North Portlanders will not put up with another burden after decades of exposure to disproportionate environmental and health burdens in the land, air and water. I refuse to accept the Port's T-4 proposal to lease their property to Verizon for the development of a regional drone facility.  

The Port is not being transparent about Verizon's plans for drone flight patterns, noise level, frequency of drone activity, and environmental or health risks. What are the long-term plans for drone use? How can we be sure there will not be heightened surveillance of residents using new drone technology? 

The Port historically has refused accountability of corporations bad practices leasing Port properties. They will likely do the same if a drone disaster were to happen on this site if Verizon, a fortune 500 company, crashed a large drone into people or birds of prey in Cathedral Park or along the Willamette River. This site is right along the river.

No adequate controls currently exist for curbing abuses of the use of drones. ACLU's report states, "Routine aerial surveillance in American life would profoundly change the character of public life in the United States. Rules must be put in place to ensure that we can enjoy the benefits of this new technology without bringing us closer to a “surveillance society” in which our every move is monitored, tracked, recorded, and scrutinized by the authorities."

The City should be approving only river dependent uses along the river. The Port, as a public agency, should be working with the community and Tribes to set high environmental and social standards when leasing and determining future uses of this land; After all, these are the occupied lands of the Clackamas Chinook, Willamette Tumwater, Wasco-Wishram, Watlata, Multnomah, and other Chinookan Peoples, as well as the Tualatin Kalapuya, Cayuse, Mollala, and other tribes and bands of the Columbia and Willamette Rivers. It is a very historically significant site - a village site of the Chinook known as Gahlawkshin.  It is also the first known place that a person of African descent landed on these shores.