Since 2012, Portland voters have approved more than $4 billion in bonds.

That money has helped rebuild and update nine schools. The last two bonds, passed in 2020 and 2025, set records as the largest in state history.

The funds from these two bonds are expected to support the modernizations of Jefferson, Cleveland and Ida B. Wells high schools.

Additionally, the 2020 bond called for the creation of the Center for Black Student Excellence, a districtwide resource for Black students.

But progress on the modernizations has stalled, with construction on Jefferson still not underway.

The desire to fulfill the long-awaited bond projects that voters approved has put PPS in a tough spot: completing four modernization projects, likely at the same time, with limited staff capable of providing oversight.

The district’s solution? Spend $61 million on a contract with Procedeo, a consulting firm, to oversee project management on the four modernization projects, as well as general administrative oversight of the district’s Office of School Modernization.

“Every month…that we spend with adults fighting battles instead of moving projects ahead, is another month in which students — and taxpayers, by the way — are sitting in outdated, inadequate facilities that don’t reflect our values or our commitments that we’ve made to voters,” said Michelle DePass, board vice chair and the longest-serving board member.

On social media over the weekend, current and former school board members debated the contract as well as the timing of the vote, which is scheduled for Tuesday evening.

PPS Superintendent Kimberlee Armstrong also weighed in. So did a former director of the OSM.

What the $61 million contract is for

The $61.5 million, five-year contract is between Portland Public Schools and Procedeo, a Texas-based company.

Under the contract, Procedeo will provide “program management services” for the district’s four modernization projects.

On Nov. 18, PPS announced Procedeo as its top pick out of three firms that submitted proposals.

“Strengthening safe, supportive and well-maintained schools, and modernizing our facilities so every student learns in a 21st-century environment, is one of my top district priorities,” Armstrong said in the district’s press release.

“As a new administration, we are building the systems, structures and project-delivery approaches that allow us to move this work forward with greater clarity and accountability.”

As reported by Willamette Week and The Oregonian, the district has been working with Procedeo for months, though on a much smaller scale.

Previous contracts have amounted to $637,000, with the description of the most recent services being to “provide interim OSM leadership”.

But this contract makes a temporary working relationship more permanent — and far more expensive.

The new, $61.5 million contract tasks Procedeo with managing the bond program, as well as leading and overseeing “the delivery of bond-funded District construction projects.”

It also charges the consulting company with overseeing the Office of School Modernization, supporting a Portland-based program management team, implementing a “first 90 days” plan and program schedule and reporting monthly to the district.

Previously, PPS has contracted out project management for some of its modernization projects, including a 2-year contract to a local firm to manage the Benson modernization project for $1.8 million in 2019.

That local firm from 2019, now called Turner & Townsend Heery, lost this latest contract to Procedeo.

According to the Oregonian, Turner & Townsend Heery’s president sent a letter to PPS officials last week, protesting the district’s decision, calling it “biased”.

OSM Staffer Kiesha Locklear said the high cost of this new contract with Procedeo is concerning and argues that district officials are being “overcharged”.

“It’s their job to put the right people in place to help advise them on decisions and make recommendations, and that’s just not happening,” Locklear said.

District staffer: ‘It’s the board’s job to question’ the superintendent

Locklear is a project manager for both the Jefferson rebuild and the new Center for Black Student Excellence.

She said Portland’s school modernization office has lost “key leadership” recently, but it needs more logistical help, rather than a complete overhaul of the department and the modernization projects already underway.

“We need someone to come in and give us some better tracking systems, some better systems to liaise with our departments and manage our standards,” she said. “There’s just some organizational pieces that we need, and that we just don’t have the manpower to do it.”

In a memo Armstrong shared with the board dated Nov. 25, she explained how Procedeo will be paid: base compensation of $55 million with up to $6.5 million in addition, if projects are completed on time and if key staffers are retained.

“PPS has never simultaneously executed on four significant capital projects, and the compensation structure incentivizes timely completion of all projects,” according to the memo.

Locklear notes that several of the district leaders advocating for this contract, including PPS Senior Chief of Operations Jon Franco and Superintendent Kimberlee Armstrong, come from an education background, not a construction or architectural one.

She would like to see a work session between the board and OSM, “so that they can gain an understanding of what has been happening and provide suggestions and guidance for solutions that are not mandated by the superintendent.”

“It is the board’s job, literally, to question the superintendent’s decisions,” Locklear said.

Locklear posted about her concerns on Facebook. So did School Board Member Virginia La Forte, who said she’d like to see a pause on the vote to allow for more time to talk through the decision.

In a statement to OPB, La Forte said she wants to make sure there is sufficient time for the board and the district community to weigh in.

“Community input isn’t a box to check — it’s essential to making good decisions,” La Forte said.

Other school board members, like Michelle DePass, say “turmoil” at OSM has hindered progress.

“We have to do something different,” DePass said. “I feel morally responsible for breaking the cycle of dysfunction and delivering for the students.”

Rashelle Chase-Miller, another PPS board member, posted on social media, too.

She said she felt like there was adequate time for the board to read up on the contract. She said she supports moving forward with Procedeo and completing the modernization projects.

“There was a pause to explore cost savings, and that pause ended up costing money, as well as time,” Chase-Miller said of the board’s role in stalling progress on the construction projects.

Chase-Miller said she sees Procedeo as providing stability for the Office of School Modernization, while also completing bond projects.

“It’s really important that we uphold our duty to the voters and to our children to get these high schools modernized, and the OSM doesn’t have the bandwidth or the ability to manage those three — four, if you add in CBSE — major projects right now.”

Board members will hear public comment, discuss and vote on the Procedeo contract at the PPS board meeting on Tuesday at 6 pm.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2025/12/02/portland-school-advocates-debate-contract-ahead-school-board-vote/