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July 14, 2017
Friends and Neighbors,
Well, it’s been nearly a week since the 2017 session came to
an end, and I’m happy to say that I haven’t been to Salem once this
week!!!
The dust is still settling on the session, and the media is
full of post-mortems and judgments of what we did and did not accomplish. I want to apologize for the somewhat
discombobulated nature of last week’s newsletter, which was very “real-time” in
its description of the final days.
If the session had ended a week earlier, it would have been
full of disappointments, but fortunately some very important, if controversial,
bills passed during the last week. In
some cases, they were bills that had passed one chamber earlier but were on
hold in the opposite chamber’s Rules Committee (either because they needed
tweaks or were part of a larger deal); in others, they were bills that were in
Ways and Means for cost reasons and awaiting final decisions. I wrote last week about some of them:
transportation, criminal justice reform, reentry reform, reproductive health
care, and healthcare for all children.
In this newsletter I want to mention some of the others.
That’s not to say that there weren’t disappointments, and in
many cases we came frustratingly close:
many of them came down to being one vote short in the Senate.
I’ll leave discussion of the disappointments to another newsletter. Not that I’m trying to forget them! On the contrary, they represent ongoing
commitment and effort for the 2018 and 2019 sessions. You’ll hear more about them in upcoming
newsletters.
And I will say that often the results were a mixture of
progress and disappointment. I mentioned
in the last newsletter the mixed results on diesel: moving forward on school
buses, stuck with the status quo on trucks and construction equipment. The same can be said for housing:
disappointing on protections from rent spikes and no-cause evictions, positive
for substantial financial investments in affordable housing. (Here is a good
summary of them.)
Overall, I would say that this was a successful session in
many ways. It was a strong session for
the Governor, who wound up accomplishing most of her key goals (especially
transportation and the various human rights issues) by the end of the session. Though transportation and the search for
revenue dominated the session and influenced much of our work, we ended up
passing a lot of good legislation. While
debate on the House floor was often polarized and rancorous, in the Senate
there was a surprising amount of collegiality this session, particularly when
compared to the bitter 2016 short session.
Many bills wound up with surprising bipartisan support. When we disagreed, tempers generally were
kept at bay. Let’s see if it stays that
way!
For those of you that can make it, I’ll happily provide more
details and answer your questions at tomorrow’s town hall and at upcoming
constituent coffees.
As you hopefully know, I'll be co-hosting a town hall tomorrow morning with my house Colleague Rep. Alissa Keny-Guyer. Hope you can join!
Post-Session Town Hall w/ Rep. Alissa Keny-Guyer
Saturday, July 15th 10am-11:30am
PCC Southeast Campus, Great Hall
Our next in-district event will be the August constituent coffee -- but please note a change here. Rather than the first-Saturday of the month, we'll be meeting on August 12th at the Hollywood Senior Center.
We are also working to nail down a date for this year's edition of our annual Bike Town Hall, so stay tuned for that.
Controlling the Environmental Impacts of Demolitions: SB 871
Successful legislating is all about patience, about
progressing steadily forward on issues from session to session. SB 871, a bill that made it through the House on the very last day
of the session, is a good example of that.
Back in 2014 some people attending a constituent coffee brought up the
problem of toxic asbestos and lead dust blowing into neighborhoods when homes
are demolished, as is happening more and more frequently in Portland. When we researched the problem, we discovered
that precautions need to be taken when commercial structures are demolished,
and when homes are remodeled; but when homes are completely demolished, there
was a statutory gap.
The result, some of you will remember, was SB 702, which I
chief-sponsored along with Rep. Keny-Guyer.
At the end of the day, it was only a partial solution to the
problem. We had to limit the bill to a
focus on testing and mitigating for asbestos, relying on DEQ to monitor
compliance. At the time, it was unclear
which state agency would have jurisdiction over lead. We promised to form a
work group during the interim to try to work out the issues around
administrative oversight and inclusion of lead.
Ultimately, that lead to SB 871, which both solved the lead problem and
clarified the role of the city in the process.
With the new authority created by SB 871, the city of Portland will be
making it easy for neighbors to be notified of potential demolitions and the
steps being taken to guard against toxins being released into the air and
finding their way into gardens and other nearby surfaces.
Interestingly, the legwork on the original bill was done by
one of my student interns at the time—Elisabeth Swarttouw—who went on to become
one of my full-time staffers during this session. She very ably shepherded the 2017 bill to
success. It required repeated and
lengthy consultations with the agencies, cities, the Home Builders association,
and legislative counsel. Thanks, Elisabeth!
SB 1062: Healthy and Safe Schools Plans
This was another example of one session’s work building upon
another, again, a bill that I worked on with Alissa Keny-Guyer. In 2015 we passed a bill (after trying
unsuccessfully in 2014) requiring schools to be tested for the presence of
radon gas. There was growing awareness
of the dangers of this environmental hazard in certain locations, but we knew
that most districts were not testing for it.
We were able to locate federal dollars that could be used for this
purpose, and schools subsequently developed plans for testing.
Then last spring the fiasco around lead-testing at Portland
Public Schools exploded. Alissa and I
had assumed that lead in water was routinely monitored in schools (unlike the
more “exotic” radon), but that was not the case. Ironically, the water WAS in fact already
being tested at PPS, but there was no clear protocol for releasing the
information and acting upon it. During
the rancorous public meetings on the issue, parents pointed out that lead in
water was not the only problem in our schools: lead paint, asbestos, carbon
monoxide, and other toxins were also potentially present and needed to be
addressed. So, Alissa and I decided that
we needed to come up with a way of addressing this problem more comprehensively
and permanently
The result would eventually be SB 1062. It calls on all school districts to create
comprehensive plans for how they will monitor, test, and rectify toxins in
their schools. They will be assisted by
the Oregon Department of Education, Oregon Health Authority, and DEQ. $2
million will be taken from an existing schools facilities fund each biennium to
pay for ongoing testing for lead in water.
Parents will be notified promptly about the results of testing and the
steps being taken to mitigate, and there will be a clear point of contact if
they see something that concerns them.
I’m really proud of the work that was done on this bill and
its principles of planning, oversight, and transparency. Kids, their teachers, and other school
personnel will be the long-term beneficiaries of SB 1062. You might think that
passage of this bill would be a no-brainer, but in fact the bill (in its
initial as SB 886) died once during the session, failing to get the votes to move
out of Senate Education. I just couldn’t let that happen, and we tried again in
Senate Rules with an identical bill under a different number and with broader
sponsorship. And then after it passed
from Rules to Ways and Means it again seemed doomed, this time a victim of the
session clock running down. But thanks
to some legislative CPR, I was able to get it back to life. Many thanks to all the partners for sticking
with this, and again to Elisabeth for helping to facilitate the work.
SB 719: A Common-Sense Firearm Safety Bill
Another bill that passed during the waning hours of the
session was SB 719. We thereby were
again able to move forward on sensible firearm safety legislation this session
(following up on background check and domestic violence legislation in
2015). SB 719 will allow a judge to
remove guns from persons found to be a threat to themselves or to others. Designed to address individuals in the midst
of a mental health crisis, it’s modeled after a successful law passed in
California recently and one approved by the voters in Washington in 2016.
This “Extreme Risk Protection Order” could be granted as the
result of a petition by a family or household member (or law enforcement). The person named in the petition could seek a
hearing to contest the petition, but if the court decides in favor of removal,
the order would stand for a year (subject to renewal).
As is always the case with bills about firearm safety, this
one was very controversial and passed narrowly and largely along party and
urban/rural lines (17-13 in the Senate, 31-28 in the House). Other bills promoting gun safety were also
proposed this session (e.g., closing the “Charleston Loophole”; requiring those
obtaining Concealed Weapons Permits to demonstrate some competence in handling
a firearm; requiring parents to keep firearms away from their children), but
failed to move forward.
I’ll continue to work with other legislators on this
issue. The courts have consistently
upheld the authority of states, consistent with the Second Amendment, to place
reasonable requirements on responsible firearm ownership. Given the epidemic of gun violence in our
country, I believe that it’s our job to do so.
A Big Win for the Elliott
At the beginning of this session, we were faced with the
potential of two big environmental losses: the repeal of the Clean Fuels
program in exchange for a transportation package (which, as I mentioned last
week, did not in the end occur) and the loss of the Elliott State Forest as a
public resource.
Action in the last week of the Legislature guaranteed that the
82,500-acre tract in Coos and Douglas counties, much of it old-growth, won't be
sold to a timber company. It will likely stay public. The Elliott is managed by the state Dept. of
Forestry but is held in trust for the common school fund. As trust land, the forest’s main purpose is
to produce revenue for schools, a task that has become difficult over the past
decades due to endangered species issues (northern spotted owls, marbled
murrelet seabirds, and coho salmon) and declines in the timber market.
The ultimate decision over the Elliott, as it is for all
trust land, is in the hands of the State Land Board, composed of the Governor,
the Treasurer, and the Secretary of State.
The Legislature took two steps this session to resolve this problem and
make it more likely that the forest will remain in public hands and open to the
public. First, Senate Environment and
Natural Resources, and then both chambers, passed SB 847,
which “creates [a] process for [the] State Land Board, Department of State
Lands and Legislative Assembly to coordinate transfer of certain trust lands managed for [the] benefit of [the] Common
School Fund that have limited performance potential as assets of [the] Common
School Fund to certain other public bodies better positioned to manage [the] lands
for [the] benefit of [the] public.”
It mirrors a program that the state of Washington has had
for a number of years that has transferred ownership and management of some of
their trust lands to other state agencies, such as Parks. Over the years, Washington has bonded more
than $900 million to “buy out” the schools’ interest in these properties.
Along those lines, the second important step taken by the
Legislature was to authorize $100 million in bonding to begin the kind of
transfer anticipated by SB 847. Over the
next few months, a “Habitat Conservation Plan” (HCP) will be developed to
protect the sensitive areas within the Elliott, while targeting other areas for
harvesting. In the long run, we are
hoping that Oregon State University will take over part of the forest to use as
a conservation research project, focusing on sustainable forestry and carbon
sequestration.
Having taken those steps, I believe that the Land Board,
with strong commitment and leadership from the Governor, and support from
Treasurer Tobias Read, will vote to keep the Elliott in public hands.
But it was a close call.
This all, of course, comes against the backdrop of many voices within
the Trump administration calling for the sale of public lands as a way of
raising revenue. It’s another example of
the Oregon Legislature choosing a different direction, one which I believe
better embodies the core values of most Oregonians.
SB 644: Mining in Eastern Oregon
One of my bigger surprises this session was to find myself,
in the last week of the session, as one of two chief sponsors of a bill dealing
with mining in the frontier parts of our state.
How I, a Portland legislator and Chair of the Environment and Natural
Resources Committee wound up in that position may be one of the more
interesting stories of 2017, at least for me.
I won’t go into all the details, but it began with my effort
to finally end in-stream suction dredge mining in those parts of the state
where sensitive essential salmonid habitat is located. At the time, I made a commitment to partner
with a Republican colleague, Fred Girod (R-Stayton), who wanted to see changes
made to streamline the permitting process for high-value precious-metal mines
in Eastern Oregon. I offered to do what
I could to help with that effort, as long as environmental impacts were not
compromised.
To be honest, I didn’t think it was going to be
possible. But at the end of the day we
were able to come up with a policy proposal that unites all the state
permitting agencies and local government permitting agencies into a single
process that analyzes and puts any necessary conditions onto a mining
proposal. It maintains the necessary
environmental and habitat safeguards while better coordinating the application
process. We got it to the point that
Oregon’s major environmental land-use advocacy group, 1000 Friends of Oregon,
removed their objections. The bill then
passed easily in both chambers.
It’s important to me, as an urban legislator and an
environmentalist, to do what I can to find places where we can reconcile the
need for economic development (which frontier Oregon desperately needs) with
responsible environmental stewardship. I
believe that SB 644 struck that note.
There were many other land-use bills proposed this session (scores of
them came before my committee) that did not.
As I stated in my floor speech closing the debate on SB 644, “I hope
that passage of this bill sends a clear message that if people have concrete
plans, are respectful of other people’s needs and concerns, and are willing to
roll up their sleeves and work to achieve consensus, we can get things done in
this state, get done the things that we need for the good of the entire state.”
Collective Bargaining Rights for University Research Faculty
Towards the end of the session, I found myself devoting a
lot of time to securing the passage of HB 3170, a bill that took me back to my
days as Chair of the Workforce Committee, and even further back as someone
engaged in higher education collective bargaining.
Faculty at nearly all of our public colleges and most of our
public universities have had collective bargaining units for many years
now. Higher education unions are
somewhat unique because of the tradition of shared governance that has long been
a feature of higher education. Looked at
from the outside, the firm line that we tend to see in traditional union
settings between manager and employee can seem blurred.
One example of this blurring and consequent uncertainty is
the case of university faculty who do scientific research and lead laboratory
teams that may include grad students, post-docs, lab techs, and other
personnel. Are they faculty (and thus
eligible to be represented by the union)?
Are they supervisors (thus excluded from union representation)? Some semesters they may be primarily one,
other semesters the other.
SB 3170 clarifies that they are faculty first and foremost,
as long as they are not supervising other faculty (i.e., other members of the
same bargaining unit). It is a simple,
somewhat elegant solution that we were able to land on through a work-group
process after the bill came over from the House. It satisfied the universities and
representatives of the faculty alike. If
the newly-eligible affected faculty ultimately decide they want to pursue union
representation, it will still require a majority-vote legal process, but it
will be possible.
I’m very pleased that it worked out, and this win wouldn't have been possible without the dogged work of my trusty aide Logan Gilles, who will be a friend to workers until the day he leaves this earth.
A New Look for Clean Energy Jobs
As I’ve mentioned, a lot of my work this session focused on
getting our state ready to take action on climate change by putting a price on
carbon pollution and using the resulting revenues to enhance the move to
cleaner, more sustainable, more economically beneficial energy practices. Partnering with colleagues in the House,
Senate Environment and Natural Resources spent many hours exploring the best
way to reach that end. We met with
counterparts from other states, including leaders in California and Ontario,
business groups (both urban and rural) communities seriously affected by
climate change, labor, and scores of citizens deeply concerned about the
impacts of carbon pollution and climate change.
As a result of those discussions, I became convinced that
the best avenue for us to make a difference here in Oregon is to link up with
the efforts being made in California and other states and Canadian provinces in
creating a “cap and invest” program that would guarantee our meeting our
climate goals while invigorating our Oregon-based industries and
workforce. Based on what we are seeing
elsewhere, it is definitely possible if done right.
To that end, at the very end of session we
drafted a new bill, SB 1070, with more than a third of all Oregon legislators signed on
as chief sponsors or co-sponsors. It
lays out our best thinking at this point, but there are still more details that
need to be worked out. That is going to
consume a lot of my time during the interim, but I look forward to this
work. It’s a heavy responsibility. If done wrong, it could be harmful to our
economy and to ordinary Oregonians; if done right, it could provide significant
stimulus to our economy, and Oregon can help further the momentum for climate
action on a regional level, which is crucial now that the federal government
has chosen to go in the opposite direction and withdraw from the Paris
agreements. Our job is to make sure it’s
the latter that happens.
For more information about SB 1070, here’s a press release
that we put out upon its release last week.
As it happens, the California legislature is about to vote
on re-committing to and extending their cap and invest program. (The vote is scheduled for Monday.) House Energy and Environment Chair, Ken Helm,
and I just sent a letter of support to our friends and counterparts there,
urging them to take that important step.
You can check out that letter here.
One final link – The Mercury did a rundown of some of the
bigger progressive wins this session. It’s
worth a read.
OK, friends and neighbors, mes amis et mes voisins (yes,
it’s Bastille Day!), that’s it for now.
Hope you’re enjoying this lovely summer as much as I—at long
last—finally am!
 Senator Michael Dembrow
District 23
email: Sen.MichaelDembrow@oregonlegislature.gov
web: www.senatordembrow.com
phone: 503-986-1723
mail: 900 Court St NE, S-407, Salem, OR, 97301
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