a few technical improvements on the -8 Amendment language that wasn’t present in the -5 Amendemtn introduced two months ago, the fundamental crux of the bill remains abysmal – ODOT is broke, and instead of raising revenue to build infrastructure to prepare for climate change, to manage traffic congestion, to reduce air pollution or address the dozens of yearly traffic fatalities on ODOT’s roads – ODOT just wants billions for more freeways that solve none of these problems and actively make them worse.

Click here to submit testimony!

Why we’re opposed to HB 3065:

While there are a few minor improvements in policy language in this -8 Amendment over the -5 Amendments introduced in March, we categorically reject that there is any sane or rational reason to move forward with spending billions of dollars on freeway expansions in the region in 2021, and any legislator supporting this bill needs to reckon with the legacy of a warmer planet, unsafe streets, air pollution, and lack of accessible public transportation they are leaving for future generations by supporting this bill.

We need faster commutes, not freeway congestion – There isn’t a single freeway expansion anywhere in North America that has solved traffic congestion by adding additional lanes. Thanks to the well-understood concept of induced demand, we now know that all three of these freeway widening projects will not get trucks or commuters out of a traffic jam – it’ll merely make them miserable during years of road construction only to have the roads fill up with traffic the day that new lanes are opened. No More Freeways has also repeatedly caught ODOT blatantly lying about the traffic projections included in the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion – hell, they lied so bad in the traffic projections that we sued them over it. No one voting for this bill should be under the impression this will provide any long term solution to traffic congestion. The only way to reduce traffic congestion is to implement congestion pricing; unfortunately, ODOT is not pursuing congestion pricing (which works to minimize traffic jams) and instead pursuing tolling (which works to maximize revenue raised, a mechanism they need to raise the money for these massively oversized expansion projects).

Click here to submit testimony!

It’s a blank check for fossil fuel infrastructure – 40% of Oregon’s carbon emissions come from transportation. Even under the rosiest of predictions for vehicle electrification, Oregonians simply must reduce the number of miles they drive as the state grows if we want to have a shot of hitting our emission reduction targets. We need to use the roads we already have better, not add more – and we instead need to be investing in public transportation, walkable communities, high speed rail, intercity buses, and maintaining existing roads.

Click here to submit testimony!

Have you been paying attention to ODOT lately? It’s been a rough month for the Oregon Department of Transportation. Between the outcry on the traffic fatalities on 82nd Avenue, the horrific images of clearcutting wildfire lands in the Cascades, and their continued tomfoolery with the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion (more on that below) – why do a bunch of legislators trust this agency with billions of dollars of freeway projects that aren’t anywhere close to shovel-ready? There’s undeniably massive cost overruns, slights-of-hands, overpromising and under-delivering ahead for ODOT on these mega projects. The agency is fundamentally incapable of transparency, accountability, or pushing policy that meets any conservation, equity, or mobility goals other than handing out massive construction contracts to asphalt, automobile, oil, and freight lobbyists. ODOT has so many other priorities in need of desperate funding – why should we give them a slush fund for more freeways?

Click here to submit testimony!

Rose Quarter project is imperiled – why is Speaker Kotek dumping more money into it? Anyone who has followed No More Freeways in the past couple years knows about the utter shitshow this proposed expansion has been (you can read our March 2021 letter to legislators about the Rose Quarter). The continued cost escalations, the public records showing ODOT was lying about the width of the freeway, the hidden plans to move the freeway even closer to Harriet Tubman Middle School, the community leaders who walked away from the project in protest of ODOT’s abysmal community outreach last summer… it goes on and on. The Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion is an absolute disaster currently facing two lawsuits and continued skepticism from a litany of youth climate activists, transportation and racial justice advocates, and public health leaders pushing for a full Environmental Impact Statement. Given the headlines over the past couple years, why on earth would any legislator want to write ODOT a blank check to continue squandering money on this project?

Click here to submit testimony!

HERE’S HOW YOU CAN SUBMIT TESTIMONY:

House Bill 3065 and the -8 Amendment are getting a hearing in front of the Joint Committee on Transportation on Tuesday, May 10 at 8am. You can write to the Joint Committee on Transportation in opposition to the bill – feel free to use any of our talking points above, or share why you want to see the Oregon Legislature fund sidewalks, crosswalks, high speed rail, bike lanes, frequent bus service, electrified buses, charging stations for automobiles, intercity bus service, or basic road maintenance ahead of committing future generations to paying for these ghastly freeway expansions that are nothing short of climate arson. Share your personal story – are you worried about climate change? Angry that ODOT doesn’t have any money to fix 82nd Avenue or TV Highway because they dump it all on freeways? Concerned about air pollution near Harriet Tubman Middle School? Share your story, and make sure the elected officials hear from you on why it’s their duty and responsibility to push back on ODOT and the freeway industrial complex.

HERE’S THE LINK TO SUBMIT TESTIMONY ON HB 3065

You’re welcome to join No More Freeways, Sunrise PDX, and a handful of other transportation justice advocate in providing oral testimony on Tuesday morning as well. Information on how to do so is here.

You can also watch the live stream of the Tuesday morning testimony here.

Written testimony due to the Oregon Legislature by 8am on Wednesday, May 12. We encourage you to also email your testimony to your legislator as well.

Click here to submit testimony!

We’re staying busy over here at No More Freeways. Just a few weeks after our first lawsuit with Neighbors for Clean Air and the Eliot Neighborhood Association, No More Freeways filed our second lawsuit challenging ODOT’s $800 million freeway expansion in the backyard of Harriet Tubman Middle School. You can read the full complaint here.

That’s two lawsuits filed in one month for our scrappy, all-volunteer, grassroots campaign.

#TubmanRally a big success

Thanks to all who came out to our #TubmanRally this month! We had roughly 200 people at the event, and some absolutely fantastic speakers. We wrote over 350 postcards to Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Governor Kate Brown, Speaker Tina Kotek, and Transportation Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty asking them to keep fighting ODOT and holding the agency accountable for the air pollution, carbon emissions and traffic congestion that this project would mean to our community, the Tubman campus, and the planet as a whole.

Check out BikePortland’s coverage of our rally.

Teenage Climate Justice Leaders launch biweekly ODOT strikE

The teen caucus of Sunrise PDX held their first sit-in outside ODOT’s headquarters this last week. They’ll be revisiting ODOT’s headquarters every other week protesting the agency’s inaction on transportation and climate justice. Go follow the Youth vs ODOT instagram account to see more photos from their event, to read their four demands of ODOT (including the appointment of a Youth Climate Justice representative on the OTC) and to learn more about their next event.

Join us outside of ODOT’s downtown headquarters on Wednesday, May 12.

OPB story on freeway in Tubman’s backyard

For years, community members and staff with Portland Public Schools have been demanding more information about the impacts of the proposed freeway expansion on the Harriet Tubman Middle School campus. ODOT has been reluctant to share any information with any of us; fortunately, through a series of public records requests, we got copies of documents ODOT produced as early as 2018 showing exactly how much land in the backyard of Tubman Middle School they intend to take for this freeway.

OPB did a story highlighting these findings, and getting quotes from PPS Board Members and us about the importance of these maps. After years of stalling to share any information with the public, these maps getting into the hands of journalists must have started ODOT, because suddenly the agency announced this last week willing to explore expanding the freeway to the west, farther away from the school. Even if ODOT dramatically changes their plans, any widening will still increase air pollution in the backyard of Tubman Middle School, which already has some of the worst air pollution in the state.

This information only came to light because of our public records requests. This is just one month after we caught ODOT lying about the width of the proposed freeway. How many other dirty secrets about this project is this agency continuing to hide from the public?

Pedestrian Safety Rally on 82nd Avenue on Friday

Why does ODOT have billions for freeway expansions but can’t find the money to make basic safety investments for their orphan highways? (The agency cries poverty when challenged on this.)

This month, two people were hit by cars and killed while attempting to cross 82nd Avenue near NE Alberta. Meanwhile, there hasn’t been a single traffic fatality on the Rose Quarter freeway expansion in over a decade.

Community leaders including Rep Khanh Pham, Scott Kocher, Oregon Walks, and others are hosting a rally on 82nd Avenue this Friday, May 7th at 4pm to demand ODOT be held accountable to prioritizing safety investments here and across the region.

NMF to present on panel with national leaders May 18

No More Freeways was recently flattered to receive an invitation to speak on a panel hosted by Move Minneapolis discussing the future of the urban interstate. Check out this lineup!

Keith Baker, Managing Director, Reconnect Rondo
Oni Blair, Executive Director, LINK Houston
Dr Karilynn Crockett, Author, Professor MIT
Dr Ben Crowther, Program Manager, Congress for New Urbanism
Ian Lockwood, PE, Toole Design
Beth Osborne, Director, Transportation for America
Dr Regan Patterson, Congressional Black Caucus Foundation
Aaron Brown, No More Freeways

You can register for Move Minneapolis’ 2021 Transportation Summit here.

Final note from Aaron – donate to keep us going!

Two lawsuits, two rallies (and a third we’re joining this week), breaking news about ODOT’s lack of transparency – as you can see, it’s been an awfully busy month. And honestly, this lengthy e-blast still doesn’t include numerous other things we’ve done over the last month to heckle ODOT, including testifying to multiple committees about the Columbia River Crossing 2.0, call out ODOT for hiding public comments concerned about air pollution outside Tubman Middle School, or other shenanigans involving pushing back on the legislature’s ongoing thirst for more freeways.

We’re so grateful for your continued support. While ODOT continues to churn forward with this project, our movement to challenge the freeway industrial complex has perhaps never been larger. Whether critiquing the agency on their abysmal climate outcomes, their unwillingness to prioritize funding basic traffic safety investments, or their deception about the air pollution they intend to pump into the lungs of current and future residents of the Albina neighborhood, we are spearheading an increasingly broad and diverse coalition of everyday Portlanders who are beginning to take their pitchforks to ODOT and demand accountability and transparency.

We’re all volunteers over here at NMF. This grassroots campaign is funded by a couple big donations and an awful lot of small donations. Whether you’ve got $5000, $500, $50, or $15 to chip in for a healthier, greener future, we’re eager to mail you a button and/or sticker and help us build our warchest for a busy summer of continuing to dismantle the freeway industrial complex.

No More Freeways, Neighbors for Clean Air, Eliot Neighborhood Association file Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion lawsuit

Community advocates opposed to the Oregon Department of Transportation’s (ODOT’s) proposed $800 million freeway expansion into the backyard of Harriet Tubman Middle School today announced that they have filed a lawsuit against the project. The plaintiff’s complaint uses various laws including the National Environmental Protection Act (NEPA) to try to force ODOT to prep a full Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to study alternatives to adding more lanes to Interstate 5. Public health advocacy organization Neighbors for Clean Air and the Eliot Neighborhood Association joined the grassroots community group No More Freeways as plaintiffs against the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), which approved ODOT’s proposed  Environmental Assessment (EA) last fall. 

“Today is a historic day for anyone who believes that ODOT should be held to basic standards of community accountability and transparency,” said Aaron Brown, an organizer with No More Freeways. “ODOT has continued to blatantly hide and misrepresent their intentions with this proposed $800 million expansion in the backyard of Harriet Tubman Middle School. The public has every right to know the impacts this proposed freeway expansion would have on our neighborhood streets, on the lungs of our children, and the planet they stand to inherit. This lawsuit is our mechanism to try to force ODOT to answer to the community’s concerns.”

“Transportation infrastructure projects like the original I-5 freeway have created an environmental justice catastrophe for the surrounding Albina neighborhood,” said Mary Peveto, Executive Director for Neighbors for Clean Air. “Now, instead learning from the past and putting community voices at the center of decision-making, ODOT is not only planning an expansion based on flawed analysis, but looks to build it right at the backyard of Harriet Tubman Middle School, an historic and majority non-white institution that already has some of the worst air pollution in the state. We’re eager to join this legal action to hold this agency accountable for the air pollution they are clearly intending to add to this already polluted neighborhood.”

“The Eliot Neighborhood Association has been fighting ODOT’s proposed freeway expansion for over a decade. We’re eager to support alternatives to freeway expansion that address the needs for restorative justice in this neighborhood,” said Allan Rudwick, co-Chair of the Eliot Neighborhood Association. “We shouldn’t spend a single dollar increasing pollution or prioritizing cars in a time of climate emergency. If close to a billion dollars is going to be spent in the area, we need to get immense returns on that investment. This project is already hindering development of the many vacant and under-utilized parcels in the area. If built, it would disrupt local traffic for several years and increase air pollution in our area for years to come.”

Two years ago, ODOT published a draft Environmental Assessment for the proposed freeway expansion that was loudly derided by community groups. The agency hid numerous crucial documents from the public in their EA, including basic details about the width of the proposed freeway and the impacts to the air pollution at Tubman Middle School. 

No More Freeways’ independent analysis of ODOT’s traffic projections found multiple egregious errors and outdated assumptions that were used to try to prop up ODOT’s dubious assertions that this freeway expansion would be the first in North American history to reduce congestion, air pollution or carbon emissions. Dozens of local elected officials and community leaders issued statements demanding ODOT conduct a full EIS for the proposed expansion, with over 91% of the thousands of comments submitted to ODOT expressing opposition to the project. Community groups demanding a full EIS in 2019 included Audubon Society of Portland, OPAL – Environmental Justice Oregon, Oregon Walks, and Business for a Better Portland. 

Despite this outcry, last fall the federal government granted a Finding Of No Significant Impact (FONSI) to ODOT for the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion. This week’s NEPA lawsuit challenges the federal government’s FONSI’s findings, arguing it violates NEPA. The lawsuit asserts that ODOT must conduct a full EIS, rather than a more truncated or shorthand EA, and that ODOT must fully evaluate alternatives to freeway expansion that will address traffic congestion, air pollution and carbon emissions. 

Last week, No More Freeways sent a letter to Secretary Pete Buttigieg, detailing findings first published in Willamette Week last month about how ODOT has deliberately hidden from the public the width of the proposed freeway. No More Freeways believes this evidence is sufficient to require that the federal government withdraw their FONSI finding for ODOT’s expansion.   

Plaintiffs in the case are represented by attorneys Sean Malone, the Law Office of Karl G. Anuta, and Oxbow Law Group’s Mike Sargetakis and Doug Hageman.

The full complaint can be accessed here. 

Wanna celebrate our lawsuit? Join us for our rally at Tubman on Friday.

No More Freeways, Sunrise Movement PDX and students from the Harriet Tubman Middle School community will be hosting a rally at Tubman MIddle School on the evening of Friday, April 9th. Confirmed speakers include former students from Harriet Tubman Middle School and advocates representing Oregon Walks, Sunrise PDX, Neighbors for Clean Air, and No More Freeways. The full roster of speakers will be announced later this week; check out the No More Freeways website for more information. 

This event will be held outdoors; masks will be required, and we will practice social distancing.

Our rally will also be livestreamed for people who wish to join us at the rally virtually; we have tentatively confirmed ASL translation will be available.

Friday, April 9, 5-7pm

Meet at the entrance of Harriet Tubman Middle School (2231 N Flint Ave)

Learn more on our rally website.

Secretary Pete Buttigieg has impressed many transportation advocates in the past few weeks since his appointment to President Biden’s cabinet. He’s repeatedly stressed the importance of making transportation investments and policies that prioritize climate action, improvements to public health, and righting the racist trespasses of backwards transportation policy that defined the twentieth century. He’s repeatedly spoken about the need to “Build Back Better” by listening to community advocates, and he leveraged his position to support the efforts of advocates in Houston fighting a $7 billion freeway expansion of I-45 that would displace 1000 homes in a predominantly Black community.

Today, we call on Secretary Pete to act on those values and rescind the Finding Of No Significant Impact(FONSI) that the federal government granted ODOT for the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion back in October 2020. Since that finding, news has surfaced that ODOT has been repeatedly lyingto the public about the width of the proposed freeway,which negates their already-shoddy traffic projections the agency used to make their biased claims in support of lower traffic congestion, air pollution or carbon emissions.
No More Freeways’ Joe Cortright penned a letter to Secretary Pete Buttigieg, getting his team up to speed on all of ODOT’s shenanigans over the past few months. Secretary Pete’s team is all over social media, so if you’re feeling so inclined, you can join us in making sure this administration.

Can you tag @SecretaryPete on instagram or twitter and tell him to #StopTheFONSI? You can share our content on our twitter and instagram,

Today, we call on Secretary Pete to act on those values and rescind the Finding Of No Significant Impact(FONSI) that the federal government granted ODOT for the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion back in October 2020. Since that finding, news has surfaced that ODOT has been repeatedly lyingto the public about the width of the proposed freeway,which negates their already-shoddy traffic projections the agency used to make their biased claims in support of lower traffic congestion, air pollution or carbon emissions.

No More Freeways’ Joe Cortright penned a letter to Secretary Pete Buttigieg, getting his team up to speed on all of ODOT’s shenanigans over the past few months. Secretary Pete’s team is all over social media, so if you’re feeling so inclined, you can join us in making sure this administration hears that Oregonians want the federal government to hold ODOT responsible for the damage they stand to cause to the Albina neighborhood and our community as a whole.

Can you share our graphics on instagram and twitter, and tag @SecretaryPete and our #STOPtheFONSI hashtag?

TUBMAN RALLY APRIL 9th

Hope we can also count on you to show up to our rally on Friday, April 9 we’re hosting with Sunrise PDX and the Harriet Tubman Middle School community. We’ll be practicing social distancing, wearing masks, and also livestreaming the event in case you wish to attend virtually. More information about the event will be updated HERE as we confirm speakers and other details. Stay tuned!

Greetings, folks! It’s once again time for our year-in-review blog post over here at No More Freeways. No More Freeways stayed very busy this year despite all the punches that 2020 chose to throw in our direction. Throughout the omnicrisis, we continued our fight against ODOT’s $800 million Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion, scoring numerous political victories throughout the summer and holding the agency accountable for their public deception and lack of accountability as they push forward an $800 million freeway expansion. Furthermore, the events of the year – historic climate-change-fueled wildfires burning across the state, a growing movement demanding a reckoning of institutional racism, a devastating pandemic in which proximity to air pollution appears a significant risk factor – have only emboldened our conviction that the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion is directly antithetical to all of Oregon’s goals for a greener, more equitable, and healthier future.

At the bottom of this blog, we’re going to ask you chip in a few bucks to help us gear up for some legal action and continued community organizing in 2021. But before we do, let’s share the updates from our fight with ODOT and our support of transportation policies reforms across our city, region and state. 

WINTER

No More Freeways, Sunrise, Tubman Moms storm OTC in Lake Oswego – The Oregon Transportation Commission (OTC) is the byzantine entity of appointed officials that ostensibly provides oversight and direction for the Oregon Department of Transportation. Functionally, the entity has largely been a rubber stamp for the agency’s freeway expansion ambitions, and has historically operated with clandestine secrecy, with little interest in public accessibility and accountability. So we showed up to their hearing midweek at a hotel in Lake Oswego to demand an Environmental Impact Statement after organizing thousands of letters and postcards to the OTC demanding a rigorous look at the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion.

There was so much excellent testimony, but for our money, the best came from NMF’s Tubman Mom champion, Joan Petit, who spoke passionately about systemic racism and the need for ODOT to stick up for her children and all the students at Tubman Middle School.

FOIA fuss fuels freeway fighters – No More Freeways’ FOIA expert Alan Kessler requested and received documents from ODOT that demonstrated the agency was attempting to circumvent the City of Portland’s Parks Department‘s approval of the expansion of the freeway over the city’s Eastbank Esplanade. Later this fall, ODOT would announce they changed their proposals to not expand over the esplanade and avoid building into the Willamette River.

Rose Lane Project Passes City Council – Thanks to the leadership from PBOT and Commissioner Eudaly, in February Portland City Council approved the Rose Lane Project, a historic policy advancement that will reallocate road space to transit over single-occupancy vehicles. (Editor’s Note: the proposed Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion would actually slow transit through the Albina neighborhood, with numerous buses seeing delays from the proposed surface-level street changes).

SPRING

Op-Ed in support of Traffic Safety published in the O – We’re so grateful for Michelle DuBarry, who experienced unfathomable tragedy after the loss of her 22-month son to traffic violence on an ODOT arterial. She wrote about her frustration with ODOT’s lack of commitment to investing in traffic safety, as represented by the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion, in The Oregonian.

“I don’t know what political mountains need to be moved for the agency to repurpose that money, but I am hoping our local leaders and advocates can apply enough pressure to convince them to invest in real traffic safety. They might start with the intersection of North Lombard Street and North Interstate Avenue where my son was killed in his stroller on a two-block walk from our house to the grocery store.

If the state has nearly a billion dollars to invest in safety, surely we can do better than a freeway expansion.”

Michelle DuBarry, “ODOT’s ‘safety’ project in Rose Quarter ignores state’s deadliest roads” The Oregonian

One of our chief outrages about the Rose Quarter is the extent to which ODOT is willing to prioritize spending billions on widening freeways while simultaneously claiming poverty when asked by local community leaders to address the orphan highways and dangerous arterials that frequently harm and kill Oregonians across the state due to poor design and disinvestment.

Tubman students, Sunrise host mayoral debate – No More Freeways was grateful to see students from the Harriet Tubman Middle School Environmental Justice club partner with Sunrise PDX and 350PDX to host a mayoral forum that asked the candidates about their views on climate justice, freeway expansion, and transit service. This was the last in-person event for many of us before the pandemic struck, and it was spectacular to be in a room where the next generation of Oregonians got to grill local officials on their commitment to climate action.

ODOT buried report showing Black Oregonians deeply skeptical of agency – In 2019, ODOT conducted a public opinion studies with Black Oregonians about their views on the expansion and whether they thought ODOT was trustworthy. Black Oregonians overwhelmingly expressed skepticism that the agency could be trusted to deliver on their promises of restorative justice. This report was shared with the Oregon Transportation Commission in February, but wasn’t made available to the public until June, after the OTC voted in April to move forward with the Environmental Assessment. That didn’t stop OTC members from citing “support from the Black community” as a significant talking point in their unanimous support for the expansion.

SUMMER

Albina Vision, City, County officially oppose Freeway Expansion, withdraw from participation – Three months after ODOT promised the Oregon Transportation Commission that they would fully partner with community leaders to secure their vote for the Environmental Assessment, community leaders expressed their frustration with ODOT’s abysmal public engagement by publicly revoking their support and participation in the project. Inspired in part by the global reckoning with white supremacy in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, Albina Vision Trust’s announcement of unequivocal opposition to the project led local elected officials Commissioner Eudaly and Commissioner Vega Pederson to publicly withdraw support and no longer participate in ODOT’s Executive Steering Committee.

“This is the wrong project for our city. I am stepping down from the steering committee. I do not support the Rose Quarter I-5 Corridor project. And I urge the state to prioritize safety, climate change, and racial justice in all future transportation investments.”

Commissioner Chloe Eudaly, quoted in Racial Justice Group Albina Vision Trust Withdraws Its Support for I-5 Rose Quarter Expansion, Willamette Week

Mayor Ted Wheeler, originally a proponent of the project, also announced his opposition in June.

“At every step, I have asked ODOT for specific goals to be met around climate, community and economic development. Those goals have not been met. Therefore, I am withdrawing my support.”

– Mayor Ted Wheeler, quoted in Mayor Ted Wheeler Is Also Withdrawing Support for ODOT’s Rose Quarter Project, Willamette Week

One week later, Commissioner Eudaly and the Portland City Council took their opposition to the project one step further, writing a letter decreeing all municipal bureaus should cease any and all communication with ODOT staffers on the project.

The letter — signed by Mayor Ted Wheeler and Commissioners Chloe Eudaly, Jo Ann Hardesty and Amanda Fritz — is the clearest signal yet that even modest efforts to expand freeways in Portland may be politically unpalatable.

– Portland bureaus cease work on ODOT’s I-5 Rose Quarter plan, Portland Tribune

Even The Oregonian’s editorial board chimed in, stating that “while the highway project may have the legislative authority to proceed, it now lacks the moral authority to do so.”

Despite the prominent withdrawl from the Mayor and other prominent elected officials and community leaders, ODOT has continued throughout the year to hold meetings with the Executive Steering Committee, and made surprisingly little reference to the absence of prominent stakeholders and leaders in subsequent meetings.

Residential Infill Project Passes – While it’s not directly related to fighting ODOT, No More Freeways and our allies were closely tracking the Residential Infill Project, which passed Portland City Council in August. Our pals at Sightline Institute and Portland: Neighbors Welcome have the full run down on this historic victory.

FALL

Climate apocalypse arrives. Is ODOT paying attention? – As the entire West Coast was draped with smoke for weeks and Oregon experienced record-breaking death and destruction from acres of wildfires, No More Freeways joined Sunrise PDX for a photoshoot on the Eastbank Esplanade.

40% of Oregon’s carbon emissions come from transportation. It’s the only sector of our economy where emissions are growing. According to 2018’s IPCC report, we now have only nine years left to dramatically reduce carbon emissions. The Oregon fires this fall killed at least 11 people, burned more than 1,000,000 acres of land, destroyed thousands of homes, and radicalized a generation of Oregonians already petrified about the looming climate apocalypse.

Probably time for ODOT to stop spending billions widening freeways! 

Community Advisory Committee disbanded, pens letter rejecting ODOT’s attempt to force them to “rubber stamp” expansion – This spring, ODOT established a Community Advisory Committee designed to provide feedback to the agency about the proposed plans. Yet community members repeatedly asked ODOT pointed questions about the charter of the committee, their ability to write statements questioning the need for additional lanes of freeway, and their desire to have more input beyond minor cosmetic details irrelevant to the bulk of the $800 million project. After four meetings of increasingly pointed questions from a diverse set of committee members, ODOT disbanded the entity days before the CAC members planned to resign in protest.

“The Oregon Department of Transportation disbanded the CAC because we didn’t play ball with them. We refused to be a compliant part of the non-transparent facade of community engagement that ODOT had created in the CAC. We refused to rubber-stamp a project that will lead to poor air quality outcomes for children at Harriet Tubman Middle School and the neighborhood at large. We refused to stop asking the hard questions, and we demanded that our voices, including and especially the voices of Black Portlanders, be heard….Without reconsidering the project from scratch, the State risks continuing the “business as usual” approach that perpetuates racism, white supremacy, and the climate injustices that are embedded and interwoven into the very creation of I5 and the Rose Quarter.”

– Letter to OTC, elected officials, signed from 14 former members of the Community Advisory Committee members

Members of the CAC penned a sharp letter to ODOT and local elected officials sharing their frustration with being asked to “rubber stamp” the expansion and their inability to provide meaningful feedback on their concerns about restorative justice, carbon emissions or air pollution. OPB’s Dave Miller grilled ODOT’s staff on the decision on a memorable episode of Think Out Loud, which featured appearances from former CAC members Oregon Walks’ Claire Vlach and Soul District Business Association’s John Washington. 

“As the kids would say, it was shady.”

-Liz Fouther-Branch, former Community Advisory Committee (CAC) member, quoted in “Inside a Contentious, Now-Shuttered Advisory Committee on the Portland I-5 Widening Plan“, Portland Mercury

City of Portland Tells Feds: We’re Out – Months after City Council forbid municipal staff from working with ODOT on the freeway expansion, Commissioner Chloe Eudaly wrote the federal government explicitly articulating that the City of Portland would refuse to participate with ODOT on the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion

“Bringing these issues to you in our role as a partner agency is unprecedented in our region’s history… we hope that agency leadership will take them seriously.”

– Commissioner Chloe Eudaly, Portland makes ‘unprecedented’ withdrawal from ODOT’s I-5 Rose Quarter project, BikePortland.org

Election Night brings new wave of ODOT-skeptics to local officials – Every single candidate who won an election for local office this year expressed healthy skepticism of ODOT and the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion. Portland Commissioner Dan Ryan and Commissioners-Elect Mingus Mapps and Carmen Rubio are on the record in opposition to the project and demanding ODOT conduct an Environmental Impact Statement. Metro Councilor-Elect Mary Nolan flipped to a position of opposition to the project this summer. Mayor Ted Wheeler even gave a shoutout to his concern with the Rose Quarter in his Voter Pamphlet Statement mailed to voters. While candidates like NMF-cofounder Chris Smith and Sarah Iannarone (and Commissioner Chloe Eudaly, the greatest elected champion of our cause) lost election bids this fall, no candidate could run for local office without stating opposition to ODOT’s freeway expansion plans. Numerous new legislators similarly expressed skepticism as well. It’s encouraging to see widespread agreement from local leaders that freeway expansion is unacceptable to municipal climate, health, and equity goals. 

And while No More Freeways’ members were split on the large regional transportation measure that failed on the ballot this November, an emerging consensus has grown from political leaders around the region that climate and transit justice must be addressed with any upcoming subsequent proposal. We look forward to joining local advocates in demanding that Metro’s next attempt at a package doubles down on the need to invest in transit, biking and walking over road and highway expansions. The electoral engagement of Sunrise PDX is a bright spot that will continue to push for climate accountability at ODOT and other agencies in their transportation decisions in the years ahead.

OTC ignores public feedback, heightened scrutiny in latest round of STIP funding – In most years, ODOT and the OTC move forward with allocating funding for the Statewide Transportation Improvement Plan (STIP) with minimal fanfare. This program determines where the state agency will spend billions of dollars on transportation projects across the state – and unsurprisingly, the agency overwhelmingly allocates funding to highways over bicycle or pedestrian projects. This fall, however, No More Freeways joined our heroic partners at Oregon Environmental Council and BikeLoudPDX to raise a ruckus and help send hundreds of letters from advocates for traffic safety, climate action, and racial justice all over the state.

“Where the failure is occurring is, we keep falling back to incrementalism and the status quo. We would love to see leadership at the state, ODOT, and OTC really step up and recognize that the time for incrementalism is over. This is a powerful agency making decisions about hundreds of millions of dollars and we need to see that money go to where it can help Oregonians now and in the future.”

– Sara Wright, Oregon Environmental Council, quoted in ODOT delays $2.2 billion allocation vote after changing funding options, Oregon Public Broadcasting’s Think Our Loud

Oral and written testimony from Bend, Jacksonville, Beavercreek, Eugene, Portland and Corvallis overwhelmed the OTC with demands they invest 15% of the upcoming STIP funding for biking, walking, and transit projects; the OTC ignored the public comment and instead moved forward with their original plans. Special thanks to BikePortland for significant coverage of this vote. 

What’s in store for 2021?

We are gearing up for another busy year of fighting the Rose Quarter Freeway Expansion and challenging the freeway industrial complex that currently dictates the billions of dollars in the budget of the Oregon Department of Transportation.

On one hand, our campaign to fight the Rose Quarter has never looked better – community leaders continue to come out of the woodwork to express their frustrations with this $800 million boondoggle freeway expansion, and the increased urgency of the voices asking for restorative justice and climate action continues to inspire new voices to speak up and demand accountability from ODOT for this freeway expansion and the road-heavy statewide budget. The state is broke, thanks to the covid-recession, and it’s uncertain where the agency could possibly find the substantial funding necessary for the ongoing cost overruns, let alone to fund a truly restorative investment in the Albina neighborhood. Voters in Oregon (and Portland specifically) are increasingly identifying climate action as a top priority, and the only way ODOT can get positive support for the proposal is to demonstrably lie about the potential impacts of the expansion on air pollution, traffic safety and climate.

On the other hand, our year ended just as it began: watching the Oregon Transportation Commission ignore passionate, overwhelming testimony pleading for reform of ODOT to align the budget and policy priorities with the values of Oregonians clamoring for climate action, racial justice, cleaner air, transportation options, and congestion relief. While our efforts are undeniably growing in strength, with a wider cross-section of advocates representing a larger swath of Oregonians, the OTC and ODOT continues to muscle forward with status quo paradigms that current and future generations simply cannot afford. ODOT continues to spend countless dollars on consultants and lobbyists to steamroll this project and act as though all the aforementioned opposition is irrelevant to the inevitability of this sprawling monstrosity of a freeway expansion. After disbanding the Community Advisory Committee, the agency cynically announced it was starting a new “Historic Albina Advisory Committee” to “center Black voices,” as if the Black voices on the original CAC were inauthentic because they dared challenge the agency. Furthermore, ODOT’s making new hires to move forward with the Abernethy Bridge expansion in Clackamas County, and appears to be moving quickly to push for a new Columbia River Crossing proposal with their pals at WsDOT across the river.

But freeway expansions are inevitable until they aren’t. Our all-volunteer civic effort has made so much progress in building opposition to this freeway expansion over the last three and a half years, thanks to the help of so many organizations, individuals, and everyday Oregonians who want to invest in communities instead of freeways. We are so grateful for the moral clarity of all who have joined us to challenge this reckless project, and for the gift of community we’ve found in organizing our neighbors and partners to speak up and demand ODOT live up to our values. If you have to bare the brunt of the wildfires, it’s best to bare it with your peers in a bold action demanding accountability from the agency’s committing arson by pouring gasoline on our future, diesel in our lungs, freeways in our communities.

In 2021, in a first for No More Freeways, we intend to pursue legal action and sue the pants off of ODOT. We think we have a pretty good case – a few pretty good cases, actually. We are actively working with our lawyers to challenge the federal NEPA Finding of No Significant Impact, and to organize our community to join us, and how to make sure our efforts for transportation reform empower our partners to reshape their community in their own image – not in ODOT’s.

Lawyers cost money, unfortunately. And while we’ve been particularly thrifty with the money you’ve given us over the years, we’re gonna need another chunk of change to mount the legal challenge we need to hold ODOT accountable for what they are proposing to do to our climate, our community, our city, our lungs. We also need money to keep our website afloat and advertise our future action alerts, as we closely watch OTC meetings, and the upcoming legislative session.

An anonymous donor has pledged to match up to $5000 in our efforts to fundraise for our year ahead. If you’re able to support No More Freeways with a donation – whether $500, $50 or $15, whatever you can afford – we’ll send you a thank you card and a button. We may not have the army of consultants and PR flacks that ODOT does – but we have an army of community advocates, we have moral clarity in the fight for climate and restorative justice, and we soon enough will have a vaccine that allows us to once again rabblerouse against this freeway in person.

Thanks for your support!
Together, we’re going to kill this dumb freeway.

Yours,
Aaron