Add Portland City Council to the list of people and institutions asking Portland Public Schools to pause its plan to close up to 14 schools.

Council members Tiffany Koyama Lane and Elana Pirtle-Guiney sent a letter Friday to the PPS school board and Superintendent Kimberlee Armstrong asking the district to “pause and revise its timeline for final school closure decisions” until they’ve shared more specifics about the proposed changes and heard from community members on the impacts.

All 12 of Portland’s city councilors signed the letter.

On Oct. 5, Portland Public Schools announced two scenarios proposing the closure of either 11 or 14 schools, citing declining enrollment. Enrollment in Oregon’s largest district has fallen 11% since 2019-20. The district scenarios include a host of other changes, including turning several K-8s into elementary schools and the relocation of dual-language programs.

Since the announcement, students, parents, teachers and community members have spoken out against the changes through letters, rallies and other actions.

In their letter, councilors Koyama Lane and Pirtle-Guiney connected the success of the city with the success of its public schools.

“The City’s investments in affordable and family-sized housing, community centers, safe streets, and neighborhood development are closely connected to the availability of strong, accessible public schools,” they wrote.

The councilors asked the district to share information about the “financial instructional, transportation, and neighborhood” impacts of its proposals.

A Portland teacher, Koyama Lane has been actively speaking out against the closures for weeks.

“I want to find ways the City Council can use our platform to engage the community and bring us together to get our questions answered and to use the data wisely for the best possible outcomes for our City in the long-term,” Koyama Lane shared in an Instagram post two days ago.

The city councilors are far from the only elected officials who have expressed concern about Portland’s process. Earlier this month, Gov. Tina Kotek sent Portland school officials a letter asking them to “take the time to get this right.”

Friday, Republican candidate for governor state Sen. Christine Drazan released a video featuring a parent whose daughter is planning to attend Sellwood Middle School in Southeast Portland next year. Sellwood is one of the schools proposed for closure.

In the video, Drazan spoke to parents, asking them to keep fighting for a delay to the process.

“When I’m in office, I’m not going to stand for this,” Drazan said. “I’m going to work with Republicans. I’m going to work with Democrats. We’re going to solve this problem. We’re going to keep your local neighborhood schools open.”

Earlier this week, City Council member Mitch Green filed an emergency “Save Public Schools” resolution, which included calls to Gov. Kotek, PPS, and the city. It failed to receive the nine votes from City Council needed to appear on the agenda.

According to Maria Sipin, Green’s chief of staff, the councilor is still planning to introduce a similar resolution at city council that would urge the state to prioritize funding for Portland schools.

In an Instagram post shared a day ago, Green said more than 1,000 community members reached out to the City Council asking for a pause.

The conversation about funding is a complicated one. Leaders in both Portland and Salem-Keizer Public Schools, another district planning for school closures, say budget challenges are separate from responses to declining enrollment. Portland projects a $65 million deficit for next year’s budget. Salem-Keizer projects a $46 million budget gap. District leaders say that closing schools makes it easier to stretch limited funding. It’s not clear whether more funding from the state would stave off closures.

But school closures appear to have fueled desires to address and update public school funding in Oregon, possibly during next year’s legislative session.

“This isn’t just about PPS or any single school district; we need a sea change in Oregon to understand and support the power of our public dollars to invest in the infrastructure that keeps us all healthy and connected to one another and the world,” wrote state Sen. Khanh Pham, D-Portland, in a Facebook post from a Southeast Portland PTA meeting.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2026/10/30/portland-schools-closure-city-councilors-ask-paus/