 * “I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; And because I cannot do everything I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.”
—Helen Keller
 Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86941729842?pwd=aXRLZ05DYTFzT0pMU3BCKytYT2t6dz09
This Tuesday, February 1, Senate President Peter Courtney will bang the gavel to convene his final session in Salem, and we’ll be off and running for 2022. Running is the right word; the Oregon Constitution limits even-year sessions to 35 days, which means we have to finish by March 5. There are rules designed to put the lid on expectations: every legislator is limited to two personal bills, and every committee and the Governor can introduce three bills. Even so, the cumulative pile of proposals will far exceed what we can process in five short weeks.
My personal bills for the session are Senate Bill 1561, relating to Campaign Finance Reform, and Senate Bill 1564, relating to cannabis.
The first circles back to my first session in 2019, when my Senate Campaign Finance Committee placed Measure 107 on the ballot to amend the state constitution to explicitly allow political campaigns to be regulated by the state, local government or citizen initiative, without specifying what the regulations would be. In November 2020, 4 out of 5 Oregon voters approved that idea…and have likely wondered why we haven’t followed up on their mandate; Oregon is still one of only five unregulated states.
I had a chance to preview my bill and lay out what campaign finance reform should look like in January 13 testimony to the Senate Rules Committee (video here).
SB 1561 was drafted to meet the standards I asked for by reasonably limiting individual donations, keeping the varieties of committees and money channels to a minimum, and, under strict conditions, providing public matching funds for small donations to give Oregonians of modest means more clout in our politics. The details take time to describe, but here’s a snapshot of the proposed limits:
 These limits are higher than I’d put out in a perfect world. In the world we have, two factors push them up. The first is a nationwide pattern of courts throwing out contribution limits that they judge to be too low for candidates to have a realistic chance of winning. Second, and more importantly, is the point made by those skeptical of this whole enterprise. If we tightly restrict how much candidates can raise, they say, we’ll tip the table more drastically towards independent expenditures, those ads and brochures cranked out by special interest groups with no contact with or permission from the candidate they’re supporting. These have come to dominate campaigns, and often take from candidates the ability to control the principles and message they’re running on; I know how frustrating that is from my 2018 campaign experience.
And thanks to the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision, we have no power to limit those independent expenditures, which is why the push for federal action to overturn that “money equals speech” decision has to continue. As things stand, the effects of CU are a huge weak spot for any reform proposal, though it’s possible to reduce the impact by requiring wholly transparent disclosure of who’s making those independent expenditures. More later in this space, if my bill gains traction this session.
Will it? This bill would be a heavy lift even in a long session, where there’s much more time to organize and negotiate then there will be this year. And those pointing out that most legislators aren’t noticeably eager to change the system in which they ran for and won office aren’t wrong. If we do fall short, I’ll shift my energy to qualifying a good initiative proposal for the November 2022 ballot, because people “outside the Building,” as we sometimes say, obviously have more appetite for campaign finance reform than those inside.
One way or another, we have to get this done. To give up on the goal of reducing the power of big concentrated money in Salem is to give up on moving boldly to solve our toughest problems.
 My second bill is one of a few that follow up on the $25 million emergency appropriation we pulled out of December’s special session to combat the huge illegal cannabis grows spreading across the Rogue Valley and, slowly but surely, much of the rest of Oregon. Several legislators came together to coordinate a short-session strategy. My piece, SB 1564, would expand the membership and scope of work of the HB 3000 task force, created last session to tackle a host of hemp-related issues, asking it for proposals to deal effectively with the illegal grows over time. It would also institute a two-year moratorium on new licenses for hemp cultivation (we already imposed a moratorium on new THC/marijuana licenses, which another bill would extend to match the timeline my bill proposes for hemp).
Word has it that some farming interests are dead-set against a hemp moratorium. That’s why we’re convening the Town Hall promoted at the top of this newsletter. I understand arguments on both sides of this question, and want some guidance from District 3 folks who care about it. If that’s you, I hope you’ll join us on February 2.
My Natural Resources and Wildfire Committee has introduced three bills into the short session.
SB 1532 aims to fortify Oregon’s organic agriculture sector by adding five field specialists to help farmers through OSU’s agricultural extension service, and invest in strategic marketing plans that could bring our farmers (and those working for them) a larger share of the growing national and global market.
SB 1533 is a “fixit” measure for last session’s SB 762, the omnibus wildfire bill. This is the kind of cleanup of language—omissions, contradictions or ambiguities—that follow on the heels of any massive landmark legislation. I don’t expect controversy or conflict here.
SB 1534 aims to advance last fall’s “Natural and Working Lands” report from the Oregon Global Warming Commission, and establish the encouragement of carbon sequestration in forest and farmland management as a policy of the state. I put this forward because it has potential for healing some of the wounds of our past climate action battles by creating valuable land stewardship incentives for people in rural, more conservative parts of Oregon. Sorry to say that the sour feelings and mistrust around anything to do with climate still run deep, making this bill more of a longshot than it should be. We’ll see.
I’ll be co-sponsoring a number of bills introduced by other legislators this session. Topping that list are:
- a bill sponsored by Rep. Marsh for relief funding to the Phoenix-Talent school district to make up for the massive loss in student enrollment from the Almeda Fire.
- a bill to put on the November 2022 ballot a constitutional amendment that would permit (not create) a public state bank like the Bank of North Dakota.
- a bill requiring the state treasury to regularly disclose the entire content of the portfolio invested in pension, local government, and other funds made up of tax dollars. The goal here is to set the table for a well-informed discussion of whether Oregon’s public investments in fossil-fuel companies should be curtailed, eliminated or left alone.
- a bill to establish a Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI) to measure our state’s well-being and inform policy decisions much more comprehensively than the current yardstick of Gross Domestic Product does on its own.
- a bill to require that most retail businesses accept cash payments, because there are Oregonians who don’t have access to any other medium of transaction.
- a bill to establish an effective structure for receiving and effectively distributing major resources from the federal government to expand broadband internet service across the state (a deep bow to Representative Marsh for her tenacious leadership on this issue).
One bill bound to draw a lot of limelight would raise legislators’ annual salary from about $32,000 a year to the median Oregon income, somewhere in the mid- $50,000 range. It’s certain to smell bad to some Oregonians, especially those unhappy with state government’s recent performance, and those attached to the hallowed vision of citizen-legislators over “career politicians.” Proponents of the raise say that the current system excludes broad swaths of citizens from the legislature, people without pensions or social security or investment income or the good fortune to line up lucrative, very part-time work on the side. The result is a tilt towards the affluent in our policy-making, and the solution is to pay people a living wage.
This is another issue where I’d particularly like to hear from you at sen.jeffgolden@oregonlegislature.gov.
 A lot of this session’s action will be more about securing mid-biennium funding for vital projects than passing bills. I’m no different than other legislators in seeking money for pressing needs in the district. There are always plenty of them. A seat on the full Ways & Means Committee gives me a slight advantage here, but the critical decision makers are the House Speaker, Senate President, and Ways & Means Co-Chairs from each chamber. They’ve already made clear that they won’t let the current flush of cash—a combination of robust income tax revenue and unspent funds from federal COVID relief packages—pull them off a fundamentally conservative fiscal approach. We’ll probably top off the state's Rainy Day and Education Stability Funds and aim for a healthy ending reserve in the General Fund. That’s a sound guiding principle when the national and state economic landscape is as volatile and uncertain as it seems today. We may not follow it completely after we hear about the severity of needs that state government isn’t meeting today; socking away money that could otherwise be used to relieve present-day human suffering definitely has its limits. Budgeting this session will be the dynamic balancing act that it always is.
I’ll write you from Salem when this soft-edged picture takes clearer shape. Take care and be safe until then.
 Senator Jeff Golden, Oregon Senate District 3
Housing:
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The Oregon Emergency Rental Assistance program will open tomorrow, January 26, for 3-5 weeks depending on the availability of funds. If you would like to apply or learn more, visit their website here. |
COVID-19:
Food:
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- If you are experiencing food insecurity, there is a network of food pantries across Jackson County with shelf stable and fresh food. Visit Access' page to locate a food pantry near you. Before visiting one of these pantries, call Access to verify the hours of operation: (541) 779-6691
- For more information about food assistance programs in Oregon, visit this page.
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