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A screen shot of the digital brochure that was printed for former Mayor Charlie Hales.

(Screen shot)

Former Mayor Charlie Hales apparently decided to give himself and Portland a going-away present: A brochure that tells all of us how lucky we were to have him as our mayor.

Under the headline "We all live here together," the brochure, which was printed at taxpayers' expense and directs people to Hales' personal website, highlights statistics from Hales' just-ended mayoral term. Among other things, the brochure boasts that during Hales' term, $800 million was diverted from urban renewal programs to fund public safety, parks and other services; that annual street repaving went from 35 miles a year to more than 100 miles a year; and that Portland voters passed a gas tax for the first time.

What's missing is accuracy. And context. And credit. Consider the urban renewal claim. That "$800 million" refers to the property value that was returned to tax rolls - not, as he claims, the amount "diverted" to fund police, firefighters and other city services. In fact, as The Oregonian/OregonLive's Brad Schmidt reported at the time, the changes to the urban renewal program were projected to deliver only another $61 million more to the city's general fund, with nearly all of it coming after 2030.

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And then take a second look at that repaving statistic. The city's not "repaving" 100 miles of road a year, as the brochure claims. It's maintaining 100 miles, most of which comes through less durable fog and crack sealing.

And the gas tax? Credit for that hard-fought win belongs more with Commissioner Steve Novick, who headed the transportation bureau, than with Hales. Voters' approval also came in spite of all that Hales and Novick had done in the preceding two years to torch the community's patience and goodwill with a series of severely flawed street-fee proposals.

Hales even attempts to market his term as one of police reform breakthroughs. He notes that use of force incidents by police dropped in half from 2010 to 2015, even though he did not become mayor until 2013. His crowing also ignores the many ways in which Hales bombed as a police commissioner. He failed to put his chief of police on leave after the chief accidentally shot his friend and was the target of a criminal investigation. He failed to notify anyone about the shooting accident or initiate a personnel review as police procedures call for. And he failed to show interest or leadership when conflicts jeopardized progress in achieving key police reforms demanded by the federal settlement. Instead, he spent his time challenging the authority of the federal judge overseeing the settlement - twice - in a move that can only be chalked up to ego.

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The brochure is just more preening and it glosses over the reality of Portland's ongoing homelessness crisis, the affordable housing shortage, deep mistrust of the police and concern over the sustainability of the city's spending. While Hales' name and website adorn the brochure's cover, he relegates acknowledgments to his fellow city commissioners and his staff on the back. Never mind that several of the initiatives noted in the brochure were championed by his colleagues, not him.

It's still unclear how much the brochures cost taxpayers. Brian Worley, who was Hales' spokesman, said the office authorized the expenditure as it has for other "citizen outreach information material." A spokeswoman for the Office of Management and Finance said the city does not appear to have received the bills yet. Meanwhile, Hales posted the digital version for downloading off his website and had been handing out the brochures before leaving on an extended sailing trip.

This isn't the first time Hales tapped city funds to pay for his own self-aggrandizement. Back in 2015 shortly before Hales announced he was running for re-election - until reality hit and he dropped out - Hales used $4,293 of taxpayer money to produce a 20-page pamphlet that purports to summarize Hales' accomplishments.

Despite the exaggerations and inaccuracies, we did find one data point in the brochure that appropriately sums up Hales' legacy. It's right on the cover in red letters: "Charlie Hales, Mayor of Portland

2013-2016."

One term and out.

- The Oregonian/OregonLive Editorial Board