It looks as though the Portland Development Commission wants to get itself out of the business of creating low-income rental housing. Which it apparently never wanted to be in in the first place, except that former City Commissioner Opie Sten was determined to wrestle a big chunk of its "urban renewal" budget away for that purpose. The way things fell out with Sten, the PDC was forced to spend big bucks on "affordable" housing, including rental housing. Now it looks as though the PDC might be willing to give up the money for that purpose, but let somebody else do the actual implementation of the projects.

It make sense to take these projects off the PDC's plate. If we're determined to grab a big percentage of the "urban renewal" budget and funnel it into low-income apartments, we should entrust it to the housing authority, Central City Concern, or somebody else who knows what they're doing in that department -- and wants to do it. Leave the PDC to stuff like giant, empty condo towers, "creative class" caves, and chi-chi theaters.

The bigger issue, of course, is what "urban renewal" has to do with low-income housing in the first place. Opie, the big wheeler-dealer, always saw "urban renewal" as a giant slush fund, available for any good deed (as defined ever-so-quixotically in his own keen mind), and his colleagues on the City Council consistently backed him up on whatever he came up with. Bike bridges, an aerial tram [rim shot] for the med school, a new county courthouse, public schools miles away from the urban renewal district -- it has all been fair game for the PDC budget. No wonder the agency is falling apart.

Meanwhile, in the course of the discussion at yesterday's PDC commissioners' meeting, board member Sal Kadri made a refreshingly candid remark:

Commissioner Sal Kadri said he'd rather see the agency focus its affordable housing efforts on home ownership, instead of the rental programs that create dense "ghettos" in urban renewal areas.