Portland’s campaign financing program doesn’t have enough money to operate at full capacity ahead of a historic election year. For some candidates, this means losing hundreds of thousands of anticipated dollars to run their 2024 campaigns.
The city’s Small Donor Election program works to help candidates who lack wealthy donors by rewarding those who pledge to only accept individual campaign donations under $350. The city matches the first $20 of all individual donations made to participating candidates 9-to-1, effectively turning a $20 donation into $180. . . .
Under the program, candidates who received donations from at least 250 Portlanders could receive up to $100,000 in matching funds, those who collect 750 donations could collect up to $200,000, and those with more than 1,250 donations would be limited to $300,000 in matching city dollars. A mayoral candidate can rake in up to $750,000 in matched contributions.
But, due to a lack of money in the city’s general fund, those caps will shrink. According to an analysis by the Portland Elections Commission, those funds could drop by 60% at the start of 2024. That means candidates who counted on bolstering their budgets with $300,000 of city dollars will only be about to count on $120,000.