Kathleen Saadat, 85, needed just three minutes to turn Portland City Council chambers into a principal’s office.
She introduced herself as an activist and a bureaucrat. The credentials: organizer of Portland’s first Pride march, in 1976 with six other activists and an audience of 200; the drafter of the city’s civil rights ordinance with co-author Keeston Lowery; service as the State of Oregon’s affirmative action office; and trainer for four decades in diversity, equity, and inclusion.
When the woman who helped write your civil rights ordinance takes a number to discuss your behavior, the hearing is already over. She cut her biography short in her introduction: “That’s enough. I only have three minutes.”
In those minutes, she delivered a conduct review. To describe its format, let us turn to a published rubric the Seattle Public Schools use, because it tracks Saadat’s commentary well.
Rule One: “Treat others with respect and fairness.”
“I am angry,” Saadat began. “I am frustrated. I am confused.” What angers her is the name-calling, the slights, the disrespect.
She declined to name any individual councilor as the source. This was not mercy. “I consider each and every one of you to be responsible for the overall functioning of this council,” she explained, which means the entire class stays after the bell.
Rule Two: “Do classroom assignments and homework neatly, on time, and to the best of your ability.”
The homework standard she assigned: policy developed from relevant data, documented need, available resources, the opinions of the people affected, and the values of the city. One would assume none of this needed to be read aloud to a seated government. She read it anyway, at testimony pace, the way a teacher handles a class that has fallen behind.
Rule Three: “No spitting, swearing, or name calling.”
The school files this rule under recess. “I don’t want to see you paid to bicker,” Saadat said. “I don’t want to pay you to call one another names or disparage one another.”
Rule Four: “Try to solve a problem before going to an adult.”
The school recommends discussion, voting, or rock, paper, scissors. Two weeks before Saadat testified, the council faced a budget dispute, tried voting, and tied. It then summoned the mayor, who is not a member of the body, and conducted a floor dispute over whether he is anyone’s daddy. Rock, paper, scissors remains available.
Rule Five: “Leave things at home that are not needed for school.”
The school’s list: candy, gum, junk food, toys, and radios. Saadat’s addition came with storage instructions: “know when your ego is in the way of progress,” she told the councilors, “and put it in your desk drawer.” Whether drawers engineered for pens and staples can hold what she is asking them to hold is a question of capacity, not compliance.
The class has been warned before.
In 2022, when Portland voted to redesign its entire government, Saadat opposed the measure, warning that sending more people into a dysfunctional room does not make the room functional. The voters thanked her for her service and approved the measure anyway.
On August 5, she delivered the grade in person. The test is the rest of the term.
I love that Kathleen did this!
This is an unfair characterization: “The voters thanked her for her service and approved the measure anyway.” The voters were not ALLOWED to vote on the three core components of charter change separately. Had we been, this mess would not exist today.