‘Unsustainable’: Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek urges Preschool for All changes

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — The deadline for parents to accept Multnomah County’s Preschool for All placement offers just passed.

Now, Gov. Kotek is urging county chair Jessica Vega Pederson to consider restructuring how the program is funded.

In a letter to the chair, Kotek calls the current direction of the program “unsustainable.”

Currently, Preschool for All is funded by a personal income tax on Multnomah County’s highest earners — individuals with a taxable income over $125,000 — and joint filers with an income over $200,000.

Kotek says the tax seems to be discouraging top earners from calling Portland home.

“There should have been a statewide tax for preschool. Not a Multnomah County tax that penalizes Multnomah County. We have seen 1,700 higher-income people in the past two years,” said Portland-based businessman Jordan Schnitzer.

Schnitzer will be discussing this topic further on the next episode of Eye on Northwest Politics, which airs Sunday at 4:30 p.m. on Portland’s CW and at 6 p.m. on KOIN 6.

Kotek suggests easing the tax burden on people living and working in Multnomah County through a number of ways, including pausing the Preschool for All tax collection for three years or reducing the tax rate.

As it stands now, single filers are taxed 1.5% on taxable income exceeding $125,000. The same rate applies to joint filers with income exceeding $200,000.

She also recommends the county figure out what is financially necessary to achieve the original goals of the program, which includes reaching universal access by 2030.

Vega Pederson responded to the governor’s letter with one of her own, saying in part, “Our community made a commitment to children, families, preschool providers. Our childcare and early education workforce, as well as our future, when 64% of voters said yes to Preschool for All in 2020.”

She goes on to say she will be finalizing a plan to revise the Preschool for All tax in the coming weeks.