Portland Mayor Sam Adams says he plans to meet with each City Commissioner one-on-one Saturday, according to Randy Leonard. Commissioner Randy Leonard confirmed in a phone conversation Friday evening that he has an appointment to meet with Adams at 11:30 a.m. on Saturday.
Leonard said he did not know what exactly would be discussed at the meeting.
The meetings are not open to the public. Leonard said if the council were to have a quorum it would be open to the public but individual meetings do not fall under the same guidelines.
A couple hundred people showed up in front of city hall Friday evening to show their support for embattled Mayor Sam Adams -- who was not on hand to receive them -- instead spending the day gathering advice on whether or not he should stay in office, according to his staff
Earlier Friday, a group of representatives from Portland's arts, business and civic communities gathered Friday in City Hall to voice their support as picketers shouted at each other outside.
The rallies capped a week of events that included the mayor's revelations that he had a sexual relationship with a teenager in 2005 and lied about it. Leonard ascends if Adams resigns
Adams continued to remain out of the public eye and away from city government even as Portlanders mobilized, supporting and opposing calls for his resignation. Adams told the Willamette Week a resignation decision was coming "within days."
“I'm not sure he can ever get back my loyalty,” Commissioner Randy Leonard told KGW. “What happened though, is Sam asking me to take something at his word or giving me all the information to reach a different conclusion or benefit of the doubt ... I can't do that. “Sam's silence to me is deafening. His complete absence from the building is telling.”
Portland Commissioner Dan Saltzman joined those supporting Adams, calling him "the right man" for the job despite the mayor's admission that he lied about the relationship.
"He has got so many ideas, so many things he cares about in this city. He loves this city," Saltzman said. "And I think he's the mayor that we need at this point to keep this city moving forward in these tough times."
Supporters said Adams was "regaining his confidence."
Pressure on to resign
Groups had formed online in support of the mayor even as a recall effort was also underway at another website.
Support groups grow Adams had not appeared in public since his Tuesday press conference detailing the relationship and cover up.
Several city commissioners refused to comment on the scandal but Saltzman said he doubted their was consensus among officers that Adams should resign.
Online blog was also pulled Thursday. Adams has long stayed in touch with constituents through the blog, but on Thursday the URL linked to a blank page that initially said, "Due to pending legal action these pages are now unavailable." By mid-morning the page was totally blank.
Local papers call for resignation
The Portland Business Journal joined Portland's gay newspaper Just Out and the editorial boards of both the Oregonian newspaper and the Portland Tribune in calling on Adams to resign. The head of the Portland Police Union also joined the call for Adams' resignation.
“Does this set a precedent that every single city employee is now allowed to lie? I think he should resign,” Portland Police Union President Scott Westerman said.
Legal inquiry launched
City Commissioner Randy Leonard called for a third-party investigation to clarify the timing of the sex and if any rules were broken to benefit the mayor and his career. In addition, Oregon Attorney General John Kroger is launching an inquiry into the scandal at the request of Portland Police Chief Rosie Sizer and Multnomah County District Attorney Michael Schrunk. AG to investigate
On Tuesday, Mayor Adams publicly acknowledged having a sexual relationship with Beau Breedlove, a legislative intern he mentored in 2005. In a Tuesday afternoon press conference, Adams apologized to the public for previously lying about it. Adams said it was a serious error in judgement, but he "has no plans to resign." Mayor's apology
The admission came in response to a Willamette Week story on Monday confirming the affair. The mayor admitted to having sex with Breedlove within a month of his 18th birthday, and that "the affair lasted maybe two months."
Mayor apologizes for lie
“I should have been honest at the time about my true relationship with Beau. I’m deeply sorry I asked Beau to lie on my behalf," Adams said. "This was a serious error on my part. It happened about four years ago, in my personal and professional life, and my job right now is to come clean."
Breedlove has not spokenpublicly since Adams admitted to the affair.
He did release a statement, in which he said:
"Reflecting back, I regret misleading anyone about the nature of the relationship. When the subject first surfaced during the campaign, I was living out-of-state and I did not anticipate the impact it might have on Portland’s mayoral campaign. While my first instinct was to tell the truth, I also wanted to protect Sam Adams’ reputation, considering our valuable friendship."
A state gay rights advocacy group, Basic Rights Oregon, issued a statement Tuesday saying Mayor Adams "exercised poor judgment," but went on to say he had "demonstrated his commitment to (Portland) and its people."
Adams said he intended to immediately make public all e-mail and phone records from the period of the relationship with Breedlove, which the mayor claims occurred during the summer of 2005.
The mayor also said he and Breedlove discussed a relationship prior to the intern's 18th birthday, when Breedlove was still a minor, but that he could not engage in an "inappropriate relationship" with someone legally underage.
Adams was asked repeatedly by the Portland press why voters should trust his judgment now, considering that he had lied through his campaign for mayor.
"I made a mistake ... I did not want to subject Beau to another round of media inquiries. I decided to come clean and tell the truth," the mayor said.
Adams: No plans to resign
Adams pointed to his two-decade career as a public official and asked Portlanders to look closely at his record.
"I messed this one up, but it's an anomaly over the two decades that I've served Oregonians and Portlanders," he said.
Adams said his punishment will be a complete loss of public trust.
Adams acknowledged he had not yet apologized to Breedlove's parents but that he planned to.
He also said that this was not an issue of sexual orientation; rather, it was an issue of a public official lying, in his opinion. "I don't think this is fundamentally an issue about sexual orientation. Other people can debate that," he said.
Adams had denied affair previously
In 2007, Adams said the rumors of the affair were politically motivated and flatly denied the relationship. He also told the public it was a non-sexual relationship.
“I’m not going to go down without a fight because this is not true,” Adams told KGW in September 2007. "This is one of the worst smears you can make against a gay guy. It preys on the homophobic stereotype that gay men cannot be trusted with young people."
Then City Commissioner Adams published an open letter to Portlanders in 2007 denying the charges and calling them "smear tactics."
Adams also said at the time that he did exchange occasional text messages and phone calls while mentoring Breedlove, but he swore he never did anything inappropriate.
Mayor's 2007 letter denying relationship
Adams admitted to the sexual relationship with Breedlove just as the Willamette Week prepared to publish a story concerning the relationship.
Mayor Adams was in the Capitol for Obama's inauguration when word of the scandal broke on Monday. He returned to Portland instead of remaining for the inaugural festivities.
Mayor Adams said the sex scandal had tainted President Barack Obama's inauguration for Portland residents but that it "would have been highly inappropriate for me to stay in Washington."
He admitted that he may have been elected under false pretenses since he had covered up the relationship and avoided answering whether or not Portland would have elected him mayor had the allegations come out prior to Election Day.
Adams has been mayor of Portland since Jan. 1.
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