For three years, Mayor Julie Hoy and Councilor Vanessa Nordyke have served side by side on the Salem City Council. They’ve taken hundreds of votes to authorize park improvements, direct city spending and set goals for Salem’s future.

Now, the two are competing for the mayor’s seat in the May 19 election in a hard-fought and at times mud-slinging campaign.

Election guide: Read more about the 2026 city election here and find your ward here.

Despite their differences, the record shows Nordyke and Hoy have voted with one another the vast majority of their time on council. That’s not unusual. Many issues that come before the city council are routine or procedural matters, and unanimous votes among the nine members are more common than splits.

Disagreements are also likely to surface in committee discussions, before an issue comes to a formal council vote. 

And a mayor’s influence shows up in more subtle ways, including the advisers they listen to, the questions they ask city staff and the issues or concerns they bring forward to council.

It’s a dynamic the mayor acknowledged in a March 10 mayoral candidate forum with What’s Happening Salem.

“I love those moments when we just 100% agree. And it’s like, what are we doing here?…When we do city business, it happens all the time. When it becomes about other issues, it just falls apart,” Hoy said.

Nordyke said in an interview that the similarities, and frequent unanimous council votes, reflect the fact that many city decisions are about keeping basic government functions running.

“Most of the things we do are pretty nonpartisan and they’re about keeping the machinery in motion,” she said.

Still, their voting records give some insight into how Salem’s mayor and her challenger have approached some of the more controversial issues to come before the city in recent years.

Salem Reporter reviewed minutes of city council and budget committee meetings since January 2023, when Hoy was sworn in as a city councilor representing Ward 6. Nordyke has represented Ward 7 on the council since 2019.

The review found about 30 instances where the women seeking the top post in city government voted at odds with one another. The majority of those were in 2023.

In some cases, the votes were generally split between the council’s majority progressive bloc, which Nordyke is part of, and its conservative minority, which includes Hoy. 

In others, Hoy or Nordyke stood alone on one side of an issue, or votes broke down along other lines. 

Here’s what their voting history shows.

Recent disagreements over immigration, police review board

Nordyke and Hoy have been on opposite sides of some of the more high-profile issues to come before the council in recent months, despite agreeing on nearly every council vote taken in 2025.

When Nordyke in November proposed declaring a city state of emergency over federal immigration enforcement, the vote split along political lines, with Hoy voting no. The mayor did vote in favor of reaffirming Salem’s status as a sanctuary city, siding with most of the council in a 7-2 split.

Nordyke also suggested in a budget committee meeting that the city set aside $400,000 to help those impacted by federal immigration enforcement. The committee’s recommendation passed 11-7, with Hoy among those opposing it.

When the issue came before the city council, it was for a $200,000 fund to be given to local nonprofits, in part to aid those impacted by deportations and enforcement actions. Hoy joined progressive councilors, including Nordyke, in supporting that proposal, which the council passed in a 7-2 vote.

The two were also at odds on a December vote to re-appoint convicted murderer Kyle Hedquist to the city’s police review board. Hedquist was originally appointed to the volunteer position in May 2024 following a unanimous council vote that included Nordyke and Hoy. 

City employees didn’t background check Hedquist, who mentioned having 28 years of experience with the justice system and prison leadership roles in his original application. Councilors later said they were unaware of his murder conviction when they voted, despite widespread media coverage of the crime and his subsequent early release.

In December, Nordyke voted with most progressive councilors in a 5-4 split to reappoint Hedquist, before changing her mind following a pressure campaign from the city’s police and fire employee unions.

During Salem Reporter’s Town Hall, Nordyke denied that she changed her mind due to the optics or backlash. 

“When I made that decision, I didn’t know the nature of the victim or the circumstances,” she said of the murder conviction. “All that information got blasted on the Internet over the holidays.”

She said she also heard concerns from her constituents about the appointment.

“If you’re going to lead … you need to look people in the eye and tell them you made a mistake,” Nordyke said. 

She and Hoy both supported removing Hedquist in a 6-2 vote on Jan. 7.

Budget issues, fee increases

Hoy has been most likely to dissent from other councilors, including Nordyke, on votes to approve fee increases.

She voted no with Councilor Jose Gonzalez on raising local garbage rates in November 2023.

Hoy was the sole councilor that month to vote against forming a city task force to examine new revenue sources to avoid deep budget cuts. 

She voted no on a budget committee recommendation in May 2024 to raise monthly city-owned garage parking fees. Hoy also opposed a plan that October for the city to research business licensing, something councilors looked into but never pursued formally.

Hoy voted against raising city utility bill costs in November 2024, saying while she understood Salem needed the money, she didn’t think the city had enough public trust to increase costs. Hoy was the lone dissenter in a 7-1 vote.

“Because all people deserve representation I will be voting no. Not that I don’t recognize the need. But if we could wait until trust is greater, I think it would be better for the community to understand why we do the things that we do when we do them,” Hoy said at the time. 

Hoy notably voted against approving the city budget on June 26, 2023, something Nordyke has criticized. The city is legally required to have a budget to operate, though the proposed budget assumed the city would collect money from an unpopular payroll tax that Hoy opposed and which voters later rejected.

“I realize there isn’t much I can do about it at this time except to register a no vote. I believe we should be making sacrifices and not reaching for more money,” she said during the meeting.

Asked recently about that vote, Hoy said in an email she took the responsibility of adopting a budget seriously.
“Salem was facing a significant financial challenge, and I believed we owed it to residents to take a harder look at spending and avoid defaulting to new or increased revenue without fully exhausting other options. That’s a position I’ve been consistent on,” she wrote.

Hoy did vote in favor of asking voters to approve a property tax levy to pay for city services, something the council supported unanimously in 2025.

Nordyke has at times broken with other progressive councilors to oppose fees and taxes. 

Nordyke in March 2023 voted against having city staff study implementing paid parking downtown, joining Councilor Deanna Gwyn in a 6-2 vote. 

She told Salem Reporter she was getting an “earful” from businesses about the plan and was concerned paid downtown parking was advancing without adequate discussion of its impacts.

“When I feel sometimes that there hasn’t been adequate input I’m more inclined to pump the brakes on something,” she said.

She was absent from the city meeting in May 2025 where the rest of the council unanimously voted to approve paid downtown parking. Nordyke said she had “some trepidation” about the program, but that the rollout seems to be going well.

As city councilors discussed imposing a tax on worker paychecks in 2023, Nordyke advocated for the tax to exempt minimum wage earners. She also supported a higher tax rate, which would have given the city money to fund a mobile crisis team.

But Nordyke also said voters should be able to weigh in and the council would lose voter trust by imposing an unpopular tax without asking for voter approval.

She and Hoy voted against imposing a payroll tax in July 2023.

In a questionnaire seeking the endorsement of the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce, Hoy inaccurately claimed Nordyke voted not to send the payroll tax to voters.

“The majority voted to not send the tax to the voters. My current opponent was a member of this majority,” she wrote.

Asked about the claim, Hoy said in an email that Nordyke’s position was difficult to track because of her opponent’s “political opportunism.”

After voters referred the tax to the ballot, Hoy asked the council to repeal it. Nordyke voted with the majority against the repeal, saying voters deserved to have their voices heard.

“The demand by the public to put this on the ballot was a completely foreseeable outcome of this vote and unfortunately, now that it’s going to the ballot, there are some voters who will never vote for this because trust has been irreparably damaged,” Nordyke said in an Aug. 27, 2024 council meeting. “They will not listen because the council did not listen.”

Nordyke and Hoy also opposed cutting vacant city jobs in 2024 as a budget-saving measure, something other progressive councilors supported in a 6-3 vote.

Transportation and planning

Several of the mayor’s dissenting votes have been on transportation and planning matters.

She voted against Salem’s Vision Zero planning efforts to eliminate traffic deaths and serious injuries. 

“We have other more pressing issues to address,” Hoy said during a June 2023 meeting where she voted against the city applying for a federal grant to fund Vision Zero planning. 

She said the city should be focusing its resources and money on homelessness, housing and mental health.

Hoy was also the sole council vote against appointing two planning commission members, Joaquin Lara Midkiff and Benjamin Fryback, in September 2024.

Nordyke and Hoy both opposed a failed proposal that would have allowed taller buildings and denser housing in the Fairmount area. They voted with the council majority, 5-4, against that plan in June 2023. 

Before the final vote, they were on opposite sides of an unsuccessful compromise effort proposed by Councilor Linda Nishioka, which would have eliminated some building restrictions but put a 45-foot height limit on buildings. Nordyke supported that proposal, while Hoy opposed it.

Other issues

• Nordyke was among the majority of councilors who voted 6-2 to censure Hoy and Councilor Deanna Gwyn in November 2024 after the two voted in favor of a land use decision benefitting one of Hoy and Gwyn’s campaign donors.
• Hoy voted against giving former City Manager Keith Stahley an $18,000 raise in November 2024 as the city faced a substantial budget deficit. Nordyke voted with the majority, 5-3, for the raise. Weeks later, a critical audit of Stahley’s job performance came out, setting off Hoy’s efforts to oust him from his post. 
• Nordyke in 2023 worked to organize a Town Hall for south Salem residents and proposed having city employees provide logistical support by livestreaming the event and helping with outreach. Councilors voted 5-3 against that proposal, with Hoy in the majority. Nordyke ultimately put on the event in November with Councilors Deanna Gwyn and Linda Nishioka.
• Hoy in March 2023 proposed an amendment to city code limiting the time one person could serve as chair or vice chair of a neighborhood association. The motion failed 6-3, with Nordyke among those opposing it.
• Nordyke has twice been the sole vote against extending a council or budget committee meeting when discussion dragged late into the night. “There are times when proceeding that late into the night doesn’t have the same value as when you’re fresh and when you’re rested,” she said.

Contact Managing Editor Rachel Alexander: [email protected] or 503-575-1241.

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