The legislative branch of Portland, Maine, is a

city council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, rural counc ...

. It is a nine seat council, composed of representatives from the city's five districts, three councilors elected citywide and the full-time elected Mayor of Portland. The eight councilors are elected for three-year terms, while the Mayor is elected for a four-year term. The Council is officially non-partisan, though councilors are often known for their political party affiliation. In 1923, the city transitioned from a

Mayor–council government The mayor–council government system is a system of local government that has a mayor who is directly elected by the voters serve as chief executive, and a separately elected legislative city council. It is one of the two most common forms of loc ...

to a Council–manager government. This was in alignment with national trends in metropolitan governments, and also partially motivated by the influence of the Maine Ku Klux Klan, which resented what was perceived as the growing power of ethnic and religious minorities. In 2011 the city charter was changed to allow an election for mayor again in

2011 File:2011 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: a protester partaking in Occupy Wall Street heralds the beginning of the Occupy movement; protests against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed that October; a young man celebrate ...

. Subsequent elections were held in

2015 File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the Apri ...

and

2019 File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...

. In 2020, voters approved a proposal to switch elections for City Council and school board to ranked-choice elections. In 2022, voters approved a proposal to switch elections for City Council to Proportional Rank Choice Voting. The Portland City Council meets at Portland City Hall, an historic 1909 building on Congress Street.

Current Councilors

# Mayor:

Kate Snyder Katherine Merchant Snyder (born 1970) is an American politician serving as Mayor of Portland, Maine since 2019. Prior to her election as mayor, she served as executive director of the Portland Education Foundation, a non-profit which raised funds ...

Democrat Democrat, Democrats, or Democratic may refer to: Politics *A proponent of democracy, or democratic government; a form of government involving rule by the people. *A member of a Democratic Party: **Democratic Party (United States) (D) **Democratic ...

, elected in the 2019 election (since 2019) # District 1: Belinda Ray, Democrat (since 2015) # District 2: Spencer Thibodeau, Democrat (since 2015) # District 3: Tae Chong, Democrat (since 2019) # District 4: Andrew Zarro, Democrat (since 2020) # District 5: Mark Dion, Democrat (since 2020) # At-Large: Pious Ali, Democrat (since 2016) # At-Large: April Fournier, Democrat (since 2020) # At-Large: Nicholas Mavodones, Democrat (since 1997)

Mayor (at-large): Kate Snyder

Kate Snyder is a non-profit executive who beat incumbent mayor

Ethan Strimling Ethan King Strimling (born October 19, 1967) is an American non-profit executive and politician from Maine. Strimling was elected Mayor of Portland, Maine in 2015. Strimling previously served as a Democratic state senator from 2003 to 2009. Afte ...

as well as city councilor Spencer Thibodeau in the

2019 Portland, Maine mayoral election Portland, Maine, held an election for mayor on November 5, 2019. It was the third election to be held since Portland voters approved a citywide referendum changing the city charter to recreate an elected mayor position in 2010. Kate Snyder, the ...

. Days after the election Snyder told the press “We know the issues and we’ll continue to work on them".

District 1: Belinda Ray

Belinda Ray was elected in 2015 to represent District 1 following the retirement of Kevin Donoghue. Ray is a resident of Portland's

East Bayside East Bayside is a neighborhood in Portland, Maine. It is bordered by Franklin Street on the west, Washington Avenue on the east, to the north by Marginal Way, and the south by Congress Street. It is bordered by the neighborhoods of Bayside, the O ...

neighborhood, having lived there since 2004. She helped found the East Bayside Neighborhood Organization (EBNO), and served sequentially as Vice President, President, and Community Organizer of EBNO. Ray was elected to succeed Donoghue as the District 1 councilor in a five-way race in which she garnered 39% of the vote.

District 2: Spencer Thibodeau

Spencer Thibodeau (born March 18, 1988) is a real estate attorney and native of Cincinnati, Ohio, who was elected in 2015 to represent District 2 following the retirement of David Marshall.

District 3: Tae Chong

Tae Chong Is a business counselor and former liaison for the Portland Police Department. He was elected to represent District 3 in 2019 beating four others including former councilor Edward Suslovic.

District 4: Andrew Zarro

District 5: Mark Dion

At-Large: Pious Ali

Elected to the council in 2016 after serving one term (3 years) on the City's Board of Public Education 2013-2016. He won his race by 62% in a three-way race to replace the incumbent Jon Hinck. Ali works at the University of Southern Maine’s Muskie School of Public Service He is an alumnus of the Institute for Civic Leadership (now known as Lift360), and in 2015, was named Lift360’s Most Distinguished Alumnus. A native of Ghana, Ali immigrated to the United States in 2000. and has lived in Portland since 2008.

At-Large: April Fournier

At-Large: Nick Mavodones

References

{{reflist

External links

Portland City Council
Government of Portland, Maine City councils in the United States