become immune to the consequences. And I want to see the final answer frombekoth right now. Hello, this is Hayley McLaughlin with the League of Women Voters of Portland and you are watching the video Voters Guide. We in conjunction with Metro East community media are here to talk with candidates running in the May 2020 primary election. With me today is Carmen Rubio running for City Commissioner position one. Welcome Carmen. Hi there. Hi. Carmen please tell us a little bit about yourself. Why you're running for this office and what unique characteristics you have among all candidates for this office. Thank you. So I grew up in a hard working Mexican family in Oregon that instilled really strong values of taking care of each other and respect for hard work. And these were the things that inspired me to work in public policy for local progressive leaders and eventually to run one of the leading Latino community based on profits in Oregon and where we serve more than 7,800 youth and families every year. And early in my career as a policy staffer when I was young I saw firsthand the difference that it made for everyday people and historically marginalized and those who don't have a voice to feel truly represented by their elected officials. I happened to work for Commissioner Srinikruz who was the first Latina ever elected to Multnomah County Board of Commissioners and I saw what it meant to people to feel like they had access to local government through her candidacy and through her elected office. People deserve to be treated with dignity to be heard and to not feel dismissed because of who they are where they live or what language they speak. And so I'm running because I believe that communities in every part of our city deserve equity and should have a voice on city council not just those who can afford access or have access to power. And honestly in these uncertain times we need leaders with experience who can hit the ground running and as a nonprofit leader of a growing organization I've managed and led large scale project overseeing multi-million dollar budgets and understood the importance of collaborative leadership and the difference that makes in the workplace. And I'm the best choice for voters because I can hit the ground running right now. And I am an experienced manager, collaborator and I have a strong grounding in my community. Thank you. With the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting devastation of small business, city employee layoffs and housing displacement will be with us for some time. How would you seek to address the fallout including the reduction in city revenue? Well first I believe that the city and especially Mayor Reeler have they've done all the right things in pushing for a statewide stay at home order. I'm also really greatly appreciative of all our first responders and all professions and especially health care workers at this time. And I also want to acknowledge the thousands of unacknowledged farm industry workers picking vegetables and processing meat so that we can have groceries. And these jobs are long, they're hard hours, they're for low wages and often without health care benefits. And this is the latest industry that we're hearing on the news that is hit by COVID-19. So right now to me our local and state government are focused on how to support workers and small businesses through unemployment grants and loans and that's what they should be doing. Next we need to assess the revenue hit to government programs and services. And the next state forecast I think is coming in May. And so I hope that that will shed some light on what our work is. And once we know exactly what we're looking at the current council can get to work on planning. And something that is really important I think to say too is that this pandemic is crystallizing for us. The tremendous racial and economic disparities that are coming to the fore and that exist in our community and across the country. We're seeing that in the disproportionate amount of communities of color hit by this virus. And we're also seeing the potential, these potential people that are hard to hit to be the ones making the lowest wages. They lost their jobs, lack health care, affordable housing and they suffer from food insecurity. So our community is suffering and this is where the work of the city is. Ensuring we provide fire, life, safety, supports that we can count on and planning for recovery and providing relief for business owners where we can. The unemployed, low income families and workers who are in unemployed who are ineligible for unemployment insurance right now as well. And renters and those that are at high risk. And I think we need to just remember as a city we're only as strong as we are as our most vulnerable members are cared for in strengthened. And I think that our leaders at city council do recognize this. Thank you. If we maintain our current government structure, what's the bureau would you want to oversee and why? Was that plural or is that just one city? I'll let you answer however you'd like. I'm obviously one of my main interests is addressing our affordable housing challenges and our houseless challenges for the chronically homeless. I'm a big supporter of the effort underway to bring more resources into our city so that we can address long term needs around permanent supportive housing for our most vulnerable. So I would love to be able to be assigned the housing bureau for those reasons. I'm also very interested as someone who works with low income families and who helps to disperse rent assistance every month. I see the need in there. I also understand from the community side the urgency that exists. So I would love to bring that urgency and my own lived experience as someone who's lived on that side of these challenges and also as someone who is working the community for the last 10 years. I would also love to see parks and recreation. I believe it's one of the most incredible resources that our city has and that there's a lot of opportunity there right now and challenge to hold on to this precious resource. But I think that I have some ideas about how to make that also more accessible to more low income families. And then finally water as our climate goals are before us and we want to make progress. I believe that water justice is increasingly going to become an issue for our community. So that's something I'm interested in delving into as well. And in terms of liaison responsibilities, I would love to be the arts and culture liaison as well as liaison to the Portland children's lobby. Thank you. How would you address the public's significant concerns about police community relations? You sub deadly force and officer accountability. So what I would say about that is city council really needs to lead the way on this with a united voice. This means that we need to continually train officers to correct for their own implicit racial biases and practices and to be reflect about areas of growth that are needed. We need less military, military, military, of policing. Sorry, I always get stuck on that word. And more community-centered focus hiring peacekeepers who are armed with non-leafable tools. We also need, there's been discussion about updating the psychological evaluation and hiring processes to ensure that we're hiring and bringing in individuals with the mindset that black people and people of color are valued community members and are also these that we're recruiting for problem solvers and help the vulnerable navigate toward systems of care that they need to stay safe. We also need to make sure that we're recruiting and hiring to truly reflect the diversity of backgrounds that represent who Portland is today. And I think that that will become increasingly evident that we're doing the right things when we're seeing a more reflective workforce when we're seeing officers that look like us speak our languages and are from our communities. These are things that would be indicative of I believe culture change. Also, we need to be a city that uses data regularly that we have transparency of data so that we can see what disparities exist and that there is the data is on the table and that should be something that helps drive our decisions and shows our progress and shows the areas where we're not making progress and that need attention. I also think that we should think about expanding the independence and diversity of the independent review for accountability and looked up victim and community experiences through the use of restorative justice practices. So I think all these in combination are good starters and will help us show progress that we're becoming a more modern, more reflective and inclusive community centered police force for the city of Portland. Thank you, Carmen. This has been the Video Voters Guide. Thank you for watching. The primary election is Tuesday, May 19th. Be sure to inform yourself about the candidates and ballot measures and exercise your right to vote.