Spotlight on Portland, ME with City Councilor Spencer Thibodeau
As City Councilor and chair of Portland’s Transportation and Sustainability Committee, Spencer Thibodeau has pushed for a wealth of environmental legislation, mobility investments, and quality-of-life improvements. In this interview, he shares insights with Cityfi about prioritizing issues and exchanging ideas from his experience as councilor and now as a mayoral candidate.
At Cityfi, we have the pleasure of working with governments, foundations, and the private sector across the country to help manage massive change in a rapidly urbanizing world.
While on a term of leave/sabbatical/extended honeymoon traveling through the US and Canada in an RV, my husband and I recently found ourselves stuck in Portland, ME with a broken transmission, falling in love with the city and state of Maine more broadly.
Turning lemons into lemonade and making the most of the accessibility of Portland city politics, I was able to set up an interview with City Councilor and Mayoral Candidate Spencer Thibodeau. Listen to the audio recording for our full conversation, or check out the highlights below:
Cityfi: To start, could you share a synopsis of your history with Portland and how you got involved in city politics?
Thibodeau: I was adopted in Portland when I was three weeks old, from Cincinnati, Ohio. I went through the public school system here until eighth grade when I fell behind in reading and my parents moved me to a Jesuit school, which turned everything around. I left the city for college and law school at Northeastern University before returning home.
I was inspired to get involved with city politics when I was walking to work one day after a snowstorm and the sidewalks hadn’t been plowed. I didn’t know who my City Councilor was or really anything about Portland city government, but it made me want to take on whoever was in office.
Fast forward a bit and, after being elected City Councilor in a three-way race, I’ve worked on exactly those sorts of quality-of-life improvements: sidewalk improvements, pedestrian crossing beacons, Portland’s first municipal solar farm, we passed one of the most prohibitive pesticides ordinances in the country…
Cityfi: What is your perception of the peoples’ priorities? How do you ascertain that?
Thibodeau: It’s easier to ascertain when you’re running for office since I’m constantly knocking on doors and going to events. The clear front-running issue is affordability, which spans a range of issues from affordable housing to taxes to an expectation for both quality and affordability of city services.
Cityfi: What are your priorities? Are there important issues you think don’t get enough attention?
Thibodeau: One is certainly long-term climate action planning. We just started a study- we’re about 7 months into an 18 month process to set long term climate action planning goals with our neighbor in South Portland. The ultimate goal is to get to 100% clean renewable energy by 2040 in line with the Mayor’s Coalition. Getting there is the challenge. Some of the technology we need to get there doesn’t exist yet. We also need to get out of our comfort zone around mobility and what freedom means… mobility freedom is not just vehicles, but bicycles and public transportation.
It took three years for us to get our first protected bike lane infrastructure in the city. But we did it, and we did it under budget.
Another example of this kind of different way of thinking is the idea of parklets. I introduced an ordinance in 2016 after learning that Maine prohibits non-contiguous use. For example, an outdoor space to consume alcohol needs to be located directly next to the associated restaurant rather than say across the street. We had to go to the state to change the statute, engage residents, and are finally embarking on a pilot program this summer to transform five parking spaces in the city.
Cityfi: Through this blog and our work at Cityfi, we try to foster an exchange of ideas between city leaders. What can other cities learn from Portland?
Thibodeau: One lesson I think cities can learn from Portland is to focus on the question of “what are a city’s assets and how do you protect them?” For us, our greatest asset is our connectivity to the water. That means being pointed in our zoning and managing growth. In Boston, for example, there are high buildings along the waterfront. Here we are cognizant that we can’t get rid of that perfect symphony of fishermen and tourism and restaurants by over-commercializing what is a thriving commercial enterprise in the fishing industry.
We also do a great job in Portland of making quality-of-life investments — in trails, playgrounds, water and natural resources. Cities can learn from the idea of making sure you don’t sell the farm.
Cityfi: We also pay a lot of attention to public-private partnerships at Cityfi. What has your experience been with these and what do you see taking place in Portland in the next 10 or 20 years?
Thibodeau: A few notable success stories include:
- The Portland Opportunity Crew-a partnership between local business and the city government offers panhandlers the opportunity to earn money to cleanup public areas and links them with needed services, such as job training and support.
- Maine’s system of Low Income Housing Tax Credits to incentivize developers to build affordable housing quickly.
- Individual and neighborhood civic engagement generally. Neighborhood groups lead cleanups and develop specific plans for their communities. This engagement is a blessing and something to build on in the coming years.
Learn more about the Spencer Thibodeau’s mayoral campaign at https://www.spencerthibodeau.com/ and about Portland city government at https://www.portlandmaine.gov/. Many thanks for joining us!
