I was honored to help officially welcome Liberty House to Woodburn at their ribbon cutting ceremony for their North Marion Campus.

Liberty House is an invaluable resource for children who have experienced challenging things in life. Their moto is “changing hurt into hope.” This new location triples the amount of exam rooms available and offers bilingual services. Having Liberty House in our community is a great resource for our local law enforcement to make sure they have the best evidence possible to prosecute, while making sure there is a trauma informed approach and minimizing the amount of times a child has to tell their story. This space also has increased capacity for parents and families to access resources.

I got to tour Salem’s Lancaster Bottle Drop facility with Representative Mannix a few months ago. Pretty cool to see behinds the scenes of something so many of us use regularly!

I visited Gervais High School to talk with the district’s team about a Career Technical Education (CTE) Grant they received earlier this year. I was inspired by their vision for the kitchen space, and saddened to see that it really hadn’t changed much since I went to school there. They still have one of the original ovens from the 1960s in their classroom—and it still works!

While I was there, I also had the opportunity to meet a student who had emailed my office to advocate for the school. It makes my heart happy to see students so invested in their education and their community.

I attended the ceremonial bill signing for House Bill 4082, which allocated $30 million for summer learning opportunities for an estimated 48,000 students across Oregon. The ceremony took place in Woodburn’s Washington Elementary School Library!

I was disappointed that the bill excluded virtual schools, but I look forward to bringing that to the conversation for future summer learning legislation. It's essential that we make targeted investments to get ALL of our students back on track. It's equally important that the Legislature take an active role in ensuring these funds are used wisely. We must track and monitor their performance and outcomes to ensure these funds are increasing student's proficiency in the basics of reading, writing, and math.

I was honored to speak at Chemeketa's Woodburn Cinco De Mayo Celebration. What an awesome celebration of Mexican history and culture!

Woodburn is the fastest growing city in the entire state of Oregon! I attended Mayor Lonergan's State of the City address that recapped his first year as Mayor of Woodburn. These were a few highlights I noted:

- 2.3% economic growth across the decade and holding strong

- Woodburn partnered with Mid-Willamette Valley Community Action Agency to open a homeless shelter

- Meal program every Wednesday is supporting over 800 families weekly

- The city has funded a third student resource officer in next year’s budget to keep our students safe

I applaud the Mayor's leadership on these issues!

I attended Governor Kotek's celebration of the statewide expansion of the Dolly Parton Imagination Library program. Although I wish Dolly Parton herself was there, I was proud to support funding for this expansion in 2023 because there are few things more important in our kid's development than learning to read. More than 54,000 kids in Oregon are currently enrolled to receive books through the Imagination Library and this expansion will continue to grow that number!

Families can visit www.imaginationlibrary.com to find out if the program is available in their area or to sign up to be notified when the program expands to their community.

I attended the Union Gospel Mission’s Simonka Place Renew Luncheon. It was a beautiful event showcasing a community of women supporting women. The panel of graduates from the Simonka program who spoke were so brave and vulnerable in sharing the deep impact the program has had on their lives as they battled addictions and abusive relationships to rebuild their lives. I’m grateful for the amazing work Simonka Place is doing in our community and hope to continue to see progress as we turn the corner on Measure 110.

I visited the Walmart Employee Appreciation Event held at the Walmart on Lancaster in NE Salem. A business is only as good as its employees, and Walmart would never have been able to get so big and serve so many without great employees. I stopped by to show my appreciation!

I visited Victory Christian Academy in Woodburn to meet with teachers and students who I missed when they came and toured the Capitol back during the Short Session! I got to talk about what I do as a State Representative and learn more about their school as well. They are running an entire elementary through high school in a church basement! These kinds of tight knit educational environments are great for learning.

I again had the honor of being a part of the Frontier Charter Academy graduation!

I hear from my district frequently that business owners can’t even get people to show up for the job interviews they schedule. I am so excited and confident for these students to enter the work force because virtual charter schools empower students to speak up and advocate for themselves—they show up! Charter schools are such an important part of the future of education!

Congratulations Class of 2024!

I was honored to attend and speak at the Gervais Middle School's 8th grade promotion. A full circle moment for me, as I graduated from Gervais Middle School!

Congratulations Class of 2028!

I toured Knife River's training facility outside of Albany this summer. Their commitment to safety is clear: they are constructing a fake town to practice driving through with different grades of roads to simulate real world construction sites. Very cool set up! Our Oregon-based contractors provide great paying jobs and we need to make sure they can continue to operate and provide livelihoods. Pretty cool to see behind the scenes!

I spent this year’s National Night Out in Woodburn. National Night Out was started to bring awareness to the importance of community policing and the community connections that police build to keep us safe! Thank you to our local police for all you do!

It was great to have a booth at the Woodburn Community Connections event again this year! It's a wonderful event to learn how to get engaged in the community, build relationships with our neighbors, and to learn about local resources. Every one of us can make our community a better place to live, work, and play!

I was glad that DHS Director Fariborz Pakseresht took the time to hold a listening session at the Kroc Center as part of their 14-stop statewide tour. This tour will help inform the development of their budget for the next budget cycle. I am glad they are doing this because one size never fits all when it comes to understanding the needs of our communities.

The HOPE Plaza had its grand opening in August! I was proud to support funding to complete this project last session and I look forward to the big difference this facility is going to make in the lives of victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, and human trafficking. Thanks to that funding, they are opening completely debt free!

The Center for Hope and Safety responded to over 38,000 contacts last year. I want to recognize the staff who are doing great work responding to those in crisis despite the extra work during construction of the Plaza! A special thank you to Executive Director Jayne Downing for her 27 years of service to our community and the most vulnerable. She will be retiring at the end of the year.

If you are wanting to get involved in what HOPE Plaza is doing, their biggest need right now is donations of size 4-5 diapers and women's undergarments!

I got to attend Mobilization Ceremony for the 41st Infantry Brigade Combat Team at the Salem Armory recently. These brave men and women of the Oregon National Guard will be deploying to Kosovo Force Mission where they will be joining the U.S European Command as part of a 28-country alliance to maintain a safe and secure environment across the region, while ensuring freedom of movement for all citizens.

The brigade’s support will include security forces, logisticians, medical professionals, intelligence analysts, and a command team. In keeping with the National Security Strategy, the 41st IBCT KFOR mission will provide stability, safety and security, as part of a NATO international peacekeeping force.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE!

I toured the Chemeketa Lancaster Campus’ Agriculture Building, which is the first net zero (produces more energy than it uses) building at an Oregon community college. It was built during COVID when steel prices skyrocketed so everything is wood and there is a lot of the very same mass plywood from Freres Lumber as in the newly remodeled Portland airport.

Students in the program are hired to work in and sell the plants from the nursery. The sales help keep the program going and employing students. Their mulch is a mixture of scrap paper and grass clippings from campus, with donated used coffee grounds from Dutch Brothers that would’ve ended up in a land fill. Each garden, planter, and flower bed all has been specifically designed to be a part of the program as a learning opportunity—beautiful and functional!

Chemeketa received a grant from PGE for two electric tractors that they use on campus and local farmers can test out to see if it might be a good fit for their farms. Click HERE to learn more.

In August, I toured DataVision in Gervais. DataVision got its start as a telephone provider and shifted into broadband services as technology changed. I’m a customer for my internet services so it was exciting to get the behind-the-scenes tour on how it all works!

In just 10 months the Willamette Career Academy Dental Science Lab went from a dream to a reality! Classes are already filled and there is a waiting list for the program. As a former Dental Assistant for a decade, I know there is a need for more people to enter this work force. I championed $1 million funding for Willamette Career Academy earlier this year during Session and I’m excited that part of that money will go towards funding the teacher and teacher’s assistant for this program for the next few years. Career Technical Education (CTE) is such an important part of how we are going to solve the work force shortages happening in nearly every sector of our economy!

It was awesome to tour Marion Polk Food Share just yesterday! They are doing great work to get nutritious food into the hands of those who need it. My mind was blown when they shared that the demand they are seeing has been greater now than during the height of COVID.

Yesterday I was also able to tour Fleetwood Homes in Woodburn. It doesn’t take being a legislator to see that Oregon has a housing crisis. Fleetwood builds manufactured homes and provides another housing option for our communities. Not everyone wants to live in a high rise, and not everyone can afford a traditional stick-built home on land. Especially after the Labor Day Fires of 2020, manufactured housing is a great option for Oregonians to own their own home without breaking the bank.

Fleetwood’s manufacturing facility can start to finish complete five floors per day (one floor meaning single wide, two floors double wide, etc.)! Supporting manufactured housing would go a long way towards reaching the Governor’s ambitious housing production goals and it provides great jobs in our community!