Portland Mayor-elect Ted Wheeler could be one of agriculture’s best friends in a city that has over-sized influence on Oregon’s vast rural expanses.

We’ve written often on the divide between urban and rural America. The divide between Portland and rural Oregon is a chasm.

Farmers and ranchers may not fully appreciate Portland’s importance as a market and a hub of vital services. But there’s no mistaking Portland’s willingness to push its agenda on farming practices, labor, economic development and the environment on its rural neighbors.

It’s a problem.

“What can agriculture do,” the Oregon Farm Bureau’s Dave Dillon asks, “to better connect with city government and thought leaders who seem to have insularity and sometimes utopian vision of food production that does not match the marketplace and the demands of a growing world population?”

In Wheeler rural Oregon may have a partner in Portland. His family made its money in the timber industry. He appreciates the urban-rural divide and urban-rural interdependence.

“You can’t talk about success in the agricultural industry without talking about the role urban areas play,” he said. “Urban communities in America are increasingly clueless about the challenges facing rural communities.”

And though Wheeler is sincere and earnest on the subject of the urban-rural divide, it’s not the biggest problem he faces. Not by a long shot.

The police bureau is in turmoil — chronically understaffed, mistrusted by many residents, plagued by poor morale. There are miles of city streets that are still unpaved, and many more miles of paved streets that need repair.

As people flock to Portland in costume and in character to become part of the city’s quirky, offbeat fabric, they find rents are sky high and vacant housing hard to come by. Any development not nixed outright by strict land-use policies will almost certainly be opposed by vocal activists.

Then there are the homeless — 4,000 largely substance-addled or mentally ill souls who have overwhelmed both the services available to help them and the patience of a town that prides itself on tolerance. Their situation is desperate and tragic.

Portland’s situation is made more difficult because solutions to these and a host of lesser problems must be crafted, spun, bent and twisted — perhaps beyond recognition — with care so as not to offend the sensibilities of a wide variety of progressive interests that will take to the streets at the drop of a hat.

Wheeler’s plate is full. If he could get more of Portland’s activist class to focus on the city’s problems instead of exporting their agenda to rural Oregon everyone would be better off.

From our distant vantage, Wheeler seems the best choice Portland has made in recent years. He’s a smart guy, a sensible choice for voters who often prefer the unconventional.

Though we won’t know for sure until he takes office in January, Wheeler seems like someone agriculture can work with to advance both rural and urban interests.