No time to cut maintenance, union tells City
Trying to save money on maintenance can have expensive consequences, Local
483 members testified at a May 17 City of Portland budget hearing. The hearing,
held at David Douglas High School, was a chance for public feedback about the
mayor’s proposed budget for the fiscal year that starts July 1. The budget contains
some cuts to maintenance, including a proposal to save money by cutting four
street cleaner positions and going down to once per year for residential street clean-
ing. But that might not save money, said Local 483 Executive Board member Wes-
ley Buchholz (pictured above), an employee of the Bureau of Environmental Serv-
ices. The bureau is chiefly responsible for sewage and wastewater treatment, and
Buchholz said skimping on street cleaning causes more debris to flow into the
City’s sewer system.
“Do you know what it costs to grind up a bowling ball in a $45,000 German-
made pump?” Buchholz asks. “A lot more than it costs to pick it up on the street.”
“In the six years I’ve been there, I’ve seen more and more stuff coming my way,
which tells me there’s more and more stuff up top that’s not getting picked up. Ma-
chines are having to be rebuilt and replaced on a regular basis, and it costs thou-
sands of dollars.”
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