said he saw an opportunity to shift the narrative of May's election away from big business and toward help for working folks and the poor, so the 30-year-old jumped into the race for City Council.

Caleb is an adjunct professor at Concordia University, and has been a member of the Oregon State Bar since 2009, but he isn't currently practicing law. Caleb recently moved to the Mt. Tabor neighborhood.

He's one of three candidates challenging long-time Commissioner Dan Saltzman, but Caleb made the most headway of the trio,

the Portland Mercury this week. His campaign has centered around a $15 per hour living wage for Portlanders. Caleb said without a living wage in the city, Portland jeopardizes making the "friendly, vibrant, culturally rich place it is today" unaffordable.

The Oregonian asked Caleb the following questions via email.

Why are you running for City Council?

Despite the power to do so, city government rarely takes meaningful action on issues like income inequality, gentrification, environmental pollution, campaign finance, or government transparency and accountability. At the time I filed my candidacy, I hadn't seen any candidate in any local race who was speaking persuasively about these issues. So, I jumped in the race to draw attention to these issues and advocate for policies to improve the lives of working families and the poor.

Nicholas Caleb, 30, said the City Council doesn't take enough action to protect families and the working poor. He's advocating for a $15 per hour living wage.

What's the biggest challenge facing Portland right now, and how would you address it?

Portland's two biggest (and intimately related) challenges are low wages and the rising cost of housing. With rapidly rising rents and property taxes combined with stagnant wages, the working poor are being forced to the margins of the city at an unprecedented pace. A $15/hr living wage is essential if we're to start to deal with Portland's problem of wealth inequality. At the same time, communities must have legal powers to control what sorts of developments are welcome in their neighborhoods. While increasing affordable housing, we must also curtail rapidly rising rents. If we do not, the people who make Portland the friendly, vibrant, culturally rich place it is today will no longer be able to afford life in this city.

Why are you specifically running against Commissioner Saltzman?

Commissioner Saltzman is the longest serving incumbent in city hall. Until a few weeks before the filing deadline, he had no challenger. As a low wage-earner myself, I was tired of not seeing the issues Portlanders care about almost totally ignored by city government. Because I've been active in social, environmental, and economic justice circles, I knew I could get some people to support my candidacy. I thought there was a good chance we could build a campaign to shift the narrative in this city away from giving tax breaks to multinational corporations and developers to finding real solutions for improving the quality of life for working families and the poor.

Commissioner Saltzman oversees the Housing Bureau, and homelessness continues to be a lingering story a decade after the 10 year plan to end homelessness. How do you think the city, and the commissioner, is doing?

As any un-housed person or homeless advocate will tell you, there's no single narrative accurately capturing the various experiences of people living on the street. If Portland is to succeed on improving the quality of live of our un-housed residents, solutions to these problem cannot be “one size fits all”. As we transition un-housed Portlanders back into housing and work, we need to take immediate action to end the criminalization of homelessness in Portland. The fact that the City is continuing to work with Right 2 Dream Too proves we can step in the right direction. We must do more to support and expand successful, cost-effective and innovative community solutions like Right 2 Dream Too has developed. Supporting effective community-driven organizations better serves the diversity of individual needs among people suffering homelessness.

(Read more about the candidates in The Oregonian's Voter Guide)

-- Andrew Theen