Oregon’s second most populous city is hoping to take a page out of Portland’s billion-dollar climate action playbook.
On Monday, a coalition of Eugene-based environmental groups announced the launch of a campaign to create the Eugene Clean Energy Fund. The fund would impose a 2% tax on local gross profits of larger retailers earning more than $1 billion in profits within the United States.
Initiative supporters estimate the tax would bring in about $15 million a year. That money would fund renewable energy and energy efficiency programs, renewable energy job training, and green infrastructure programs, Breach Collective Oregon energy transition organizer Aya Cockram said.
Cockram, who is a lead petitioner for the initiative, said that spending would make a huge difference in the effort to meet the city’s climate goals and would improve the quality of life for working families in Eugene.
“The Eugene Clean Energy Fund is an opportunity for our community to live up to our climate goals and invest in our community,” Cockram said. “By making billion-dollar companies pay their fair share, we can increase resilience, we can develop comprehensive energy efficiency programs, support local businesses, create good clean energy jobs, and more.”
The Trump administration has rescinded hundreds of billions of dollars previously awarded to address climate change. In Oregon, some of those funds would have boosted solar adoption and added more renewable energy projects onto the power grid.
Eugene is the first city in the nation to follow Portland’s lead by taxing large retailers to create a climate action fund, initiative backers say.
“As this federal administration continues to choose to put profit over people gutting hard fought investments into climate action and environmental justice, we have chosen to invest in our communities now,” said Joel Iboa, Eugene community member and chief petitioner of the initiative. Iboa is also the founding executive director of the Oregon Just Transition Alliance.
Portland’s Clean Energy Fund, known as PCEF, was implemented in 2019, and is expected to generate $1.7 billion through mid-2029. The fund has had so much financial success, it’s helped fill in budget gaps for some city bureaus engaged in climate-related work. Portland has also transferred interest earned on climate fund dollars into the city’s general fund. These dollars all come through a 1% tax on larger retailers.
Opponents to the initiative that created PCEF argued before its passage that a new tax on businesses would contribute to the city’s affordability crisis.
The Eugene Clean Energy Fund initiative aligns closely to Portland’s. Though PCEF taxes 1% of the gross receipts of larger retailers, the Eugene initiative would tax 2% gross profits, Cockram said. Portland’s tax on receipts is based on total sales regardless of a company’s expenses, while Eugene would subtract expenses from sales and only apply its tax to profits.
“Portland has been so successful in generating funds to support amazing projects and transportation and housing and job training, and we would really just like to have the same in Eugene and think that this could be a great model for other communities as well,” she said.
The fund could also help Eugene catch up on its climate goals, she said.
Last year, the city announced it was behind on greenhouse gas emission reduction goals listed in its Climate Recovery Ordinance. Eugene aims to reduce 50% of its carbon emissions by 2030. So far, it has only reduced emissions by 24%.
“I think that one of the things we just hear over and over again when trying to work, not just on climate, but also on community justice projects is we don’t have enough money,” Cockram said. “So this campaign is really an effort to take matters into our own hands and create the funding needed to have a good quality of life in Eugene and have a clean, green future for our children.”
Cockram said internal polls predict that if this ballot initiative were to go in front of voters today, it would pass with 63% approval.
The initiative’s backers — Beyond Toxics, Breach Collective, Oregon Just Transition Alliance, and Oregon Sierra Club — hope to bring the tax proposal to Eugene voters on the November ballot. If successful, the money generated from the fund would be doled out to the community as quickly as possible, the groups say.
This story comes to you from the Northwest News Network, a collaboration between public media organizations in Oregon and Washington.