The Bend City Council welcomed its new and returning council members on Wednesday night with a ceremony at City Hall. Along with returning members Megan Perkins and Megan Norris, newcomers Gina Franzosa and Steve Platt were sworn in by Municipal Court Judge Pro Tem Erin Zemper.
Upon reading their oaths of office, councilors offered remarks to the community. Franzosa, who has a background in housing, engineering and the environment, expressed her excitement for her term.
“It is my honor to serve the City of Bend, so thank you all for your support and I look forward to working with you in the coming four years,” Franzosa said at the meeting.
Platt, another newcomer to the council, is a science teacher at Summit High School. Platt thanked his family and voters, and summarized why he chose to run.
“I choose to serve to push back against the sense that the problems in our world are too big for us to impact… I ran for the opportunity to serve all members of our community, and that’s exactly what I plan to do,” Platt said.
“Our community will believe in the value of good government when they see us delivering in ways that improve their lives measurably and in the near term. I look forward to working with you all, with our mayor, my fellow counselors and the city staff to get stuff done.”
Perkins, starting her second term on the council, recalled the last four years and some of the challenges the region has faced. “I’m very honored to be sworn into the Bend City Council for my second term… This work is not easy or simple, but I look forward to more of those challenges and decisions these next four years,” Perkins said. She went on to thank her family, along with city staff members, for their support.
Norris, another returning council member, made remarks about her second term. “I look forward to working with new colleagues and… old colleagues and working together to transform our city, to do what’s best for our city and really make sure that we are doing everything we can to be good stewards of our city,” Norris said while also acknowledging her family and city staff.
Following the comments, the Bend City Council voted unanimously to re-elect returning councilor Perkins as Mayor Pro Tem.
“I think the theme you’re going to see from this group of people, and why I’m glad that we have a couple of folks who are new and [a] couple returning, is we’re going to get stuff done and we’re going to make government work for the people. I think that’s why we had, overwhelmingly, the voters saying, ‘Yes, we want to see things done. We want to see work on housing and homelessness and transportation and climate,”” said Bend Mayor Melanie Kebler, addressing the community.
“Those are the values of our community that we represent up here. We’re here not just to talk about it, but to do things about it — whatever we can do at the local level — which is where it’s going to be happening, I think, in the next four years and beyond.”
This article appears in The Source Weekly January 9, 2025.
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Councilors:
Try your best to keep the interest of the City of Bend at heart.
You will be tempted by developers and Brooks Resources to enrich yourselves.
Please keep in mind, this area is fragile. It sits in a fire zone. We have limited health care resources. We have a two lane road up to the mountain. We have people here who have lived here their entire lives.
It’s not a given that you have to create California in the Cascades.
Thanks.
Please be the voice of the residents not the devopers!