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Dear Friends,
With only nine days left of session, the pace of legislation is moving at light speed. However, there is still much work to do. Even at a quicker pace, I predict we will still be in session on March 10th, which is constitutionally the day we must adjourn.
The main priorities this session have been to balance the budget, address the housing crisis, and fix M110. Please read the below information with important updates.
As always, please reach out to my office with questions and concerns.
 Anna Scharf
State Representative - HD 23
Yesterday, the House of Representatives passed HB 4002A with a 51 to 7 (2 excused) vote count. The bill will effectively end M110 as we know it. This bill is far from perfect but does have some positive aspects. Associations representing District Attorneys, Sheriffs, and Police worked hard with lawmakers to give this bill a chance to gain control of our drug crisis. It restored many of the tools taken away from then with the passage of M110.
The bill recognizes that police and prosecutors have a role to play in disrupting the supply of dangerous drugs and protecting communities, while still providing the options to get people into treatment who are suffering from addiction.
There are four main aspects to this bill:
Make it easier to prosecute drug dealers: HB 4002A will reverse court rulings that have made it more difficult for district attorneys to prosecute drug dealers.
Enhanced penalties for dealers: HB 4002A will create stiff penalties for dealers who sell near parks, treatment facilities, and homeless shelters.
Recriminalizes drug possession: Possession of a controlled substance will now be an Unclassified Misdemeanor that carries up to 180 days in jail if a defendant fails a diversion program.
Creates voluntary county-level deflection programs: The legislation provides funding for local communities to opt in to build deflection plans that allow officers and prosecutors to divert people who would otherwise be charged with drug possession toward pre-booking diversion programs when appropriate.
Here’s how the new process would work:
A police officer arrests someone for using drugs. The officer or district attorney is encouraged to refer the person to a deflection program - think of a deflection program as a treatment program similar to a DUII diversion program offered to 1st time offenders. There are few details about how rigorous deflection programs will be right now, and much of that determination will be left to local control.
If the individual successfully completes the deflection program, their arrest records will be expunged. If they fail, they are given another chance to avoid jail via a conditional discharge diversion, which is 12 months of supervised probation. If they fail conditional discharge diversion, they will get convicted with probation. If they fail probation, probation is revoked, and they get up to 180 days in jail.
While this is not ideal and some would prefer to go straight to jail time for drug use, it is an opportunity for people to get long term solutions to their drug addiction. For those that chose drug use over recovery, the answer will be incarceration. It’s better than what we have now, but we still have a long way to go.
Notably, here is what is not in the bill:
- It doesn’t repeal Measure 110.
- It doesn’t make sobriety a goal of our drug policy.
- It doesn’t remove harm reduction as a core measurement of success.
- Data tracking isn’t required to include sobriety as a measurement of success.
While I heard from HD 23 voters loud and clear that they wanted a full repeal of M110, this was the closest we were going to get with the current political divide in Salem. As I said in my speech on the floor, “Will this be the answer to ending the war on drugs? Will it happen fast enough to save people we love? Will the voters approve of the legislation being passed here today? Those are all answers we will have to wait for. I just hope voters understand that when politics get involved in policy, wars get messy and are not always won in the way they would have liked, or as fast as they would preferred”.
Earlier this week, the Joint Committee on Ways and Means approved $376 million in investments for the Emergency Housing Stability and Production Package (Senate Bill 1537, Senate Bill 1530 and House Bill 4134). They passed on a bipartisan vote and now moves to the House and Senate Floor for the final vote.
SB 1537, requested by the Governor, creates a new department and allocates $10.6 million toward the Housing Accountability and Production Office which will support local governments as they work to access buildable lands in order to achieve their housing production goals. A component of that is an additional $3 million that will be directed toward the Housing Infrastructure Support Fund to provide technical assistance to small and rural cities for grant writing and other purposes.
However, it also has a component of the bill that works around Oregon’s 50 year old land use planning process and SB 100 from 50 years ago. Here is the work around language in the bill - "Requires local governments to process certain applications relating to housing development as limited land use decisions. Develops alternative processes to amend urban growth boundaries to include up to 100 net residential acres per city. Provides for limitations and review by counties, Metro and the Department of Land Conservation and Development and the courts. Sunsets on January 2, 2033.”
While there are some sideboards in the legislation that will limit the number of cities eligible for this work around, the point is that there is even a work around to start with. In 2023, the Governor requested a one-time workaround for 1,000’s of acres to site semiconductors (SB4). That was a one-time request and so is this. What will be the next “one time request”? Once our land is paved over, you cannot un-pave it.
While I know we need solutions for our housing crisis, I cannot support circumventing our 50-year-old land use laws. I cannot support the governor’s proposal to give a free pass to cities to expand by 50 to 100 acres without going through the historical Urban Growth Boundary process. A process that is arduous for a reason. It is a process that allows property owners an option to participate in the decision affecting their city and the surrounding farm and forest lands.
SB 1530 is another omnibus package full of hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of pork projects and handouts to non-government organizations (NGOs) with zero accountability or requirements to show results with the funding. For example, there is a $1M allocation for Furniture Warehouse. A quick Google search tells you that this is PDX project to take in, refurbish, and hand out furniture to low income residents. While this is a noble cause, there are already organizations like Goodwill Industries, St Vincent DePaul, and H2O in Dallas that do similar work and they didn’t receive a million dollars.
Despite the unaccounted for funding in the bill, there are good programs such as the $5M allocation for Individual Development Accounts (IDA). These are programs offered to people to incentivize them to learn personal finance and save for their first home or other opportunities. When they meet their goals, there is a match available to them through this fund. This is a great example of a hand up not a hand out.
Unfortunately, when omnibus bills are stuffed with more bad than good it is difficult to support them. The IDA program was a stand-alone bill that I supported in the House and Human Services Committee, but the Ways and Means process decided to shove it into this package to get support for the other waste.
HB 4134 includes $7.1 million in direct allocations to cities for shovel-ready projects related to infrastructure that will support additional housing development inside the UGB. This bill was well vetted by the Chief Sponsor Rep. Elmer (R-McMinnville), and I was happy to be a sponsor on the bill. Specific to HD 23, there is a $750K line item for the City of Dallas for The Mill Station Project. I appreciate them sending me this project to advocate for and working to ensure that every dollar will be well spent and benefit the residents of Dallas.
These bills will be on the House Floor some time next week to be voted on.
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Capitol Phone: 503-986-1423
Capitol Address: 900 Court St NE, H-387, Salem, OR 97301
Email: Rep.AnnaScharf@oregonlegislature.gov
Website: https://www.oregonlegislature.gov/scharf
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