PSU Magazine Winter 1993

have been waging a guerilla war against Metro for the last 10 years. Cu ma, a 1969 graduate of Portland State, know it a well as anyone. "It' the nature of the beast," he says. "Local governments view us as a threat. They're convinced we're go ing to take them over tomorrow, and we're not." It's no wonder that local officials, since the founding of Metro in the late '70s, have reacted with some trepida– tion. Metro's powers are great, and its reach i far. It is in charge of regional garbage di posal; it plans the area's transportation; it manages, plans for and helps enforce urban growth; it operates the Wa hington Park Zoo, the Portland Center for the Performing Arts and the Oregon C nvention Cen– ter. And now with its new charter, passed by the voters in th November election, it will have expanded taxing powers. In the future, Metro may assume even greater authority, uch as taking over the region's parks and bringing Tri-Met under it domain. I it any wonder that some local politicians view thi power as ominous? No. But at the same time, at least two faculty members of PSU's chool of Urban and Public Affairs-Ron Cease and Ethan eltzer-see Metro, like democracy it elf, as a great and largely successfu l experiment. Of the 350 regional governments in the United States, Metro is th only one with elected officers. And while, like any government, it ha it flaws, they ee it as the way of the future: a model that other urban areas would do we ll to emulate. "Metro is a cutting edge idea that a lot of metropolitan areas are starting to contemplate very seriously because metropolitan areas don't correspond to juri dictional boundaries," says Seltzer, who worked as a land use supervisor at Metro from 1988 to 1992. He currently is the director of PSU's new Institute f Portland Metropolitan Studies in the School of Urban and Public Affairs.