Now is not the time for more business taxes

By admin | Published: May 17, 2013 | Leave a comment
Rep. Sal Esquivel

Rep. Sal Esquivel

Less than 24 hours before the release of the state’s latest revenue forecast, Gov. Kitzhaber held a press conference, in which he expressed support for higher taxes on Oregon business.

This comes after a bad month for many big businesses throughout the state.

Integra is moving its corporate headquarters from Portland to Vancouver, Wash. The last lumber mill in Josephine County has closed down. Greenbrier is laying off 200 workers at its Gunderson LLC plant in Northwest Portland. SoloPower announced the suspension of its Portland operations. Xerox is laying off 300 workers in Coos Bay and North Bend. Kinder Morgan pulled the plug on plans for a proposed coal terminal in Columbia County, and CenturyLink just announced the closure of its Hood River call center.

These are just the big businesses that are struggling, and does not include all the small businesses throughout Oregon that are also having a hard time right now.

Calling for higher taxes on businesses sends the wrong signal to job creators at a time when Oregonians need jobs more than ever.

The Public Employees Retirement System (PERS) reforms that the governor has signed are a good first step. But they don’t solve the problem.

I’ve been saying for years that our state government needs to get its spending in line before asking anyone for more taxes. PERS costs affect every school district, city and county in the state. We need to fix those issues immediately, instead of continuing to kick that can down the road.

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We all have to step up to care for elders

By admin | Published: May 17, 2013 | Leave a comment
Rep. Dennis Richardson

Rep. Dennis Richardson

Our most elderly citizens deserve our respect and attention. They deserve, whenever possible, the opportunity to live and die in familiar surroundings, in their own homes.

To help our senior citizens remain in their homes the state provides Oregon Project Independence and federal in-home health care programs.

Helping our older generation transition from life through death is not convenient. It is not always pleasant, but it is our duty. Such service is good for them and it is good for us. Oregon families and friends care for 80 percent of Oregonian’s elderly population without state subsidization. The remaining 20 percent are served by our state and federal programs. Oregon has an aging population and the cost of their long-term care is not cheap. The fastest growing age component of Oregon’s population is in the 85-plus category.

For “end-stage” living, the greatest costs are incurred by those receiving long-term care in nursing homes, residential care facilities and assisted living facilities. Since most elderly Oregonians would prefer to live in their own homes if possible, we as family, as friends, and as neighbors, have the honor and duty to be engaged. We can reach out and ask what we can do to help care for elderly family and community members.

Family, friends and community-based programs ultimately must assume responsibility to ensure adequate care for our seniors. They, who so generously gave us the care we needed when we were young, now deserve the best we can give to them.

Watch a short video of Dennis Richardson talking about his parents and the duty to care for elders.

 

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The economy is picking up

By admin | Published: May 17, 2013 | Leave a comment
Mike McLane

Rep. Mike McLane

Oregon’s May revenue forecast was released Thursday and showed an increase of $271 million over previous estimates. Along with $1.5 billion in increased tax collections we already knew about, plus $260 million set aside in the current budget, Oregon will have over $2 billion more for this budget.

As a member of the budget-writing Ways and Means Committee, I take these numbers seriously. One of the Legislature’s most important duties is to pass a balanced budget that funds our most critical services. In 2011, we were able to build a bipartisan budget that enhanced education funding to protect classrooms, provided for proper reserves, and did not raise taxes. I am hopeful we can do the same this session.

The May revenue forecast shows the beginning of recovery for some parts of the state. Some improvement, however, does not discount the need to continue to talk about reforming cost drivers to the budget like the PERS unfunded liability, and helping Oregon businesses continue to create jobs and put people back to work.

Fixing PERS will provide long-term budget relief and additional funding at all levels of government. It will mean more teachers for Oregon classrooms, more police and firefighters for our communities, and more stability for all local governments.

I will continue to support efforts that help Oregon’s job creators as well, and will resist the call to raise taxes with so much additional revenue already. I agree with the vast majority of Oregonians that private sector job growth is the key to economic recovery and that we should fund critical government services.

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Let’s work together

By admin | Published: May 17, 2013 | Leave a comment
Alan Bates

Sen. Alan Bates

Peter Buckley

Rep. Peter Buckley

It’s no secret that Oregon’s schools are in desperate need of increased funding. Reinvesting and stabilizing schools and reducing class sizes are our top priorities this session in Salem. We have a historic opportunity to reinvest in education, and we believe it’s time to embrace the proposals to make that happen.

Today, Oregon has the opportunity to invest in early childhood education, our K-12 schools, our community colleges and our universities in a way no one could have expected even six months ago.

The Oregon economy is improving. Week by week, month by month, the number of Oregon jobs grows. Oregonians have worked hard to hold things together and build our way out of the recession. Now, with a strongly positive revenue forecast for the state for the first time in years, we are in a position we’ve worked for since the early 2000s — to provide affordable access to health care for all Oregonians, to have a more effective, lower cost public safety system, and finally begin to re-invest in education to benefit our kids, our economy and our future.

Gov. Kitzhaber has seized this moment to call for legislators on both sides of the aisle to come together, to drop partisanship, rhetorical arguments and allegiances except our first and foremost allegiance — to our state. He is asking us to engage in principled compromise.

We’re ready to take that stand. Neither one of us have shied away from standing on principle in our time in Salem, and both of us have been consistently willing to work for principled compromise if the end result is what is best for our state. And that approach has produced results.

For instance, Oregon will be expanding health care coverage to 220,000 Oregonians over the next year. This means that 95 percent of Oregon families will have access to health care. Was there compromise involved? Absolutely — every step of the way.

Today, with positive economic numbers finally before us, the path to reinvest in education is the same path we have always followed — keeping the goal in clear focus and working across the aisle on behalf of what’s best for our state.

When it comes to our economy, to funding our schools and looking after the most vulnerable, we can’t afford partisan gridlock. Let’s move forward and get this done.

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Oregon is getting back to work

By admin | Published: May 10, 2013 | Leave a comment
Alan Bates

Sen. Alan Bates

Peter Buckley

Rep. Peter Buckley

One of our top priorities this session is getting people back to work and helping small businesses grow in our area. So we were glad to read new data from the US Department of Labor last week that showed Oregon is making strides towards a strong economy and getting Oregonians back to work.

The report indicated there were 165,000 new jobs added nationally in April 2013, and U.S. unemployment declined to 7.5 percent. This means we’re finally seeing a positive trend towards more jobs and lower unemployment. In addition, the jobs reports for February and March 2013 were revised up, and now indicate that an additional 114,000 new jobs were added nationwide during that time, which means growth over the past few months was stronger than initially reported. Another study showed that nearly all regions of Oregon have seen growth in the past year, and looking locally, Southern Oregon added 2,600 jobs, behind only the Willamette Valley counties in creating the most private sector jobs.

Despite these positive indicators, there’s still much work to be done this session. Some of the proposals at hand would streamline the process for businesses using enterprise zones, make sure that state officials consider the needs of rural Oregon while crafting state building codes, and encourage career and technical education grants for Oregon’s universities. Jackson County has applied for an e-commerce zone that would encourage creation of more good technology sector jobs in Southern Oregon. Finally, a legislative task force of representatives from both parties has been formed in the Oregon House to find additional ways to support our state’s small businesses.

We’re encouraged to hear more and more often about businesses opening and expanding here in Southern Oregon. But there are still Oregonians looking for work and people struggling as we recover from the Great Recession, and we’re not done looking for ways to get our community back to work.

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Law would clarify how to measure 1,000 feet

By admin | Published: May 10, 2013 | Leave a comment
Rep. Sal Esquivel

Rep. Sal Esquivel

Ever so often, a piece of legislation is required to correct a situation, even though it should never have been necessary in the first place.

On May 2, the Oregon House of Representatives passed House Bill 3434 on a unanimous 56-0 vote. I sponsored this bill in response to a specific issue in Medford.

A methadone clinic has been operating in town for several years now. In order for that to happen, the clinic was required to be licensed.

One of the conditions of that license was that a survey be conducted to verify that the facility is more than 1,000 feet from a school or preschool.

But it turns out that the clinic is still within that 1,000 foot limit, because an improper method was used to calculate the distance.

I called the state to ask why the license had been granted. The response I received was that the laws surrounding this were not specific enough.

This response was troubling to me, as there have been several court cases regarding similar matters.

HB 3434 was drafted to try and resolve the issue once and for all and further clarify the law.

The bill defines the phrase “within 1,000 feet” as a straight line measurement in radius extending 1,000 feet or less in every direction from a specified location or from a boundary line of the property.

A public hearing on this bill should be scheduled in the Senate fairly soon.

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Bill will help the public track their money

By admin | Published: May 3, 2013 | Leave a comment
Rep. Sal Esquivel

Rep. Sal Esquivel

A bill drafted in response to an important local issue is making its way through the legislative process. House Bill 3013 was inspired by the controversy surrounding the Cherry Creek Development in Medford. The property involved was purchased by the Jackson County Housing Authority, at which point the zoning was changed to a higher density in order to accommodate low-income housing.

Neighbors became concerned about the possible impacts on home values, and asked to see the appraisal that had been done prior to the property purchase. Their request was denied, despite the fact that this was all done with public money. Once the transaction had been completed, there was no reason to conceal this information from the public. But the housing authority still refused to divulge that information.

HB 3013 excludes real estate appraisals submitted to a housing authority or obtained by a Housing and Community Services Department from public records disclosure exemption. It passed the Oregon House of Representatives on a unanimous, bipartisan 60-0 vote on Tuesday, April 23, and is on its way to the Senate.

This common sense proposal will bring greater transparency to processes involving properties purchased with public dollars. The passage of HB 3013 will ensure that decisions utilizing public monies are not made in secrecy behind closed doors.

Such a proposal never should have been necessary in the first place.  I’m determined to do everything I can to see this bill through to passage in order to prevent this kind of situation from ever happening again.

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Driver cards should help keep roads safer

By admin | Published: May 3, 2013 | Leave a comment
Alan Bates

Sen. Alan Bates

I was proud to vote recently in favor of extending drivers cards to undocumented Oregon residents: This is a safety issue, a jobs issue, and helping more qualified drivers get to work, get to the store, and take their children to school safely is simply the right thing to do.

This bill will give more Oregonians the opportunity to drive legally and safely, including the elderly, low-income Oregonians, and undocumented residents. For example, it would help an elderly couple who has simply lost track of documentation, or a young person who has lived here their entire life but who is still undocumented.

Issuing drivers cards allows the DMV to ensure drivers have valid insurance, which will save lives and reduce costs for drivers who are impacted by currently-uninsured and -unlicensed drivers. It cannot be used as proof of identity. Furthermore, drivers cards will help more Oregonians get to their jobs safely, which drives productivity for all Oregon businesses.

Secondly, many drivers currently aren’t able to get any sort of certification from the DMV, creating a dangerous situation on Oregon’s roads. This bill helps make sure that people can get to and from work safely, and that drivers on our streets are properly trained and follow the law.

Encouraging properly trained, insured and accountable drivers on Oregon roads has brought together Republicans and Democrats, business owners, agricultural communities, law enforcement and advocacy groups. This is a great step in the right direction for Southern Oregon’s families, businesses and agricultural communities.

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Why I voted against driver cards

By admin | Published: May 3, 2013 | 1 Comment
Rep. Dennis Richardson

Rep. Dennis Richardson

The Driver Card Bill (Senate Bill 833), passed the Senate, the House and has been signed into law by Gov. Kitzhaber.

I voted against issuing driver cards to those who cannot prove legal residency after learning the experience of other states where such laws have been tested. (Watch a video of my floor debate against Senate Bill 833 on YouTube.)

New Mexico’s illegal immigrant drivers’ law failed to achieve its goal of lessening the number of uninsured drivers. Investigations revealed New Mexico’s law was a magnet that attracted additional illegal immigration into their state.  In addition, New Mexico’s governor says she wishes their law could be repealed — citing problems relating to fraud, human trafficking, organized crime and national security.

After several years, Tennessee repealed its driving certificate laws. Investigators discovered non-residents were being shuttled to Tennessee and driving certificates were being issued based on false residency documents and even bribery of government officials.

In short, the desire to help thousands of undocumented workers and their families be assimilated into Oregon society may be well-intended, but the new Oregon driver card may have unintended consequences.  When states such as Tennessee and New Mexico have documented, widespread fraud and abuse of their driver cards, and have either repealed their laws or have a governor who wishes the laws were terminated, Oregon should beware.

Like it or not, the Oregon driver card law will become effective Jan. 1, 2014.  Time will tell whether or not the Oregon driver card was good policy or fraught with negative unintended consequences.

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Legislators must tackle tough problems

By admin | Published: April 26, 2013 | Leave a comment
Mike McLane

Rep. Mike McLane

Oregonians want good jobs, safe communities, great schools, and effective state services.

On Wednesday, the Oregon House moved us toward that end by unanimously supporting a Republican plan to eliminate offshore tax havens and dedicate the savings to mental health programs.

It was offered by Republicans as an alternative to the Democrats’ plan to raise taxes on businesses and eliminate tax deductions for certain individuals.

But there is more to do. It’s time to sit down and have a bipartisan discussion of what is best for balancing Oregon’s budget and fixing the Public Employees Retirement System (PERS). Remember, we haven’t done this yet. The ruling Democrats did not seek Republican input when they set their budget.

Oregonians have sacrificed greatly already. In addition to teacher layoffs, larger classes, and job losses, Oregonians have paid more in record tax increases passed a few years ago. The state already has $1.7 billion more to spend for this budget. When is enough, enough?

Meanwhile, PERS obligations continue to drain precious resources from school districts, police departments and local governments. It’s time to fix PERS. But that is not what SB 822 — passed without a single Republican vote — did.

SB 822 has been criticized by school boards, education activists and local governments as not fixing PERS. We’ll be back in two years facing the same broken retirement system.

We need the political courage to stand up and solve the problems we were elected to address.

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