Thank you for Attending the Oct. 8 Joint Gateway Town Hall!

Dear Gateway Town Hall attendees, 

First, we want to extend a big thank you to everyone who came out and made your voices heard at our first town hall co-hosted by District 1 Councilors Candace Avalos and Jamie Dunphy on October 8th at the Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization (IRCO)! Our staff has been hard at work transcribing and organizing all of your notes and feedback from the town hall, small group discussions, and follow-up e-mails. We will be ready to present – and advocate for – a community-led vision for Gateway at our follow-up meetings with all three District 1 council offices, the Mayor, and relevant Bureaus. 

Upon compiling notes from all of the discussion tables, two major priorities emerged: a comprehensive plan for a Gateway Town Center/activation of the Fred Meyer site and sidewalks!  

Pedestrian safety, walkability, food and grocery access, and active collaboration with the community and neighborhood associations were central topics of discussion at nearly all of the five tables. We will be leading with these priorities as we move forward toward a concrete plan of action and are committed to accountability and keeping you informed and involved every step of the way. 

We are including the transcriptions of each table’s notes, so if you see anything missing from your table(s), please let us know! Find the notes at this link.

Here’s how we got here and what’s next: 

• After the Oct. 8th joint town hall, we worked with notetakers and facilitators to transcribe all the notes from the small group discussions and gather all the feedback. 

• On Oct. 22nd, we met with notetakers and facilitators to go over notes and make sure we captured everything. 

• Today we are sending this email to you, Gateway joint town hall attendees and interested neighbors who asked to subscribe to our newsletter. 

• Today, Oct. 28th, the offices of D1 Councilors Candace Avalos, Jamie Dunphy, and Loretta Smith are meeting to put together all the feedback they’ve collected from constituents during their respective town halls and prepare action items. Our hope is that these can be broken into short-term activation ideas (like a holiday ice rink!) and long-term anchors and projects (like grocery stores, more sidewalks, and more affordable housing). 

• In November, the three Councilors will work with Prosper Portland to dive deeper into the specifics of their Gateway TIF District plans and share their action items with Mayor Wilson.

• Next, our offices will share those action items with the Gateway Town Hall attendees and everyone who subscribed to our newsletter(s). 

• Heading into the new year, we will continue to host smaller round table discussions about development in Gateway and continue to inform and engage the community. 
  
  
• Our hope is that with breaking down action items into short and long-term, we can begin implementing the short term solutions fast, as early as this winter and spring and the community can start seeing an activation of the Gateway area in the immediate future, as we work on long-term solutions, such as more housing and other buildings.
  
  
• To stay in the loop and continue to receive updates, make sure you’re signed up for Councilor Dunphy’s and Councilor Avalos’s newsletters! 

Thank you again to everyone who attended the Oct. 8th Joint Town Hall. Please keep in touch!