It does look like the company wants to grow Portland now. Portland growth plans were put on hold to beef up SEA to compete with Delta, then Covid, etc. SEA is now basically at capacity gate wise and they are ready to get things going in PDX.

From a company press release earlier this month:
"Alaska Airlines is ramping up our growth in Portland to provide our guests with more choice and convenience. We’ve added more than 20 daily departures starting this summer to sought-after destinations from the Rose City. Our capacity has increased by 25%, improving connectivity and providing additional travel options."

If you came to Alaska and wanted to live in PDX you would probably get based in SFO to start with. Can do long call reserve from PDX to SFO to start. About 10 flights a day between all the airplines PDX-SFO. Next most junior base is SEA which has a drivable long call commute. Junior FO in PDX with the June 2024 bid effective date was hired in March of 2023. Would probably guess a year or two to get into PDX after getting hired.