FOR Portland
I’m Brandon Mullen, and I’m running for Portland City Council in District 3 to make life better for Portlanders.
My platform is simple, but deeply personal: I support policies that make sure my daughter can walk safely to school.
This means a few things:
Safer streets for all users
Reducing the cost of housing
Supporting working families and unions
A flourishing small business community
Investing in recreation for all ages
Building consensus with a servant leadership ethos, I will use my energy, education, and decade-plus of public service experience - including with the City of Portland - to fight for a Portland that’s better for our kids than it is for us.
About Brandon
Spending over a decade in public service and holding a Master’s in Leadership and Organizational Development, my work and education have focused on bending government toward justice and making sure people have more power over decisions that impact them.
I work hard, care deeply, and build consensus to get stuff done.
Born in Oregon, Made in Portland
Growing up in Corvallis, Oregon and graduating from Linn-Benton Community College and Oregon State University, I have spent nine years in Portland where I met my wife Cassie, where I held my first internship with Senator Jeff Merkley, and where I worked in Portland City Hall for four years. After Cassie’s work and education took us away from Oregon for a bit, we are now back home in Portland raising our daughter (Parker) with our cats (Zora and Czar).
The time I spent away made me appreciate Portland even more. Ask any of my colleagues or friends from that time and they’ll tell you how often I bugged them to come visit: that Portland has some of the best food in the country, that the people are awesome, that we have really cool clusters of small restaurants and shops, and how we are an hour away from mountains, glacial-cut gorges, the ocean, and forests.
Portland is special, and Portland is home. We both came back excited to raise our daughter here, and I am energized by the opportunity to serve out city in a new way.
From Vision to Action
My superpowers are my energy, optimism, and ability to turn vision into action. Yes: we can both imagine new ways of doing things AND get specific on how to make them happen. We need both.
During my career, I have:
Led the creation and passage of a Social Equity Program at the City of Portland to help workers with criminal cannabis convictions and lower fees for small businesses.
Directly supervised small teams (between 4 and 8 FTE staff), research fellows, and interns at the City of Portland, Metro, Clutha District Council, and the City of New Haven.
Designed and led trainings with garbage, recycling, and hazardous waste workers at Metro to make improvements to complex, multi-process work with an explicit focus on empowering workers and keeping them safe.
Managed a multi-million dollar budget over several years and helped design and refine regulations for a new cannabis regulatory program with the City of Portland.
Helped write and project managed a $2M Reconnecting Communities planning grant with the City of New Haven to plan for more affordable housing and reconnect neighborhoods split by I-91 in Connecticut.
Designed and facilitated organizational culture and leadership trainings, and provided executive coaching, for staff in the US, New Zealand, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
In my work and life, I have always encouraged my staff, colleagues, friends, family, and leaders to dream big and reject statements like “we’ve always done it that way.”
Pretending we can’t change big things might feel safe, but it’s almost always the wrong approach, especially in a moment where Portland needs practical and visionary leadership more than ever.