e-News for February 21, 2017

Upcoming Eugene Events

Senator Manning welcomes you to join him and his colleagues at the following upcoming community events in Eugene:

Community Forum and ACA Rally

with Peter DeFazio, Jeff Merkley
and local Lane County Elected Officials
Saturday February 25, 2017   |  10:30am-12pm
Lane Community College, Building 5 (GYM) 
4000 E 30th Ave., Eugene
Healthcare rally led by Senator Merkley at noon

Ways and Means Community Hearing

Saturday February 25, 2017   |  1:00pm
Lane Community College, Building 17 (The Forum)
4000 E 30th Ave., Eugene 

For more information on either of these events,
contact our office at 503-986-1707 or by email.

What Constituents Are Concerned About

During the past several weeks, Senator Manning's office has received many emails and phone calls from constituents on a couple of issues in particular.  We thought we'd provide an update to just a few of those bills, to help keep you informed. Click on any of the links below for more information.

SB 494: This bill merely establishes an Advance Directive Rules Adoption Committee, comprised of 13 members.  Twelve of the Committee members must be appointed by the Governor, representing the hospitals, health care providers, individuals with disabilities, consumers of health care services, the long term care community, hospice care, expertise in advising end-of-life decisions, legal expertise in elder law, legal expertise in health law, and a clinical ethicist affiliated with a health care facility in the state. The 13th member shall be the Long Term Care Ombudsman or designee of the Long Term Care Ombudsman, who is not appointed by the Governor.  Members of this Rules Adoption Committee will be tasked with adopting the form of an Advanced Directive to be used in the state or Oregon and review the form at least once every four years to determine changes if necessary.

SB 301: This bill prohibits employers from using marijuana and other legal substance screening as a condition of employment, as long as it is lawful in the state. This would not prohibit an employer from requiring that work performance is not impaired by the use of any legal substance.  A public hearing was held on 2/21 in the Senate Judiciary Committee, which can be viewed here. No further meetings or votes have been scheduled.

SB 559, SB 560: Both of these bills propose various changes to the Public Employees Retirement System (PERS) and public hearings were held in the Senate Committee on Workforce on 2/13.  No further hearings or votes have been scheduled as of now. Hearings can be viewed by clicking the links above.

SJR 3: This Senate Joint Resolution would refer Ballot Measure 50 (from 1997) back to the voters of Oregon, with proposed changes to the assessment of property taxes.  Passage by the Legislature would put the proposed changes on the ballot for the next regular election.  Voters would then decide whether or not to accept these amendments.  Hearings have been held on 2/14 and 2/21. Clicking on either of those links will play recorded hearings.

HOUSE BILLS: These bills will have to pass the House, prior to consideration by the Senate.

HB 2001, HB 2003, HB 2004, HB 2240: These are all bills related to residential rentals and propose certain prohibitions to lease conditions.  These bills have all currently been assigned to the House Committee on Human Services and Housing, and none have been scheduled for public hearings at this point. 

We will continue to do our best to provide updates on the bills for which we're receiving the highest number of calls or emails.  Please contact us if you have further questions.

How to Navigate the Bills Before the Legislature

During the course of the Legislative session, we expect to receive emails, phone calls and other correspondence (often by the hundreds every day) on issues that are before the Legislature. Our office works hard, not only to convey the positions of constituents to Senator Manning for his consideration, but to educate them on how they can track bills, watch hearings and floor votes, and participate in the public process to be most effective. Your voice is important to us, but there are often other members that can benefit from your personal stories and experiences as they relate to upcoming legislation. HOW TO FIND A BILL If there's a bill you're hearing about either in the news or elsewhere, finding it is easy.  The Legislature has a great tool available to you, within the legislative website at OregonLegislature.gov.  From the homepage, you can access bill information by clicking on the OLIS icon (that stands for Oregon Legislative Information System in the menu bar (see image below).

Once inside OLIS, you'll see a summary of the day's events, including hearings, floor sessions and other Capitol events.  You'll also see a menu at the top right with an icon for "Bills", which is a great place to start. You can search for bills either by the bill number, or if you don't know the bill #, you can search by keyword text or by the bill's sponsor. Both House and Senate bills can be searched and by hovering over the results, you can read the bill summary, to help to narrow it down to what you're looking for. I FOUND THE BILL, NOW WHAT?

Once you've located the bill, you can find out all the pertinent information about the bill, to start engaging in the process.

Senate bills originate in the Senate and House bills start off in the House. The bill's Chief Sponsor(s) are the Legislators introducing the bill, and Regular Sponsors are other Legislators supporting the bill. It's important to know the bill's Sponsors so you can communicate your support or opposition to them directly.

All bills must first pass in their chamber of origin prior to moving on to the next chamber for consideration.  So for example, if you're looking at a House bill, Senator Manning's first opportunity to weigh in on that bill would be in one of his Committees - in the event that it's scheduled either in Senate Judiciary or in Ways and Means, of which Senator Manning is a member. Otherwise, his first vote on the bill won't be until it's headed to the Senate floor. All bills must first be voted on by a policy committee and if the bill calls for allocation of funding sources, it's sent to the Ways and Means budget committee, before it can go to either the House or Senate floor for a vote by the Members. Still with me?

From the summary page for any bill, you will see an icon at the top right with a link to see the actual bill draft (fair warning, only lawyers can usually make sense of these). On the right side, is a link labeled "e-Subscribe Email", which allows you to subscribe to alerts on the bill, that will let you know when there's an upcoming hearing or vote. The bill's summary page has everything you should need to know about the bill, including the Committee to which it's been assigned, scheduled meetings and votes, and helpful information such as the "Staff Measure Summary", which puts the bill into very simple, easy-to-understand terms. The page also includes all the meeting materials and testimony that may have been submitted during a hearing, and a full Measure History, which highlights dates of hearings and votes (called "work sessions" when referring to a Committee vote, "third readings" for a Senate or House floor vote). If there have already been hearings or work sessions, you can click on the blue links and see the testimony and other materials, watch the hearings, and see what the Committee vote may have been-(Aye means yes). If a Committee vote or "work session" has not occurred yet, this is an ideal time to communicate with the members of the Committee or submit written testimony to the "exhibit email" link for the specific Committee by which the bill is under consideration.

AM I TOO LATE IF THEY'VE ALREADY VOTED? Well, that depends.  If the Committee has already voted, the bill will still need to be voted on by the members of the full chamber.  And remember, all bills need to repeat the process in BOTH chambers, so if it hasn't made it's way through the other chamber, there is still time to weigh in with the members prior to a final vote. Every bill that makes it's way to passage through the Legislature must also be signed by the Governor to become law. WHAT SHOULD MY MESSAGE BE? Regardless of your message, remember to be respectful to Legislators and their staff.  We receive correspondence from people on both sides of every issue and we try to be prepared to answer questions on bills for which we're receiving a lot of input. Express your support or opposition based on facts, and not by just what you may have read in the paper or heard from a neighbor. If you don't quite understand what a bill does, we're happy to clarify. If you can offer a suggestion on how a bill may be changed to garner your support, let us know!  Bills are usually amended during the course of the vetting process and Legislators want to support strong policies with bi-partisan support whenever possible. YOU CAN ALWAYS CONTACT US! Senator Manning's staff is always happy to help. If you have questions or want to know more, you can always contact us by phone or email. We're happy to assist in any way we can.

Staff information: Tiffany Edwards Chief of Staff/Communications Director Tiffany.Edwards@oregonlegislature.gov

Lawanda Manning Legislative Assistant Lawanda.Manning@oregonlegislature.gov    Capitol Phone: 503-986-1707   District Phone: 541-678-3370 Capitol Address: 900 Court St. NE, S-205, Salem, Oregon 97301 Email: Sen.JamesManning@oregonlegislature.gov Website     Facebook      YouTube