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2011 Legislature Wrap-up
Our regions legislators say, “Not soooo bad.”
by t.a. barnhart
The 2011 Legislature wrapped up
work in record time and with remarkable
results: surviving the 30/30 split
in the House, as unprecedented as the
third-term governor; building a budget to
cope with a $3.5 billion revenue gap; and
completing redistricting without resorting
to the courts or the Secretary of State’s
office. And they managed to do all this in
an atmosphere that rarely strayed from
the collegial and respectful.
After a month’s rest and recuperation,
and a chance to meet with constituents
around the districts, the region’s three
members of the Legislature — Senator
Betsy Johnson and Representatives
Deborah Boone and Brad Witt — looked
back at the session’s challenges and
outcomes, both the positive and the
disappointing. Not surprisingly, one thing
stood out as the defining feature of the
2011 session:
“Very significant … 30/30 in the
House.” Senator Johnson
“30/30 made [action] more problematic.”
Representative Witt
“For the most part, the [shared leadership]
experiment worked.” Representative
Boone
The even split between Democrats and
Republicans in the House had never happened
in Oregon, so the entire session
was spent inventing the wheel. All actions
had to be approved by two Co-Speakers
and, in committee, by two Co-chairs.
The Senate had the narrowest partisan
margin, 16-14 Democratic; despite the
close divide of the two chambers, Johnson
saw the session as being “remarkably
civil”. She felt the two Co-speakers were
“gentlemanly” and “overall, it was a session
that Oregonians can be proud of.”
The Legislature’s priority in every
session, of course, is to pass the state’s
biennial budget. With the added burden
of starting $3.5 billion in the hole, this
task in 2011 was especially daunting. But
not only did the Legislature pass budgets
for the three major areas of state government
— education, health and social
services, public safety — they completed
the biggest, for K-12 education, in April,
in time to let school districts know how
much funding they would receive before
they completed their budgets. Historically,
the education budget is one of the last
things done in the session.
The budgets were, admitted Johnson,
“skinny” but they did get done. She noted
with pride that unlike some past sessions,
and as some people feared, no major
programs were shut down, including
ever-threatened Oregon Youth Authority
programs. Some of the outcomes were
harsh, however. Boone talked about
fees for accessing the medical marijuana
program, which will increase from $100 a
year to $200 — but for some low-income
users, that increase will be from a nolonger-reduced
$20 to the full $200, an
increase she called “egregious”. She also
pointed to recertification fees charged to
EMTs that will drive some from the job.
On the plus side, however, she was happy
that Project Independence, which helps
seniors remain in their homes, had been
scheduled for cuts, but, in the end got a
small “bump” in funding.
Witt termed the entire budget process
as “holding the line” on issues of greatest
impact to those in his district. He spoke
on those issues a number of times on
the House floor, most notably in March
when he defended the need to extend
unemployment benefits to the long-term
jobless — something Legislature was able
to do in spite of the budgetary challenge.
“Budgets are about priorities,” said
Johnson, who served on the Ways and
Means Committee, which authors all
budget bills.
One outcome of the “complex process”
in the House that resulted from the
30/30 split, Johnson said, was that it
“whetted [both parties’]
appetite for that one
seat” needed for a
majority. She predicted
that the 2012 campaign
would be “gruesome”
in the chase for
a legislative majority.
Boone reflected, with
an air of resignation,
that a certain amount
of gamesmanship had
occurred, with committee
chairs blocking
action on bills they opposed,
sometimes just
because they could. It
was a state of affairs no
one wants to repeat in
future sessions.
Bills on social issues
were introduced in
2011, as usual, but,
said Boone, there was
an unspoken agreement
early on that
“huge, far-reaching” bills were not going
to move forward. She didn’t think that
was a bad thing necessarily; it would
force backers to continue work in education
at the local level before trying to
“slam them out” in the Legislature.
Johnson, when asked about how the
district fared in the session, said that
“we were ok” because many needs had
been met in previous sessions. Capital
construction funds for the two community
colleges had already been secured.
Boone, in speaking about her district,
while glad that several projects in regard
to wave energy had been funded, also
noted that the major experimental project
was currently blocked from using the
power it produced. “I hope to fix that
in February,” she said, referring to next
year’s short session.
Senator Johnson, the Ways and Means Committee and the passage of K-12 budget, maing lemonade.
One achievement of which Witt was
proud was his landmark bill to block the
sale or possession of shark fins. The fins
are used in soup and are in worldwide
demand; however, fins are supplied not
by fishing the entire shark but by cutting
off just the dorsal fins and throwing the
maimed creature back into the sea. Witt’s
bill helps set a precedent for banning
the practice that he expects to see grow,
including in Canada.
And all three were happy to see the
upgrade in the Bottle Bill.
The three legislators wasted no time
following the end of session in meeting
with constituents. Johnson held town
halls in both House districts with the two
representatives, meeting from Tillamook
to Astoria (“I want to give them kudos for
getting the most people … on a Sunday
morning … incredibly well-informed”) to
Sauvie Island. Issues covered health care,
bicycles, the Oregon Bank, ESDs, all-day
kindergarten, kicker reform, emergency
preparedness on the coast, BPA in sippy
cups, marijuana and more. She was
surprised that the Liquid Natural Gas
terminal only came up once, and just in a
general conversation about Oregon being
an exporter of natural resources.
All three legislators are now back into
their non-legislative lives. Brad Witt is on
the campaign trail, seeking the Democratic
nomination to replace David Wu
in Congress. The timing of the election
means that either he’ll retain his House
seat if he loses the primary or general
special election — or his district will have
to pick his replacement in early February
2012 if he wins. And that will be while
the Legislature is in session.
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