Bridget Barton West Linn Editor and Publisher The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? I’m a Republican outsider, so my approach to drought isn’t confined to 40-years of leaning harder into failed policies like single-species focus in the Klamath Basin or rejecting drawing water from the Columbia River in NE Oregon. As someone who’s not building a political career, I have the freedom and the will to “rip the Band-Aid” and have frank discussions about who’s winning and who’s losing the water wars, and how we can make that more balanced. Our current approach focuses too heavily on wildlife at the expense of people and their livelihoods. My vision will refocus our natural resources on people and bring balance back to policies that have needlessly and critically harmed rural Oregonians. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I’ve never been afraid to do hard things, but it will be my pleasure to rescind the harmful cap-and-trade program that Gov. Brown is using as a stick to beat our citizens into paying more for energy, gasoline and propane. This “green theater” government program is all pain and no gain. Gov. Brown and the Green New Deal leftists think that taking more of your money for state government will magically stop climate change. They’re wrong, and they know it. I’ll stop this plan and save our struggling families hundreds of dollars on their energy bills and trips to the gas station. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? For nearly 40 years, our state has been led by weak career politicians who have bowed to radical environmental groups. They have collectively turned our forests into unmanaged tinderboxes that burn every summer and kill people. These special interests have forced forest road removals so firefighters are unable to fight fires and save towns. They’ve decimated once-thriving rural communities by shutting down lumber mills with ridiculous wildlife regulations. They’ve told rural Oregonians to “get ready to run,” because they won’t lift a finger to protect our forests from the massive forest fires we’ve experienced the last few years. But I’m a Republican outsider and I have the guts to undertake a complete rewrite of these failed policies—no matter the political pressure. These weak politicians and radical environmental groups have blood on their hands. The only way to immediately reduce wildfire impacts on our citizens is to break out the chainsaws. When I am Oregon’s next governor, we will build forest roads, manage the forests and unleash rural Oregon. I’m done with radical, urban special interests decimating rural Oregon and letting it burn. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? I have been in recovery from alcoholism for 40 years. I started drinking when I was 14 and when I stopped at 28, I was a chronic alcoholic. I have spent my life in recovery and helping dozens of other Oregonians face their own addictions. Oregon is No. 2 in the country in addiction and No. 50 in treatment options … and our children are suffering dire consequences. When I talk with sheriffs across Oregon, almost uniformly they tell me that Measure 110 was the worst policy in decades, and is an underlying cause of our recent explosion of violent and property crime. As governor, I will immediately marshal law enforcement, parents advocates and the substance abuse treatment community to lead the repeal of the legalization of hard drugs. We should let the people of Oregon decide how it’s working. At the same time, I will refocus most of the billions we spend on failed “housing first” policies and invest in large, low-level shelters with one-stop-shop options for addiction and mental health treatment. We must turn our approach to this problem on its head – it has clearly failed. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? I faced my alcohol addiction 40 years ago and have helped dozens of other people face and fight their own addictions. When you talk with sheriffs across Oregon, they will tell you that substance abuse is the primary root of homelessness and crime. When leftist billionaires tricked Oregonians into legalizing hard drugs in 2020, they created a massive new market for drug users and cartels. This easy money, high-stakes hard drug market is enabled by these new laws from Salem that stop police from pursuing criminals. Those same state politicians have made Oregon one of the friendliest states in America for illegal immigrants moving drugs across the border. And when voters elect pro-criminal district attorneys like Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt, there aren’t any consequences for using, selling, or dealing drugs to our children. As governor, I will have a package waiting for lawmakers to consider on my first day in office. It will include this: · Immediately declaring violent and property crime a public health emergency; · Giving Oregonians the chance to repeal the legalization of hard drugs; · Granting substantial emergency funding for law enforcement across the state; · Cleaning house on the soft-on-crime parole board; and then · Cracking down on drug cartels and dealers who treat Oregon like their playground. I’m the only Republican outsider in this race with the guts to stand firm against gangs and cartels to finally clean up this mess. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? I raised our two children as a working mom. When Kate Brown first closed Oregon schools during the pandemic, the first thing I thought about was the working parents with young kids in school. Those working parents are my heroes. Oregon families and kids suffered and these parents pieced together bringing home a paycheck, caring for their children during a pandemic, homeschooling their kids on screens, and trying to stay sane at the same time. As the next governor of Oregon, I won’t forget the unsung sacrifices the parents of young children made during Kate Brown’s needless pandemic restrictions. I promise them that they will never experience mandates like this on my watch. Gov.Brown locked Oregon kids out of school for longer than nearly any other state in America. This didn’t have to happen. I want parents and students to know that when I’m governor of Oregon, I will never implement a statewide school closure. I’ll reinstate standards, and refocus our schools on academic excellence. I will end the divisive, needless stress that politically motivated curriculum brings into our classrooms. We will once again create an environment where schools are safe, productive places for Oregon kids to learn and grow—without all the politics and uncertainty. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? As a mom, a small business owner who raised our two kids while working, and as a grandmother, I understand how important child care is to working parents raising young children. My son and daughter-in-law struggled to secure child care months in advance, knowing the market is scarce. Our state government has created a hostile environment for private business owners of all kinds—including child care providers. I know too many working moms who are working just to cover child care costs. And it’s not because we need more lackluster government services—it’s because we need more child care providers to feel welcome to open in Oregon. As a Republican outsider, I’m not focused on the old back-and-forth conversations about how many new government services state government should provide. I’m focused on how we can revive a spirit of support for our entrepreneurs and small business owners. We need potential child care providers to feel confident that they can start and grow businesses here without major financial or regulatory surprises. As governor, I will work to recruit and retain our high-quality child care providers. When we welcome more child care providers, child care prices will come down for our families. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? As a mom and small business owner who raised our two kids while working, I understand how important child care is to working parents raising young children. Our state government has created a hostile environment for private business owners of all kinds—including child care providers. I know too many working moms who are working just to cover child care costs. And it’s not because we need more lackluster government services—it’s because we need more child care providers to feel welcome to open in Oregon. As a Republican outsider, I’m not focused on the old back-and-forth conversations about how many new government services Oregon should provide. I’m focused on how we can revive a spirit of support for our entrepreneurs and small business owners. Child care providers, like any other entrepreneur or business owner, need two key things to maintain, start or grow a business: certainty that new, surprising taxes and regulations won’t increase their costs and reduce their profitability; and a consistent, high-quality workforce. As Oregon’s next governor, I’ll pause all new taxes, fees and regulations on Oregon business owners. And I’ll refocus our schools on academic excellence and raise standards to ensure that our graduates are well prepared when they join the workforce. When we welcome more child care providers, and can offer a high-quality workforce, child care prices will come down for our families. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? I spent much of my career as a conservative advocate and commentator in local media. It was my honor to share how weak politicians had allowed radical special interests to starve and decimate rural Oregon. Referring to the hardest working Oregonians who provide our food, fuels, and building materials as “extraction” is cringe-worthy and underlines the attitude problem and imbalance between rural and urban Oregonians that needs correction. Rural Oregonians do not want handouts from state government. They’re fiercely independent and self-reliant, and more than capable of fending for themselves, if government would get out of the way. As governor, I will unleash rural Oregon from the devastating economic, labor-related and environmental restrictions that weak politicians have adopted to make our rural areas “No Jobs Zones” for the recreational enjoyment of urban elitists. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) As a Republican outsider, I reject the premise of this question -- that these are the only levers to create an environment where we can put more people to work in higher-paying jobs. All these proposed “solutions” rely on state government taking action to fix our economy. I’m a small business owner and I published a conservative business magazine. Successful business owners will tell you that they’re not looking for anything from government other than for it to get out of their way and let them find their own methods to grow and create job opportunities for our citizens. My vision for Oregon’s next four years is to end the “Gotcha Culture” that state government has toward business owners. The job of state government is to help businesses do things right and support economic growth. I will give my fellow business owners certainty that I will reject any new taxes, fees or regulations on them. I will give them a moment to breathe after the unprecedented strife they’ve been through the last two years. When I’m Oregon’s next governor, business owners will finally have an ally in the governor’s office. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? Since I began my work as a conservative writer, publisher and advocate 30 years ago, I have watched radical environmental groups execute an experiment on Oregon that they started in the 1970s. The basic premise of their effort is this: restrict the land on which you can build. It’s pretty simple that when you reduce supply (of housing) then you increase demand—and that drives up prices. Renters in Portland recently experienced the biggest average rent hikes in the nation. Families struggle to pay rent and mortgages here because leftist environmental groups restricted where, and what we can build. And more recently, state building codes require builders to tack on green extras like bike racks and electric vehicle charging outlets that cost us all a lot of money. So when young people can’t afford homes here, it’s because the market has been manipulated by environmental policies that make life more expensive. I have kids who are starting young families. I want my grandchildren to grow up in a neighborhood home where they can ride their bikes. But that’s way out of reach for too many families. I will work to expand opportunities for builders to build more homes and apartments and reduce ridiculous building requirements and restrictions that make building or remodeling too expensive. I plan to take a hard look at Oregon’s land-use policies that are choking off supply for both housing and business expansion. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? As a person who’s been in recovery from alcoholism for 40 years, and has helped dozens of other people to face their own addictions—I know the last thing you should do is hand an addict the keys to an apartment, tiny home, or yet another tent. We are allowing people to commit slow suicide on our streets and it’s not compassion. It’s enabling. As governor, I will reject any efforts to enable people to stay homeless and that includes enabling them to sleep on our streets in any fashion. We treat dogs and cats better than we treat addicted and mentally ill Oregonians. They need treatment—not a bottle of water and a tent. It’s inhumane, and other states have solved this. We need to focus on policies that have worked in other states and reject current policies that have made Oregon streets open-air drug markets and turned our emergency rooms and jails into mental institutions. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? My answer to this is going to be the same as the first housing question… Since I began my work as a conservative writer, publisher and advocate 30 years ago, I have watched radical environmental groups execute an experiment on Oregon they started in the 1970s. The basic premise of their effort is this: restrict the land on which you can build. It’s pretty simple that when you reduce supply (of housing) then you increase demand—and that drives up prices. The weak politicians have been too afraid to address the root cause of this problem (and so many others) which is the fact that they won’t allow us to create more spaces for people to build housing. We can’t expect prices for families to come down when we are focused on stacking apartments on top of each other in our major cities, while adding more and more “green theater” restrictions. Renters in Portland recently experienced the biggest average rent hikes in the nation. Families struggle to pay rent and mortgages here because leftist environmental groups restricted where and what we can build. And more recently, state building codes require builders to tack on green extras like bike racks and electric vehicle charging outlets that cost us all a lot of money. So when young people can’t afford homes, it’s because the market has been manipulated by environmental policies that make life more expensive here. My kids are starting their own young families. I want my grandchildren to grow up in a neighborhood home where they can ride their bikes. But that’s way out of reach for too many families. I will work to expand opportunities for builders to build more homes and apartments and reduce ridiculous building requirements and restrictions that make building or remodeling too expensive.
Court Boice Gold Beach Curry County Commissioner The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? With the environment, if your policies are reactionary, you aren’t solving environmental problems, you are an environmental problem. Our water problem is based in decades of environmental mismanagement and incompetent governance. This is exacerbated by the 2014 Waters of The US (WOTUS) policy from the Obama Administration. Former President Trump re-wrote the policy in 2018 and things improved. President Biden returned to the 2014 Obama plan last fall. Essentially, it places federal control over the water issue and subordinates state needs and programs to federal rules even for waters in this state. We need more reservoir capacity and until that is accomplished, we’re having to continue the failed reactionary measures inherited from past administrations and we will not have sufficient water to sustain our population and meet environmental needs. Additional reservoir capacity involves the federal government: That makes it a long-term issue. That’s not just about sufficient water for the population, agriculture, industry and firefighting: Oregon’s hydroelectric power generation capacity demands increased reservoir capacity to increase power production and lower costs for the consumer. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I’m not big on executive orders. Sometimes they’re necessary but executive orders compromise our government. They’re easy, but eventually the people can no longer govern themselves. “When the people learn to just go with executive orders and mandates, they submit to tyranny.” We have co-equal branches of government and the legislature is one of them. I’m going to rescind this executive order even if it’s still in front of the court. Why? That executive order was, arguably, Brown, who is “lame duck,” exploiting the emergency powers that accrue to the governor to issue an executive order to cover for legislators who don’t want to deal with their untenable position and the failures and consequences of the supermajorities in the House and Senate not doing their jobs. Think on this thing: Does the Brown Administration’s climate protection plan reduces carbon emissions? The last round of cap and trade established three new bureaucracies. Two are for regulation of fossil fuels. The third is tasked with eliminating them. This isn’t about “carbon emissions” and never has been. It is, and always will be, about over-reaching big government opportunities for increased taxation and control over the people. Describe the “New Green Deal” plan for powering agriculture, the food industry and transportation. Fossil fuel is going to be used and you’re going to be penalized for living here, feeding your family and holding a job. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? Understand a couple of things here: There is a lot more to these plans than just “clearing fuel.” This is about forest and timberland management. There are a lot of issues involved in this including harvest and re-planting clearing tracts of dead and otherwise compromised trees and maintaining the conifers in this region instead of allowing these cleared or burnt off forest tracts to be taken over by hardwood trees and other deciduous trees and shrubs. There are issues of planning and maintaining access to these forests and timberlands, providing for firefighting resources and assets and developing and articulating plans for not only firefighting but also for the harvest, re-planting and clearing aspects of management. Furthermore, the needs are regional in nature. Places like Bend and Burns have considerably different needs than does the Jefferson Wilderness. It’s like two different planets. Perhaps these scientists should consider one other thing here: If you have an ignition source (a minor lightning strike) a forest floor covering of endemic bio-mass (the fuel) and oxygen (it’s about 23% of our atmosphere), chances are 100% that you’ll have a fire. You aren’t getting rid of the oxygen or lightning. Remove the fuel and you significantly reduce the probability of a fire. We learned that in the boy scouts. Understand this clearly: The timber industry and organizations like Timber Unity know forests and managing forests, re-planting and recovery. It’s their business and nobody is better at it. One other thing: When you mix science and politics you get reactionary political pseudo-science that is worse than no science at all. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? The only recourse for this incompetence is repeal and replace. Measure 110 expanded drug use by decriminalizing it and fails to meet the expressed intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment. $270 million is appropriated to fund this “treatment” program however, nobody stepped up the treatment. It does cover over-dose antidote kits and housing but not treatment. It diverts marijuana tax money from education, law enforcement and other services into support for people with addictions. That support, however, is not the treatment mandated but not otherwise detailed in the law. Any actual “Treatment” mandated in this act jeopardizes federal funding for treatment that disappears into Oregon Health Authority. Hmmmmm. The treatment is not detailed, so how is the $270 million price tag and appropriation determined? In terms of “crime,” Oregon enables drug abuse by de-criminalizing it thus eliminating codified deterrent measures and actual consequences. The relevant consideration here is crime and safety. This primarily involves habitual users, who have no income and, in many cases, are chronic indigents. So having created a potentially dangerous situation throughout the state, is Oregon culpable or actually liabel for losses and injuries arising from drug-related crime? It’s not about drug “crimes.” It’s about the crimes ancillary to decriminalized drug use. You cannot compel an individual to participate in drug treatment other than in a sentencing package. In Oregon, that’s pretty much out the window since Measure 110 doesn’t provide for the mandated treatment even though it is funded to the tune of $270 million. Understand this: You can, however, compel active and documented participation in treatment as prerequisite to access to subsidy and services. Consider also that this could prompt professional indigents who came here for Oregon’s subsidies to leave reducing the burden on the taxpayers. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? Fentanyl is one of the most serious public health issues we face. Part of the reason that this isn’t changing is that the efforts to combat it are, again, reactionary: “If something happens fix it.” Mandate something? Various state agencies have roles in dealing with this. We need to focus on the in-place assets and not on re-inventing the wheel with another special mandate. There is no legitimate “anti-fentanyl” action to be taken. Re-establish consistent law and order is the first step. Without that there is no foundation for dealing with fentanyl, heroin, meth or human trafficking. A big part of that is eliminating the “sanctuary jurisdiction” from the state on down to the smallest communities. There is no path to a safe and secure community environment that provides for disregard of the laws. This entails putting the attorney general and all prosecuting attorneys on notice that they have one client: Oregon. Law enforcement will be consistent and aggressive and according to the Oregon Penal Code. Dealing with these crimes, including the fentanyl trade, also demands that every law enforcement organization in Oregon will fully cooperate with all others as well as law enforcement of the other states and interface with federal law enforcement organizations in the enforcement of federal law. Oregon’s law enforcement must be committed to the protection and safety and security of the citizens and their property as well as public property. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? I generally oppose executive mandates but, to prevent the real implosion of our K-12 education and to eliminate the stresses, I will immediately mandate the return of Oregon K-12 education to the traditional academics-based education environment that our children, parents and teachers are familiar with. Bringing this environment back to the classroom is critical. Education is about academics not social engineering. I will immediately ban all social, lifestyle, political, ethnic and cultural indoctrination from pre-school and kindergarten to the state universities. I’m taking on the “WOKE” stressers to protect taxpayers, the parents, the children and the teachers who just want school to work. The current permissive environment of indoctrination enabled by DOE is setting these young people up for failure. This administration apparently wants to get the students all “WOKE” and send them out unable to compete in the world. Those young men and women know it too. The most sacred relationship in K-12 education is the parent and child, followed by the teacher and parent followed by the teacher and “student.” We are paying for traditional academics based curriculum that is consistent, legitimate, measurable and competitive with systems throughout the nation and achieves the consent of the parents. We are getting one of the most expensive and poorest performing public education systems in the country marked by stresses and conflicts at home and at school over social engineering indoctrination that has no place in the education process. In a pathetic effort to increase graduation numbers, the Department of Education and the governor lowered the graduation academic standards for mathematics and reading almost to functional illiteracy while providing for political, social, and lifestyle indoctrination. To keep the schools from imploding, put the schools back on the mission they were designed for: Education. Lose the social engineers. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? I believe Oregon Department of Education needs to focus on K-12 education and stay out of the child care/pre-school business. The problems in K-12 public education preclude the state from trying to expand child care and education options to children 5 years old and younger. That beginning of socialization and learning is the business of the family. The day care and pre-school environment is as susceptible to the existing improprieties of indoctrination evident in the K-12 environment and I will not let the Clinton mantra that “it takes a community to raise a child” to be part of Oregon’s education process. We have to be able to define success and, right now, we have a sub-standard K-12 education program that has involved itself in uncontrolled and illegitimate social experiments. We have to get fundamental education in place and establish the appropriate relationships before we talk about anything else involving public education. Currently, DOE doesn’t seem to be particularly good at their job and, as governor, I would be seriously opposed to putting anything into that mess. Expanding K-12 appropriations, like any other appropriations, is a matter for the legislature to deal with. Currently, Oregon is in considerable financial disarray such that deficit spending is not an option. “We can’t survive in this hole and more shovels aren’t part of the solution. ” I am opposed to increasing taxes to provide for any additional efforts and mandating even temporary solutions is seriously irresponsible in this fiscal environment. We have to have a competitive and successful K-12 education before we can even discuss ideas to alter our system. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? Any proposed solution that entails additional state spending is a non-starter. The suggested shortages in available child care is more a problem of over-regulation, exploitation of the power to levy taxes and state interference in a private sector issue. There is no solution that involves throwing state money at it. This is a private sector matter. Consider that a lot of the care that is out there and functioning is grassroots level business and family support. Getting the state involved in these subjects to expand administrative law and bureaucratic inefficiencies. While the suggestion is political and general in nature, deficit spending is not and is likely to be vetoed. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? Warning: The decline of the rural economy is always followed by across the board economic failure. Let’s consider these three symptoms: Agriculture in consolidation is about monopolization of agriculture by corporate farming and off-shore investment in agricultural properties and corporate farming. This is about benefitting shareholders, not the farmers or the economic environment in general. Understand here that declining natural resource extraction is not caused by the market, it’s caused by government overreach and arbitrary politically developed regulations. Tourism provides mainly minimum wage jobs. These jobs are not value creation or value addition. They’re primarily service jobs requiring no or minimal skills. Skilled and semi-skilled jobs pay living wages and have significant benefits. A faltering or receding activity economy results from failed executive, legislative and fiscal policy. Is the supposition perhaps that these rural industries should be engineered out of Oregon’s future? Everyone involved needs to understand clearly that the government is not in the business of determining who wins and who loses. The nature of the economic base in any locale is a matter for the people of that locale to form in their own decisions and efforts. The market will support it or it will fail. First: Address the symptoms of a troubled over-taxed and over-regulated economic base and its impact on the taxpayers. Second: Understand and respect that rural Oregon is Oregon too. Those rural industries are essential to the future of Oregon. Third is accept the reality that compensation for services is determined in the market, not in a university classroom or the legislature. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 5) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 3) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 0) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 3) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 1) Other (be specific) /job training programs Financial aid to education and skill training needs to be in voucher form. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? Let’s get a bit more specific here: How do you build “low income housing?” What makes a new structure affordable to people who do not have sufficient income to buy a house? Where do you put affordable housing? Is the effort aimed at rental? Where do you put these low-income apartment developments? Who makes these decisions and what level of public input is required? Housing is a major component of the economy. If you try to separate housing from the economy, you can’t legitimately address either one. Stay out of trying to manipulate the economy and deal with how these people became homeless. Oregon’s involvement in rent control and the pending effort to disallow mortgage interest as a tax-deductible item and the increases in property taxes, will continue to complicate the housing component of the economy. Currently, there is no suggested solution to the perceived housing shortage that does not involve increased taxation or increased deficit spending and growth of public debt to fund massive building projects which further degrade the foundations of the economy. As I mentioned and repeat here: Oregon’s individual tax burden is one of the highest in the country at 9.9%. We’re looking at $27+ billion failure of PERS (essential bankruptcy) and we’re spending about $55 billion annually on an estimated $47 billion revenue stream and we’re sitting on approximately $44 billion in debt. Get clear that “Just write the check, your grandkids can cash it” is not a solution. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? As governor, the more important question is: Why would we compel people in some place like Scio to help pay for Portland’s self-inflicted disaster? Those are problems arising from the municipalities making commitments they can’t fund. I will oppose any plan that continues to penalize the people of Oregon to bailout mis-managed cities. Ask me and the answer is “veto.” Without specified and meaningful client participation and actual requirements for access, documented approval of the people in those cities and towns, stipulated law enforcement protection, code compliance, public health and hygiene provisions, there is nothing legitimate about any of this and the state will not support it. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? Address this: Affordable housing means one thing to the taxpayer who is paying for it and something else altogether to the indigent living in it. Let’s get a more clear understanding of “affordable housing.” We address homeless issues by building new taxpayer funded ghettos where we hide the homeless? These are real people. They aren’t urban blight and this idea of just building more places for them to stay just consigns these people, including their future generations, to second class citizenship. These politically expedient subsidy and welfare proposals don’t address the problem, they are the problem. Convenient and politically motivated reactionary code and land use policy changes in this just guarantees system failure and expanded damage to the state and, more importantly, to an already compromised population. The “signature land use development system” amounts to centralized control. Show me where that has solved any problems. Show me where they have not negatively impacted property values. Explain how lowering property values supports a stable tax base and revenue stream. Your questions do not appear to address shortfalls in water supply or power generation. We’re importing power and we don’t have sufficient ground water and reservoir capacity to provide water for expanded urban housing and our needs for agriculture, industry, power generation and the environment. The WOTUS 2014 policy from the Obama era pretty much guarantees that this will be a permanent major problem. You can’t solve the affordable housing demand problem until you acknowledge its source. Figure out how to stop more people from becoming homeless. Get out of the way of the economy and let it function as it is intended to and has always done.
Christine Drazan Oregon City State Lawmaker The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? Access to water is essential—and too often, too political - as federal laws collide with state water needs and stakeholders do battle in the courts. With recent federal decisions and years of drought, lives now hang in the balance. I don’t want to read another story about a farmer or rancher leaving the state their family has called home for generations. We have to help. We must respond to drought needs quickly—before the wells run dry and fields lie fallow. Democrats in Salem withheld needed drought relief for months while they positioned and pushed political agendas. That has to stop. I will not allow farmers, ranchers and Oregon families to be held hostage by Salem. I will work to eliminate the red tape that has resulted in neighbors being prevented from supporting neighbors in need of water. I will direct our state agencies to support innovative water policy including conservation efforts and storage projects so that we can hang on to extra water during peak flow months to serve our needs in drier months. I will advocate on behalf of Oregonians before the federal government and the courts to ensure our needs are met and not traded away to achieve political objectives regardless of human impact. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I would tear up Gov. Brown’s cap-and-trade executive order on day one. Not only was her order unconstitutional, but it will not lead to meaningful improvements in the environment. Her approach to climate has been, and continues to be, designed to raise costs on businesses and consumers, making it even less affordable for families while weakening essential industries like timber, manufacturing, and trucking. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? For far too long extreme single-party control has led to a crisis in our forests. As governor, I will work with all landowner types and our federal delegation to advance efforts to reduce the frequency and intensity of wildfires through proactive forest management. We need all hands on deck to address this crisis, and those committed to finding a solution will have a seat at the table under my administration. We must manage our forests for the greatest return to Oregonians while relying on the most innovative, environmentally sensitive management practices available to meet our highest standards without sacrificing water quality, air quality or public safety. Given the fuels on the landscape here in Oregon we must treat, thin, detect and suppress wildfires. We need to invest in early smoke detection, drone technology, and our ability to use resources closest to the fire to attack wildfires when and where they start - not when they become megafires. We have made some progress on this in recent years, but there is much more work to be done. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? Measure 110 has been a failure and we should not wait for greater impacts to hit our homes and streets. Measure 110 must be repealed. The measure hid the merciless reality of decriminalized hard drugs and focused on the unrealized promise of investments in addiction and recovery services, and intentionally misled Oregon voters in the process. Since this measure passed, the crisis in our families and on our streets has only gotten worse. As governor, I will lead with a measurable plan that focuses on outcomes to expand services, expedite treatment, and increase our behavioral health workforce to serve more Oregonians searching for help and long-term recovery. It is time to stop making things worse and instead stand with those impacted by addiction and their families to improve delivery and access to drug and alcohol treatment services. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? Just last month, we lost two Portland-area teenagers to fentanyl overdoses in a span of less than 24 hours. Countless additional lives have been lost over the past year as this crisis grows out of control. Fentanyl related deaths have more than doubled from 2019-2020. We have a crisis on our hands. We must raise awareness among parents, children, and the public about the dangers of these drugs, how to spot an overdose, and what to do if someone is experiencing an overdose. The state has worked to increase access to life saving drugs like Naxolone so that when an overdose does occur, we have a better chance at saving lives and I will continue to support interventions to save lives and help people facing addiction get help to achieve long-term recovery. At the same time, I will advocate for repeal of Measure 110 which is not helping stem the tide of overdose deaths and will do all I can to support federal investigations of fentanyl trafficking to ensure those distributing these dangerous drugs will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? Much of the conflict and stress on our schools has been a direct result of the governor’s shutdown of our schools and the introduction of politics into the classroom—even at the youngest ages. We have to get politics out of the classroom and return to teaching our kids how to think, not what to think. A return to core academics, will help rebuild the partnership between schools and families. For too many of our kids and teachers, distance learning did not work. It was a huge shift and not everyone was trained to make it, not all students could thrive in isolation and not all parents were able to be present to support their students learning. It was a mess and Oregon families and schools are still recovering from the impacts of the lengthy closures. Overnight, our kids went from the comfort and routine of the classroom and time spent learning and growing with their friends and classmates, to isolation and remote learning. At the same time our educators were trying to understand how to effectively teach our kids in a remote learning environment, recognizing that for too much of their teaching time they couldn’t even see students faces to ensure they were even on the other side of the screen, let alone learning what they were trying to teach. When it was time to return to in-person learning students weren’t even tested to help teachers identify learning gaps. Parents are rightfully frustrated their kids were denied the education that kids in open states received and teachers are caught in the middle. We need parents to be welcomed into the classroom and treated as partners in their student’s education and within that partnership we need to support our teachers. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? This idea that the state has to step in and be our kids’ first parent is a dangerous assumption. We need childcare for those who are looking for childcare, but the analysis too often assumes childcare is needed for every child born in the state and that if we don’t have access for every new baby to be in a paid childcare setting from birth to kindergarten that we are failing families. The state should not have an interest in assuming that no parent chooses to stay home and parent their own children, or that parents who have family supports to care for their own children shouldn’t use them and should instead opt for publicly funded childcare. No, I don’t believe k-12 schools should expand their mission to include birth to pre-k child care. The state is not a better parent than a child’s own parent, whether it is the benefit of bonding or developmental milestones, babies benefit from spending time with their parents. State policy should support and advance this goal while lowering barriers for small business child care providers to open and serve their community for those families who need or want it. There is no doubt we can do more to grow the number of childcare providers in this state, but going all in on a system that relies on our K-12 system to deliver this support is the wrong approach. Not only that, but the state’s recent move to increase costs and increase regulation around child care is counterproductive to the goal of increasing access to child care providers. Let’s work together to increase the number of safe, private childcare providers without expanding unnecessary regulations and driving costs even higher. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? Without compromising the safety of our kids, we must commit to eliminating unnecessary government red-tape and rejecting regulations that make it harder to open and staff childcare facilities, which limits access to care. At the same time, this is a system that has been riddled with failures to communicate with parents about the safety of facilities regulated by the state. Not all child care is safe child care. To protect children and increase transparency, we must move quickly to investigate claims and shutdown dangerous child care settings. The state must improve the real-time release of accurate information about quality and availability of child care providers, including investigations and incidents of harm. We must also recognize the role and value of in-home child care providers, including them in data analysis on access, as we encourage more people to join the childcare field and prioritize their retention. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? I’m a small-town girl. I was born in Klamath Falls into a family and community that was dependent on the natural resource industry for good wages and steady employment. When the mills shut down, it was hard on all of us. Unfortunately, once they closed, most of them never came back. My administration will support natural resource-based industries, like the timber industry in rural Oregon, making this economic engine a part of our state’s future not just the past. That means recognizing that many of the policies being passed in Salem are directly related to the decline in rural Oregon. The recent agriculture overtime mandate, for example, is expected to accelerate the consolidation of family-owned ag operations into corporate megafarms. Despite pleas from the farming and ranching community to veto this bill, Gov. Brown signed it into law. I would have vetoed it. I will lead by restoring local control, supporting affordability by lowering taxes and fees and prioritizing our natural resource industries in public policy so communities like the one I grew up in have an opportunity to grow their own local economies again without the weight of a heavy-handed state government stifling opportunity in rural Oregon. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 4) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 3) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 5) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 2) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 1) Reverse the trend of overregulation by our state agencies and bring down the cost of doing business in this state by lowering taxes. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? Our state government has repeatedly interfered with the private sector’s ability to meet the demand for housing. The result has been skyrocketing housing costs with little hope of ever building the number of units economists say are needed to address our housing crisis. To add to it, policies like inclusionary zoning and the regulatory complexities of our land use system add thousands of dollars to the cost of building new homes. We must expedite the process to make buildable land available, speed up the development of new units, and lower the cost associated with building new housing in Oregon. We must also protect existing programs – like the mortgage interest deduction and first-time home buyer program – while holding down property taxes that already make up a significant portion of Oregonians’ monthly mortgage bills. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? The state has spent billions in recent years on housing affordability, rent assistance, landlord assistance, shelter units and other investments like navigation centers to respond to streets that are in many regions overrun with tarps and tents in parks and in the public right of way. The money has been invested. Now we need to see improvements across our communities. More tent camping is the wrong answer. We can’t accept this standard of living for those on the streets or those avoiding the streets and businesses because someone has blocked the path and taken up residence along a neighborhood path or in front of a business. This is not a question of more state investment. The state has a responsibility to help address the root causes of homelessness– addiction, mental health, and affordability – and work with our nonprofits, the faith community, and local governments to get people the help they need and get them off the streets. “Tiny homes” and local solutions that respond to local challenges are an appropriate part of the response in the short term, but we have to recognize this as a human crisis, not just a shelter or housing crisis. We need to support local governments as they respond locally, but we cannot accept this as a new normal for Oregonians. We must provide access to services, enforce local ordinances, and restore community safety. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? Oregon’s land use system is one of a kind. It has helped maintain much of what we love about our state – it has protected farm and forest land, prevented urban sprawl, and allowed neighborhoods to maintain their character through generations. It is also extraordinarily complex, susceptible to unpredictable public policy changes, too expensive, moves at a glacial pace, and often lacks the certainty necessary for game changing investments in housing. These issues have come into particular focus as the number of available housing units continues to lag behind need. We need to let recent changes in housing laws go into effect before making additional changes. We need to get through the regulatory process more quickly, but that does not mean that we are sacrificing neighborhood character or community quality of life. There is no doubt that some communities are struggling to meet the needs of their community and need land use laws to work for them not against them, but too often land use mandates from politicians have not added units—even in some cases mandating the wrong kind of housing units—and all too often have limited housing options and stifled investment.
Jessica Gomez Medford Founder/CEO, Rogue Valley Microdevices The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? Oregon, like California, has failed to take advantage of wetter years by increasing impoundment capabilities. One long-term solution is to build water storage and distribution infrastructure that will provide relief to communities enduring chronic drought conditions. In parallel, Oregon needs to assist our agricultural industry in adopting technology that will make more efficient use of the water that is available. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I would rescind Gov. Brown’s order because it puts an undue financial burden on working-class Oregonians without having any measurable impact on climate change. A couple of years ago I took an in-depth look at Oregon’s contribution to global climate change. What I discovered is that if Oregon completely eliminated all carbon emissions, we would reduce the warming of the earth by no more than one-one thousandth of a degree. This however, does not let us off the hook for assisting the global community in reducing climate change, but rather it should point us in the direction of where we can have the most impact. I believe that by leveraging Oregon’s technical resources such as our University System and community of technology companies, we can develop exportable technologies that the world can use to improve energy efficiency and reduce carbon emissions. From what I have seen, our global partners have ambitious long-term carbon reduction goals, but are struggling to implement solutions for medium-term carbon reduction. SMR and methane pyrolysis technology are showing promise as clean, cost-effective medium-term energy solutions. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? It's very difficult to make informed decisions on policy without having all voices at the table, so I would include as many of those who have a stake in forest management and wildfire prevention as possible. However, the argument that clearing fuels and bug-killed or other dead trees contribute to the severity of wildfires has no merit. Oregon’s restrictive forest management policies are partly responsible for the severity of recent wildfires. I support a much more balanced approach to wildfire prevention in Oregon, and will press our federal partners to do the same on their lands. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? I will pursue an aggressive program of building out additional treatment capacity statewide. I sit on the Oregon Health Authority’s State Policy Board, and I am deeply disappointed by the lack of urgency displayed by the OHA in keeping the promises made by Measure 110. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? The importation of Fentanyl into Oregon is an ongoing problem. Where I live in Southern Oregon, foreign drug cartels are operational and pose a real danger to our residents. Due to the magnitude of this problem and the fact that it transcends our country’s borders, I do not believe that Oregon can deal with this on its own. We will need to collaborate with our federal law enforcement partners to get a handle on this dangerous situation. Oregon can help reduce the demand for opiates by implementing the drug treatment portion of measure 110, thereby making our state less lucrative for the cartels. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? I believe stress is often caused by fear of the unknown. Parents and educators are concerned that there is no viable plan from the Governor’s Office to restore Oregon Public Education back to pre-pandemic standards. We need to fill all vacant positions for teachers and teachers aids. Teachers may need extra assistance in getting their students back on track after a year of remote learning. I would expand Individualized Education Programs and explore restructuring classrooms into small workgroups led by instructors who can provide the individualized attention students need. Ultimately, I would like to reinstitute high academic standards for public education and encourage innovation and specialization within the public-school system. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? At this time our state is not capable of undertaking another large public system. As governor, I would encourage employers to offer at work childcare for employees by removing the regulatory barriers that make childcare expensive and, in some cases, impossible for employers to implement on site. This would be tax deductible for both the parent and the employer. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? The licensing process for childcare facilities is overly bureaucratic and expensive, and discourages small local childcare facilities from being established. As governor, I would work toward streamlining the application and approval process for new facilities, and reduce permitting costs. I would also encourage employers to offer at work childcare for employees by removing the regulatory barriers that make childcare expensive and, in some cases, impossible for employers to implement on site. This would be tax deductible for both the parent and the employer. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? First, we need to admit that any decline in natural resource industries has been caused by public policy. Oregon decided it wanted to mandate reduced logging, fishing and other “rural” industries and passed measures to do so. I support opening up our forests to salvage logging and fuel build-up clearance as noted above. Lastly, I would work closely with rural communities – which are not all the same just because they’re “rural” – to determine what they believe would be effective in helping them build their local economy, and then implement policies at the State level to help facilitate that. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 5) Targeted tax breaks for key industries (only in very limited situations in rural areas and with very tight, legally-enforceable agreements on what those areas will receive in terms of job creation 3) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 0) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 2) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 1) Other (be specific) - Top to bottom review and amendment/repeal of all State regulations that limit private business growth. Appointment of Agency Directors in appropriate areas who see business growth as a priority. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? Oregon has spent many decades enacting public policies that have driven up the cost of housing, making our small, mostly rural state one of the most expensive places to live in the country. Reversing this situation starts with amending Oregon’s land use system, which limits the supply of buildable land. We also need to revisit Oregon’s property tax system which is pricing so many senior citizens on fixed incomes out of their own homes. I will encourage local communities to revisit their building codes to ensure they are not overly restrictive or costly for builders, or for those who may want to add on to their home or site a “tiny home” on their property. I would also look to eliminate or dramatically lower “system development charges” which are a huge driver of the cost of home building in Oregon. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? It is not compassionate to allow people to live in cars or tents on our streets, or in parks or parking lots. I’ve done it myself as a teenager and would not wish it on anyone. I don’t support continuing to enable people with addictions or mental health challenges to live outside society. This is why I will develop an “assisted living” model for those with addictions or mental health needs, similar to the successful system Oregon already has in place for senior citizens. Once sufficient programs and housing are developed, I would support outlawing camping on streets and in parks. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? As noted above, I believe we must revisit Oregon’s land-use system which has not really been updated since its passage. While we may believe its goal – the protection of farmland – is a laudable one, the unintended consequences of artificially inflating the cost of buildable land by making it more scarce have proven unacceptable. While we may be able to cram more houses into every corner of buildable land, Oregon’s quality of life will plummet if we do. Rather, we need to take strong action to amend or repeal government policies that drive up housing costs, or that delay or slow construction. We also need to be very careful with efforts to limit rent increases or prohibit or make more difficult landlord actions to remove undesirable tenants. We risk completely discouraging the development of any new multi-family housing in Oregon, which will only make the housing problem worse. We need to make it easier and more economically viable to create more rental housing.
Nick Hess Tigard CEO and Entrepreneur The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? Our first priority should be to modernize piping systems in rural areas prone to water loss. This can reach up to 70% of water lost through old pipes and canals during transit. We must also prevent water loss in reservoirs by leveraging technology to limit evaporation. Additionally, the state must invest in new dams and reservoirs across the state. For long-term solutions, the state must innovate and think outside the box. We should be looking at adding wave-powered desalination plants along our southern coastline. This would not only add jobs in an area of Oregon that needs them most, but also would allow freshwater to be piped into drought-stricken areas of our state. Any excess water generated from these plants could also be sold to California. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? We must rescind Kate Brown’s current Cap and Trade executive order. Strong-arming legislation does not create lasting, sustainable, and results-driven change. It is simply an abuse of power. Instead, we need to work with relevant industries and come up with long-term plans that incentivize businesses rather than forcing them to change through requirements. I believe that we can find solutions that both reduce emissions and protect Oregonians’ livelihoods at the same time. To do that, we must focus on finding solutions that work within Oregonians’ day-to-day lives. We cannot force people to adapt to changes we put in place. That is not leadership and it is not sustainable. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? Any and every entity and organization that is involved in or relies upon our forests. That includes members of the timber industry that earn a living from harvesting resources from our forests. It also includes Oregonians that live in or near our forests or logging communities. We also have Oregon State - one of the top research universities in the world - in our back yard that are currently researching wildfires including how to prevent and manage these natural disasters. We need ALL voices if we are going to make substantial, lasting, and informed change Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? And that is the problem with Measure 110. It was pitched to voters as a way of keeping non-violent drug crimes out of jail and the promise of additional drug rehab facilities. However, Measure 110 created a slew of other problems. Since its implementation, we have seen a sharp increase in property and violent crimes. According to OPB, more than 16,000 Oregonians accessed services through Measure 110 but less than 1% of those helped were reported to have entered treatment. Over the past two years, our access to treatment has only gotten worse. According to SAMHSA, Oregon has fallen to 50th in the nation for access to treatment with 18% of Oregonians needing but not receiving treatment. We need more addiction and mental health resources now. To do that, we need to remove Oregon Health Authority’s certificate of need which restricts adding new hospital beds which includes mental health and addiction facilities. It is also holding up more than $270M that was allocated with Measure 110 for treatment facilities. Once we can establish these critical services, we need to go back and add teeth into Measure 110. The current version of the law requires a five minute phone call with an addiction specialist. If we want to truly help those experiencing addiction, we need to force them into rehab facilities that allow them to build trust and gain access to resources that a phone call does not provide. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? This comes back to adding teeth into Measure 110 and having the necessary treatment facilities available that were promised to Oregon voters when the bill was passed. Additionally, we need to ensure our state police officers have adequate resources available to them to curb the spread and trafficking of fentanyl. The same resources must also be available for county law enforcement where drug cartels are prevalent. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? First, having open schools and consistency will help with burnout, stress, and fatigue. Workers in every industry have been burnt out by constantly changing requirements and the same goes for teachers. But here is the reality: we have mental health issues across ALL demographics in Oregon because we have a shortage of mental health resources in Oregon. And that–above all else–is a failure of the current administration. As governor, my first priority is to do away with Oregon Health Authority’s Certificate of Need and add more hospital beds, mental health, and drug rehab facilities in Oregon. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? Again, this should be something for counties to decide on. If we make decisions to fund childcare on a statewide basis then we are risking the opportunity for the government to misappropriate funds on county and city levels. On a state level, we will ensure grants are available to counties if they choose to offer early childhood care. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? The lack of child care centers comes back to Covid restrictions and fear being the biggest deterrent. To get facilities to reopen, the state should look at incentivizing them in the short term through tax breaks and grants. Regulation is the second barrier. It takes a long time to get registered as a child care provider and the requirements to maintain licenses are exhausting. Child safety is important but we need to limit restrictions so that we can get more facilities open and operating safely. We need to streamline the process and ensure the Oregon Department of Education has adequate staffing in place so facilities can pass inspections and open promptly. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? As governor, my 3 steps are: Make Oregon a hospitable place for businesses by lowering taxes and cutting red tape that prohibits the creation and growth of businesses. Reinvigorate our industries that rely on our natural resources. This includes logging and mining. And future-proof our natural resource jobs by attracting a green technology sector to Oregon industries. Again, one example of this would be adding a wave-powered desalination plant along the southern Oregon coast. It will provide good jobs in a place that desperately needs them and allow for fresh water to be piped into areas hit hardest by drought. And has the possibility to generate revenue for the state by selling off excess water to California. Ensure more inventory of affordable housing across the state. We cannot bring new jobs to Oregon without places to house workers. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 2) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 4) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 5) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 3) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 1) Other (be specific) - Reducing state budgets to put more money back in the pockets of all Oregonians" What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? Most of this comes back with encouraging counties to grow and to take the necessary steps to do so. To spur supply to match our increase in housing demands, we need: Increase housing supply through city and county zoning changes. We need to build denser in our urban centers. Currently, many of our metro suburbs can build no more than 5 stories. We also need to be sure we are maximizing our space by placing parking underground. Decrease housing regulations that add unnecessary costs to new builds. We must also pause unnecessary requirements that are placed upon construction companies. One example of this is the Portland city ordinance that requires 20% of new construction to be built by minority-owned businesses. This is a well-intentioned ordinance but the reality is that there are very few businesses that fit these requirements. It is causing delays and cancellations of construction projects. Government-run housing either needs to be streamlined or handed off to private non-profits with a history of success. To put it simply, the government is not doing enough in its current capacity to be considered “successful” and throwing more money at the problem will not solve it. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? I have said this from the beginning: our private nonprofit organizations are doing incredible work around this state and for a fraction of the cost that the state, city, and county governments have been spending. The government does not need to reinvent the wheel. Instead we need to be helping these nonprofits grow and expand their ability to help. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? As governor, I will implore the local counties to make decisions that are right for them. They need to be the ones to decide if and how they want to grow. The state’s role would be to encourage denser growth and building taller in urban suburbs. We desperately need more housing inventory in Oregon and that should be the goal. But not all communities are ready to grow. We must encourage them to get there.
Tim McCloud Salem Business Development Analyst The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? As governor, I will support Oregon’s efforts to build small-scale desalinization plants that can help deliver needed resources to arid parts of Oregon. I will encourage new policies regarding privatized water collection and incentivize home building practices that help residents to reduce water waste as well as develop water storage systems. I will proactively support at risk industries with subsidization of drip irrigation and retrofitting systems, and water transportation. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? As governor, I will rescind Kate Brown's unconstitutional executive orders and will work through the legislature to develop effective environmentally friendly policies that also consider the impact of Oregon policies on humans and our economy. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? As governor, I will include regional stakeholders such as tribal members, timber and logging professionals, wildlife conservation, geologists, wildfire management professionals, and land usage experts to work on forestry solutions. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? Measure 110 is a poorly drafted as written and needs to be repealed. Oregonian youth of our state need rehabilitation options and Measure 110 fails to do that. Oregon is currently playing the role of an enabler, as it fails to make individuals accountable to the harm that drug addiction causes to others in our society. We also need tougher consequences for criminalized drug behavior; otherwise, addiction, crime, and homelessness will continue to accelerate throughout our state causing significant damage. Giving youth and first-time offenders a choice in seeking treatment is not taking advantage of a monumental intervention opportunity. Measure 110 does not appropriately fund addiction recovery centers, which means those that do want help are not able to receive the help in a timely manner. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? As governor, I will restore the ability for law enforcement officers to protect themselves and the community. Certified drug addiction staff is necessary within enforcement agencies to provide individualized and appropriate interventions. I will increase the number of effective drug treatment programs and services; as well as improving drug counseling staffing available to schools throughout Oregon, to ensure that early treatment and prevention strategies exist where they are needed. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? Classroom instructors have succumbed to the pressures of allowing external politics inside of the classroom. It has since become a major distraction that has failed to improve student outcomes. As governor, we will return learning priorities to traditional fundamentals, while ensuring that student electives allow Oregon's youth to pursue further education in the areas of interest that are important to them. We must improve graduation and attendance rates. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? Oregon's public K-12 system is currently failing to meet the needs of existing students; therefore, any increase of student capacity in this area would be highly irresponsible. As governor, I will support growth of the childcare industry in private and nonprofit sectors with low-interest loans and applicable subsidies. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? A lack of housing inventory and high startup costs to childcare center development are significant challenges. As governor, I will encourage building of quality and affordable housing throughout Oregon and minimize licensing costs of new childcare businesses in Oregon. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? We have to help our existing industries survive, while also encouraging new small business growth. As governor, I will encourage new small business startups with a 20% cut on state business license fees and assessments for 3 years. I will eliminate regulations that make Oregon less desirable as businesses from relocating to Oregon and ensure that Oregon businesses are able to remain open without the threat of another forced government lockdown. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 1) Targeted tax breaks for key industries: Childcare, house building and development, agriculture, timber, and energy products manufacturing. 2) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 3) Statewide incentivized corporate tax cut of 2.5%; statewide income tax cut of 5%; property tax cut of 4% on state assessments, and a 2-year gas tax holiday. 4) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 5)Infrastructure and public works: Port expansions, critical phase expansion of 1-5 and major street resurfacing. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? As governor, I will prioritize development of single and multi-family living accommodations throughout Oregon, and redevelopment of inactive commercial spaces into transitional housing. I will seek to reduce constraints on maximum occupant restrictions and seek changes to home lending policies that traditionally disadvantage students and low-income borrowers. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? Homelessness in Oregon is a complex challenge that cannot be fixed with a one-size-fits-all approach. In addressing homelessness, funding must be appropriated to the counties, who have the knowledge of their communities and the ability to support changes of ordinance, while also creating housing development zoning and opportunities within cities. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? We need future land development to accommodate Oregon’s housing challenges. Communities throughout Oregon have housing needs that have not been addressed. As governor, I will increase Oregon’s inventory of developable land and support changes to existing state laws that currently limit the allowable height of residential development in urban areas.
Bud Pierce Salem Physician The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? We must supply more water to counties facing long-term water shortages. This will require us to build dams in environmentally sensitive ways in areas of abundant rainfall, allowing us to store water and deliver this stored water to areas of need. In short, intensifying conservation efforts will enable us to have adequate water supplies in areas of drought in the absence of adequate rainfall. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I would rescind the order. It is essential to reduce carbon while not damaging good businesses and industries and not increase the high cost of living we are all living with today. To do this, we must work cooperatively with industries that produce carbon and assist them in lowering their carbon footprint. This would include tax credits for investment in carbon-reducing technologies, regulatory relief, and easier completion of carbon-reducing tasks. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? I would include both the timber industry and environmental groups to lead us to optimal forest management. We still have much to learn about how to best manage our forests in the era of timber harvest. I favor timber harvests as a management tool, as it allows us to provide necessary natural products for both our local and global economies. Optimal forest management will evolve as we better understand how better to do this. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? This law needs to be repealed. A replacement law needs to mandate that users of decriminalized drugs enroll in substance abuse disorder therapies. This cannot be optional. This approach concerns me because the use of illicit drugs directly supports drug dealers, cartels, and their behaviors. This includes crimes like stealing, gang violence, and human trafficking. While incarceration need not be necessary for drug users, mandated drug treatment, fines, and community service for those cited are in order. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? My policy priorities include: Improving substance abuse programs, creating a well-funded public education program, supporting law-enforcement efforts that fight against drug dealers and cartels, and making Narcan widely available. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? It is time to reform our failing public K-12 education program. I favor the reforms initiated by the state of Massachusetts in the 1990s when their public education programs were some of the worst in the nation. After reform, they are now one of the best in the country. Their approach was simple: improve teacher education and training. Various education options became available in the public schools, including learning academies, subject-focused schools, and career technical schools, with the students and their parents deciding on the educational track. Parent groups worked closely with principals and the teaching staff at each school, with real input on the educational process. There was a statewide oversight working group whose sole focus was to improve the quality of education. This is the model that we should follow, and this will decrease the stress and the dissatisfaction of teachers, students, and their families. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? Excellent childcare and preschool are essential programs for many families. While parents work, children need to be well cared for and prepare for school. I favor generous tax credits for low-income, working families and direct support for childcare institutions. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? Adequate training and preparation of childcare providers and the high cost of providing the services. The training and preparation can be addressed by mandating adequate education that is not excessive in length and cost. The high cost for families can be addressed by providing tax credits for childcare costs. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? We need to obtain federal waivers to allow timber harvest on federal lands. We need to allow for mineral extraction. We need to support agriculture and the growing of food by improving the water supplies to rural Oregon. The COVID-19 pandemic has taught us that we cannot be reliant on other countries for basic necessities for our society. Oregon can provide timber, food and crops, and mineral extraction, which can be done in an environmentally friendly way. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 4) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 2) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 5) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 3) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 1) Other (be specific) Simplification of red tape and bureaucracy. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? To build affordable housing, we must take several steps. We must lower the cost of land by modifying our land-use planning to allow more land to become buildable. We must dramatically reduce the fees, red tape, and time the builders invest in building homes. Finally, we must loosen stringent building requirements that significantly increase the cost of building a house. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? We must not allow the creation of permanent “shanty towns” in our communities. The state should support Oregon cities in designing temporary shelters, including sheltering and wraparound services, to change people’s lives from absolute dependency to contribution. Public-private collaboration is an essential part of this transformation. Nicely situated and well-built smaller homes will need to become a permanent component of Oregon’s affordable housing. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? Oregon’s land-use planning laws were developed to prevent sprawl and environmental degradation. The law succeeded in accomplishing these goals. The law now requires reform to allow us to develop land affordably, achieve the goal of affordable housing and development while still helping us to avoid sprawl and environmental degradation. We must allow for the development of more buildable land, and counties should perform land-use planning at the local level. Cities and counties should have significant leeway in planning the use of their lands, to create a variety of housing options for Oregon citizens.
Stan Pulliam Sandy Mayor of Sandy The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? There are no easy answers here, but a Pulliam Administration would focus on increasing the transportation of water to farmers rather than on radical environmental priorities such as stopping the logging of trees. My focus would be on local control and empowering those on the ground to make decisions best for their area. And I will prioritize landowners and our natural resource-based workers who need our support. Finally, my administration would be willing to try ideas that are often shot down by radical environmentalists, such as building artificial beaver dams to help increase the natural storage of water while also restoring natural beaver habitat. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I would absolutely rescind that order. This is a global climate issue that Oregon plays an extremely small role in. Unfortunately, Oregon’s politicians think they should fix the global issue here on the backs of hard-working Oregonians. Policies like the Clean Fuels Program have been expensive and grand gestures with no demonstrable effect on our carbon footprint. Working families are paying 20-30 cents more per gallon for little to nothing. We need to abolish this program and stop passing useless and even expensive laws and regulations like banning fracking and use of coal on our power grid without cheap alternatives. All we are doing is making it easier for bad actors like Russia to sell more fossil fuels and prop up dictators. We must follow France’s model where they adopted small-scale nuclear facilities across the entire country and now have clean, carbon-free energy with measurable results to the environment. I’m particularly concerned about the strain the rapid adoption to electric vehicles is going to have on an already taxed electrical grid. Wind and solar will not be enough, we need to get serious about energy production, and that includes nuclear. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? For decades, the voices of the timber industry have been ignored while extreme environmental groups have successfully advocated that we increasingly leave our forests untouched. Clearly, that policy isn’t working as wildfires destroy forests and buildings and our once thriving timber industry has been dying. As governor, I would listen to the on the ground local loggers, not the special interest corporate fat cats who have traditionally been able to make their backroom deals in Salem. We can listen to those who make their livelihood off of the forests while still protecting wildlife. And the reality is we need all the help we can get to prevent future devastating wildfires. Even though much of Oregon is federal land, the State of Oregon can do much more to manage both state and federal lands. Under federal Good Neighbor Authority policy, Oregon can take proactive steps to thin forests before wildfires destroy our communities. The best part is that proper forest management funds itself with revenue off of timber sales, which supports good-paying jobs and economic activity in rural Oregon. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? I think voters didn’t fully understand what Measure 110 was when they voted for it. Yes, we should absolutely connect those who are stuck in a cycle of addiction with services they need to get back on their feet, but we also need to deal with those who refuse to seek help. I think it’s ignorant to think that everyone who is living in tents on Foster Road would accept help if offered. We need to provide help to those who want it and be firm with those who don’t. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? I think Measure 110 absolutely made this issue even worse. It essentially opened the door for drug cartels from across the southern border to operate in Oregon with little to no consequences. By tripling the size of the State Police we will be able to better crackdown on illegal drug grows and cartels in this state and reduce the amount of illegal fentanyl threatening the safety of Oregonians. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? One of the great successes of the Trump administration was how he changed the way the VA approached healthcare. By giving veterans choice in their healthcare providers, they offered high-quality alternatives and forced the VA to step-up their customer service. I will do the same with schools. The pandemic opened parents’ eyes to curriculum, what motivates their children in the classroom, and who the government teachers’ unions are really looking out for (not the kids). Every parent should be able to take their child’s state allocation to education and take it to a private school, charter, or homeschool learning pod. Their children will have the education their parents choose, and public institutions will have to start listening to parents to compete. Additionally, we need a culture shift in focusing education on preparing students for the real world. If I were a 16-year-old aspiring carpenter who spent more time being taught that the color of my skin makes me a victimizer than how to use fractions to measure and cut a piece of crown molding – I’d be less than enthusiastic about school. Curriculum has become overwhelmed with indoctrination – at the expense of education and training – and that needs to stop. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? You’re asking if the state—which continues to be near the very bottom in the country in education by more than one metric—should bear more responsibility in providing childcare. I say absolutely not. It’s far better to empower local governments with the ability and resources to meet local needs. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? The entire state of Oregon is a childcare desert. One reason it is worse now is the effects of Covid on our society. Another barrier is that a lot of our elected leaders typically don’t have young children so it’s just not a priority. As middle-class parents, MacKensey and I have the same daily struggle as many other families to balance work and family needs. As Mayor of Sandy, we made childcare a top goal. We modernized our urban renewal and utilized public money to incentivize private sector growth. As governor, I would support the creation of an HSA style program that allows parents to invest pretax dollars for family needs such as childcare. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? Again, the first action I would take as governor is to forgive and pay back any COVID-19 related fines that have been levied against Main Street businesses through OSHA. Second, I would look to repeal a slate of legislation that has hurt Main Street small businesses including the gross receipts tax. Finally, I will aggressively pursue opportunities to bring back manufacturing, timber, rail, trucking, and other natural resource job opportunities for Oregon like the expansion of the Port of Coos Bay and the Jordan Cove Pipeline. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 0) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 3) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 0) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 2) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 1) Other (be specific) Tax breaks for middle-class families and small businesses What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? Both the state and federal government have been derelict in their duty to support communities’ infrastructure projects such as wastewater, water treatment, and roads. And now local municipalities have had to start investing in high-speed broadband internet access. All these items create huge strains on local rural communities. If the state government wants to get serious on the housing affordability issue, they need to pick up their responsibility on these critical infrastructure items so that local municipalities can begin to lower their system development charges for developers. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? As I’ve campaigned across the state the past year, I’ve had the opportunity to visit a number of different organizations that provide non-traditional housing to those who have fallen on hard times. I will continue to partner with these fantastic groups and listen to them as we provide resources to those on the streets with the intention of getting them off the streets. That said, I am the only candidate with a plan to deal with the criminal element in mass homelessness. We currently have significant resources being directed at transitional housing and social services for those who want help. I’d like to focus on the most visible aspect of the homeless problem, which is people camping in public right of ways and committing crimes. There are laws on the books to address this, but cities like Portland refuse. I want to use state resources of the DEQ and ODOT to decide when to sweep camps for public safety concerns and locate those camps to a Port of Portland property where they would be monitored by Port Police. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? The idea that the state government has made it easier on local communities to develop is an absolute joke of a question. In recent years, state government has thwarted the local control and responsibility of our communities throughout Oregon, forcing the values and the beliefs of the big city politicians onto the rest of us. As governor, I would look to return local control to locally elected officials who are accountable to their neighbors in the communities in which they live.
Amber Richardson White City Massage Therapist The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? We need more reservoirs, roof rain collection systems, cracking down on the border and these illegal grows that have been stealing water. Do not close the dams, there are many policies that are in place right now that have been devastating to our forest industry and environment that has actually caused more damage. Utiliziling our resources in Oregon in a healthy productive way is what needs to happen. After the Almeda Fire in Southern Oregon, I couldn’t sit back and watch the destruction any longer. We didn’t even have the water pressure to put out the fire. Not only did we ask for help a year prior stating the facts, we were left defenseless, we were forgotten. When you are born and raised in Oregon like myself you have watched the destruction and it truly breaks your heart. Which is why I’m running, which is why you see a lot more grassroots patriots running for office. The time is now for patriots, not politicians. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? When I get elected a few things first, executive orders take a voter's voice away. Here is where I will be very respectful when it comes to executive orders, I will have to write some to bring our state to balance because Kate Brown has written so many. So for every one I write I will remove three of Kate Brown’s. My executive orders will be written to represent our state and support “ we the people.” There are experts that are in our forest industry and know what is best for our state. We used to never have fires, we used to manage our forest, we used to do a lot more. This is why you need an ‘action now’ governor, not a board appointing governor who creates problems. I have solutions, again it is time for patriots, not politicians. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? We need more timber companies, when I was growing up we didn’t have one, also we had family-owned timber businesses that also helped with management. These have been stripped away. It is going to take a little time to develop our timber industry back again, but again the beauty of being in the governor position is talking to the experts. We didn’t have the fires we have now when I was growing up. There was huge change on how we managed our forest compared to how we mangage now. How we plant now, how we used to do a lot of the industry now is not what it used to be. I think everyone can agree that talking to the experts in the industry and building back what once was safe and effective is the way we need to lead our state. Our loggers were the first line of defense, clearing brush and so much more. As we know climate is in cycles and mother earth is something we have to respect, not force. What has happened to our resource industries is destroying our beautiful state in a catastrophic way. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? This was one of the worst measures that happened to our state. We had 100,000 fentanyl deaths in less than one year, in that first year of this being passed. We did not see any inpatient treatment centers, or mental health which was stated in that bill. We have been lied to over and over time and time again by these very so-called leaders in our state. How do they sleep at night? Tell them to talk to a parent who has a kid addicted to drugs at 14 years old. Or a 14-year-old child who smoked marijuana for the first time laced in fentanyl and died. We have a cartel problem, we have a human and sex trafficking problem facilitated with this measure, but hey they gave them a clean needle to use and they made us pay for it. You can tell I’m very upset, and most of us are. How do they sleep at night? One option is to get rid of the OHA. Let's use those buildings for inpatient treatment and mental health facilities. Let’s start talking to endocrine doctors to really apply treatment so as the body goes through the roller coaster of getting clean, keeping hormones balanced, keeping your body balanced and guess what we can do naturally without costing people a fortune! We do not treat people in our state to get them better, to get more money out of taxpayers and keep people in a cycle of abuse. It is disgusting. We need a audit on all taxpayer funded agencies, we need to see what is working, and what isn’t working, where the money is going. We keep dumping funds and the results are getting worse. I ask again how do they sleep at night? It is time What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? We will need a real crackdown at the border. We have some really great people running for our US state senator position. This is huge everyone, this 2022 election will change Oregon for the better. Ron Wyden hasn’t been there for us, we need an Oregonian in that seat. As governor we have a cartel issue now with these large illegal grows. We need to crack down on this, our current leadership wants to make it easier for large grows from 2021-2023. When we have a massive issue, what does that tell you, the current establishment is not making good decisions for our state. It is all about money, pow er, and control. If it takes the national guard and the military help to get our state safe, that is what it takes. We are dealing with human and sex trafficking right along with this. We can no longer put a blind eye to what is going on. Our sheriffs are overwhelmed, our police had their badges taken away, crime is through the roof. Now they keep making it easier for these grows. The OLCC is not the answer for regulation of the farms. We need a real team built. A real budget to crack down on this problem. Enough is Enough, how many people have to die for our current governor to care. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? I will have to write an Executive Order for NO CRT or any other name emotional social learning scheme they want to call it. In public schools k-12, there will be a reform on what has happened. These students deserve a chance, a degree from Oregon used to mean something, now it does not. Reading, math, science, all of this is very important, bringing back what good education means. The foundations for these students are crucial so they can be thriving when they graduate. Our teachers ( the good ones also need moral boosting) My father was a teacher, and a really good one. Apparently, there needs to be a lesson taught about personal boundaries requirements and ethics with staff ( when I was in school, I could not tell you my teachers personal views) let’s get back to that. Bring the ethics back into the classroom; this isn’t personal time. It is teaching your lesson plan. We need to have trade, and personal finance and self defense brought back into school. We want our students prepared for the world. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? Yes, but government funding generally causes prices to inflate. I do want to talk about preschools and retirement homes. It is proven that our youth and our elderly provide a shift of great value to each others lives. I have a plan for this. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? First, we need to tackle the problem with our inflation crisis, and everyday bills for families and the average person surviving in our state. Getting to work alone with just gas prices is already getting difficult. We have to get the nuclear family perserved, again, be supportive of the family unit. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? Again, we must deregulate the red-taping on our businesses, bring our resource industries back, like our logging industry. We need to start talking about our natural gas industry, the jordan cove was a marine gel pipeline. Look, we need to think about engineering smartly without destroying property lines and still creating energy that will crackdown on the inflation crisis. It is 2022 we can do this, we have to stop being stonewalled, and start being lifted up. Everyone can agree that we need to work together because if we do not, we will suffer even more than we already have. The people who claim who have been on our side clearly haven’t. Look what they have done to Oregon. Look how we all are suffering. We have been left with a state of destruction, and they don’t care, they got rich, how do they sleep at night? I really want to know. We need to talk to the experts, real experts and utilize every type of resource and pull our state back to one of balance. We can do this carefully and with great engineering, and with great care for our state. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 1) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 1) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 1) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 1) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 1) Other (be specific) we are going to have to tackle our state from every angle, Kate Brown and the establishment have left us with a huge mess. Everyone knows it. This is not Oregon, we have crime through the roof in our cities, in our rural parts of the state, we have human and sex trafficking in such extreme numbers it will take your breath away. We have a homeless crisis, drugs, mental illness, education, housing, inflation, forestry, we have a divided state which is so sad. The media has done such a disservice to us. The list goes on, our elderly, our children, our state is under such disstress due to complete lack of care from our governor and the establishment that has gone along with making their lives rich while destroying so many in the making. I’m a patriot stepping up, and all I ask is don’t brush me off because of money, or my age, or because I’ve never ran before. Those are all reasons to consider me. Thank you, it is time for patriots, not politicians. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? De-regulate, stop red-taping, stop over-permitting. Get our logging industry back. Get the inflation down in our state, start utilizing our resources so we can survive in our state. These are all common sense policies that help bring costs down. We need to stop making everything so much harder, again long-term solutions actually work so people can actually survive in a real way. Cut down these boards that have overlapped that have caused major issues so nothing can even get done. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? We need an audit on all the state funding agencies, right now we keep dumping funds and we really don’t know what is working and what is not working. I do like nonprofits but when there are so many and some aren’t even helpful what they are really doing. We need an audit, people oftentimes think republicans don’t want to help, that is far from the truth, what we want is to actually help. Most people are tired of dumping funds into programs that are enabling problems rather than helping. I want to help, I want to know what is working, right now as we feel left in the dark. Let's shine the light on what is actually working and let’s find out what isn’t. This can happen while business runs as usual, we do this every time you take over a business anyways. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? Well, they always want to zone other people’s property, no thank you. I live in Southern Oregon. I do not want our neighborhoods destroyed. Again, we have to treat Oregon in the different parts of the state how it is. Also, when you own your property and you want to build a mother-in-law house they make restrictions on what you can do with your own land. This is not right, our state is taking our property rights away and so much more. They want to zone our properties, which is always the solution….. Yet when you live in rural Oregon you will have major issues once you let the Government start zoning your land. As I’ve stated throughout this survey, it is time for patriots, not politicians. We need to de-regulate on building for our contractors, stop all the red taping, bring the cost of goods down with allowing our logging industries back and other resource industries. There are more common sense policies that can happen that haven't been in place because we have had such poor leadership in our state. We have had our rights stripped away, and now they want your land. When will they stop. It will stop on May 17th and come November, we the people will stand up and say No.
Bill Sizemore Redmond General Contractor The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? Oregon receives enough water to manage times of drought, but we need to do a better job of storing it and transporting it to where it is needed. I would support building more reservoirs and pipelines and also matching the amount of water the State of Washington takes from the Columbia River. A lot more river water could be utilized without damaging fish habitat or upstream migrations. One thing I do not support is usurping the historic water rights currently held by farmers and ranchers. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I would immediately rescind Kate Brown’s executive order, which violates the separation of powers doctrine. She did not have the authority to do by executive order what the legislature declined to do. It should go without saying that climate change is real, but it is also nothing new. The climate has always changed. The question is the extent to which human activity contributes to it. I lean toward the belief that our contribution is relatively minor and pales compared to forest fires, volcanic activity, sun storms and other events beyond our control. It is irrational for our one little, low-population state to do violence to its economy and kill family-wage jobs when our total contribution, if any, to the climate problem is minuscule compared to China and India. The Green New Deal is a power grab by radical far-left activists and politicians to use our love for the environment to grab power that would not be given them for any other reason. We must resist that inclination and better inform the public that there are plenty of renowned scientists who have reached vastly different conclusions regarding what affects the climate and what most likely does not. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? Some scientists have agendas and some are just following the facts. Anything that has to do with the environment, and that certainly includes forest management, is always vulnerable to science that is only so-called. I support thinning and clearing fuel and would not tend to give much weight to scientists who have concluded that removing things that make the forest a tinderbox does not lessen the chances of catastrophic fires. One of the things a conservative governor will have to do is do some thinning of his or her own. I am talking about not simply replacing agency and department heads, but going deeper into the bureaucracies and thinning out the entrenched personnel who would seek to further their own leftist agenda no matter how much policies have shifted at the top. If Donald Trump proved nothing else, he proved that draining the swamp does not end with changing department heads. Regarding this issue, there are even those currently working in the agencies who believe that we should adopt the view that forest fires are natural and we should just let them burn. I was raised in the rainforests of the Olympic Peninsula and would tend to listen to professionals in the timber industry who have a vested interest in healthy, sustainable forests and are damaged by forest fires over those with antigrowth and anti-logging philosophy. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? I know a bit about this issue from firsthand experience. I had a daughter who became addicted to meth and heroin. It was a nightmare for her and for the rest of our family. You can offer treatment all day long, but until addicts are ready to be clean it is just beating the air. My daughter was living on the streets for about a year-and-a-half, but today has been clean for about nine years and by the grace of God is (a) mother to three amazing children. It took a while for our daughter to come to her right mind, but thankfully she did. Many never do. Measure 110 was a tragic mistake. The amount of drugs people are allowed to possess is much higher than most voters realized, and the ability to address the addicts living in homeless camps and committing crimes to feed their habit is severely limited by Measure 110. I would like to see us repeal Measure 110. The rehab portion is a dismal failure and hard drugs should not be legalized, period. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? First, repeal Measure 110 so there are fewer weeds for those pushing fentanyl-laced drugs to hide in. Then we need to increase law enforcement budgets and work with the federal government to push back against the cartels. We need to loudly demand that the federal government demand better policing, including harsh trade sanctions, against those countries allowing the production and shipment of fentanyl to the U.S., primarily China and India and more recently cartel owned, high production pill mills in Mexico. It is very difficult to stop the proliferation of this drug once it crosses our national border. But Oregon must be known as a state where selling fentanyl will result in the harshest penalties. As governor, I would be loudly and publicly all over the backs of any district attorney, or even the state attorney general, who does not seek the maximum penalties for those knowingly selling and distributing fentanyl or fentanyl laced narcotics. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? I must begin by saying that this is a self-inflicted wound that has done immeasurable and unnecessary damage to our kids. I would never have closed the schools when it was clear so early on that the risk of serious illness, hospitalization and death was close to zero for school-age kids. Gov. Kate Brown could not have been much more misguided and ill-advised as she was. She essentially capitulated her authority over public education to the teachers' unions, even going so far as to give vaccination access to public school teachers before much more vulnerable elderly Oregonians – and then not even requiring public school teachers to return to their classrooms. So, of course, there is a lot of stress that we are going to have to work through. Kids are behind and may never catch up. Some have been psychologically damaged to the point of clinical depression and even suicide. I would begin by assuring students and teachers that the virus is not as deadly as many have been led to believe and that most of us should not live in fear of it. I would assure students and student-athletes that we will not close schools and cancel sports seasons again. And I would end mask mandates which do nothing to protect kids but serve to spread fear and anxiety. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? My wife works in early childhood development and spent many years as a pre-school teacher. I am somewhat familiar with the field. I do not support extending preschool to those under the age of 5 or an expanded government role in providing childcare. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? As a matter of principle, I support more parental involvement in the lives of young children and less shipping them off to day care. Young children need parents. I would rather support lowering the tax burden on families and changing land use laws and lowering system development charges to bring down the cost of housing, including mortgage payments and rents, so it is less necessary for families to have both parents working full time to pay the bills. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? I would begin by promising to veto every ill-advised (I am being kind) bill that radical Democrat legislators from Portland and Eugene try to inflict upon rural Oregon. Timber jobs are in steep decline because of what we did, not because there is a lack of market for forest products. I reject the notion that the timber industry is dead. I have a plan that would bring back small mills to towns across the state and guarantee them access to the timber they need to operate and justify the investment in the infrastructure required to set up new mills or recommission old mills. This would create thousands of family wage jobs. Also, I would change out the unelected bureaucrats running state agencies, personnel who make decisions, mostly by administrative rule, that restrict or prohibit regular and historically respected farm and forest practices. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 0) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 1)Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 0) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 2) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 3) Other (be specific) Reduce land use restrictions and ensure that there are large plats of land available for larger investments. Oregon lost a $20 billion factory to Ohio simply because our land use laws have foolishly and unnecessarily locked up too much land from development. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? I mentioned this above. End the urban growth boundary approach to land use. Increase the supply of land upon which houses can be built. Housing prices are primarily a result of supply and demand, a law that cannot be repealed. We also need a moratorium on unnecessary system development charges, which can add tens of thousands of dollars onto the cost of a house.d from development. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? I do not support taking money from people who are working to pay their mortgage or their rent to provide free government built homes for others, tiny houses or otherwise. That is not a proper function of government and will never solve the problem. Providing free housing to the homeless is a leftist idea that will only encourage more homeless people to move to Oregon. That’s the law of unintended consequences. You subsidize something and you get more of it. I do not have a problem with carefully situated tent camping sites. The Ninth Circuit Court has pretty much locked us into not being able to arrest illegal campers unless there is a place for them to go. If we need to provide camping areas for tents to enable us to remove illegal homeless camps, then so be it. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? I do not support forced density. The land use laws are the problem and the legislature has not gone far enough to solve the housing problem because they have not touched that sacred cow. It is absurd to have urban growth boundaries around towns that desperately need to grow and do not have large enough tax bases to fund basic services. You cannot meet the supply problem by approving high-density homes for people who want their own backyard where their kids can play. The demand is for a different kind of housing than democrats are willing to allow. On a separate but related note, we have an abundance of secondary lands in the country, that due to soil type and terrain are not suitable to farming. I would support opening up that land to housing to increase the supply without forcing density in the cities. High density inevitably leads to high housing prices and increased crime.
Marc Thielman Cottage Grove Former School Superintendent The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? As governor, I will initiate a proactive plan to store more water and apply good science to manage existing sources more effectively. More mountain reservoirs, aquifer recharge areas and better management of current resources will ensure that we have ample supplies of water for rivers, ranchers, farmers, fish, and urban communities. We have enough water in Oregon, but we must foster the political will to build in safeguards and infrastructure to bridge our supplies in times of drought. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? On my first day in office, I will repeal the climate protection plan that has been imposed without any consensus of the people. This order has not been effective at carbon reduction and further locked up our forests and natural resources so they could burn catastrophically. Overall, Gov. Brown’s order has … needlessly created regulatory hardship and burden for businesses, ranchers, and family-owned farms. Oregon is ready for a new direction in leadership that applies real science in the place of zealous political ideology and generates real and lasting positive results. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? This question accurately highlights the politicization of forest management issues on all sides. The only path forward is to apply commonsense and real science to the management of our forests. This involves getting opposing groups to the table and applying good science. Good forest management has more common ground among foresters, loggers, hunters, fishermen and environmentalists than opposition. Fuel clearing and tree density management are effective methods for creating safety corridors around established communities, and these zones support more food sources for deer and elk and many other desirable plant and animal species. In addition, they reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires and allow for more ground water to feed our streams, creeks and rivers. This process creates a lot of wins for all interest groups. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? Getting Oregonians struggling with addiction treatment requires accountability. Unfortunately, Measure 110 has removed accountability provided by law enforcement and the threat of incarceration and the results have been a ten-fold increase in overdose deaths within one year of the Measures implementation. In addition, the state government has been derelict in its obligation to expand and provide treatment for the addicted. As governor, I will meet the intent of the measure by expanding drug and alcohol treatment programs in conjunction with my homeless plan. The two issues are comingled, and an effective plan is needed to address both issues. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? Fentanyl is the greatest threat to health and safety in Oregon and it is being put into every classification of hard drugs indiscriminately. Overdose deaths relating to fentanyl are growing exponentially and the use of Narcan by law enforcement to resuscitate overdose victims has become a regular occurrence. As governor, I plan to restore accountability and empower law enforcement to enforce the law. We need a comprehensive plan to tackle this problem at all levels to include security at the border where Fentanyl is smuggled into the country, effective addressment of the homeless situation, real choices for users i.e. treatment or incarceration, and a hard no on cartel activity and human trafficking here in Oregon. This plan will require new investments in law enforcement, facility utilization, and expansion of effective treatment and awareness programs. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? As a public-school superintendent, I experienced the rising stress levels among educators firsthand and I can speak with authority when I say the vast majority of the stress is due to bad government policy. Schools used to be places of learning where students were taught how to think and not what to think, but today, they have become indoctrination centers and places of profound division. Stress is lowered in schools when teachers are allowed to teach reading, writing, math, science, history, and social studies objectively based on factual content. In most school districts this kind of autonomy is no longer supported, and teachers are being told to focus more on equity, race, gender identity, comprehensive sex education, and mental health before learning the basics. The pandemic served to amplify the gaps in learning as teachers had less time and access to their students and the curriculum of division took precedence over learning to read, etc. As governor, I will ban the teaching of divisive curriculum/ideologies in our schools, uphold parents’ rights, and reimpose reasonable standards and graduation requirements. Further, as the Chief Petitioner of the School Choice Initiative, I believe that parents should be able to pick the educational pathway that best fits their students and that tax payer resources should follow the child in that journey. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? I have always been a supporter of preschool education and in every district, I have served I have partnered to provide stable preschool programs in support of working families. If the K-12 system is to be used to provide preschool education, it should do so under a flexible model and not a one size fits all. I have found that nonprofit/public school partnerships is the most effective model to provide good preschool programs on a cost share basis. The state of Oregon has made public early learning funds available, but unfortunately, they have applied the politics of one-size fits all coupled with divisive curricula that has not been well received by a large percentage of parents. Addressing this requires flexibility and variety of preschool program options that allow parents to pick the program that best fits the needs, values, and wishes of the parents. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? One of the best methods of providing adequate childcare is the proliferation of family wage jobs. This allows many parents to either stay home with their child or be able to afford quality childcare if they need to work. Strategic Tax relief, tax credits to employers who provide benefits for childcare, and incentives for day care providers to start up a childcare program and or run a preschool/day care facility will create a renaissance of choices, services and options for all Oregon families. Creating a childcare/preschool marketplace is the best way to meet the unique needs of all families, communities, and regions in our state. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? Most of Oregon’s natural resources are locked away and underutilized. Forests are burning rather than providing economic, tourist, and natural resource extraction value. As governor, I will increase access to all our natural resources, including fisheries, to everyday Oregonians, loggers, miners, farmers, ranchers, hunters and fishermen. Government policies of the last 30 years is the cause of the decline in our natural resource industries, and it will take strong leadership to change directions and appropriately access our abundant natural resources. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 1) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 4) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 2) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 3) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? As governor, I will implement immediate changes that will greatly reduce the time, cost and affordability of housing for hard-working Oregonians. Specifically, making state and county-owned property available to developers for little cost, streamlining permitting and planning to reduce delays that raise costs, and delivering quality houses to new home buyers at a truly affordable price (around $180,000). Making state funds available to lenders that subsidize down payments and closing costs for those who have been making high rental payments but are unable to save for a down payment will go a long way to getting young families into homeownership and equity building. Further reduction in permitting and planning charges by local counties/municipalities will also help as they will be able to access a 1% increase in property tax assessment thereby paying themselves back for lost fees overtime. Government should be working aggressively to solve the affordable housing shortage and doing so will mean thinking differently and acting aggressively in support of working Oregonians. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? Partnering with nonprofits is a good option for addressing homelessness, and a lack of housing, but only if the nonprofits can demonstrate real sustainable results. As governor, I will support these partnerships but require proof of results that benefit the taxpayer. These programs do exist and those that are most effective should be replicated in every county, city and municipality. I believe in an “all of the above” approach to tackling homelessness and all the underlying indices, such as drug & alcohol addiction, that contribute to the growth of the problem. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? Oregon’s signature land use development system is the problem, and this “system” is one of the most restrictive in the nation. The legislatures’ efforts have fallen far short as they do not address the drivers of costs for new housing, and they require Davis Bacon wages and full permitting and planning costs. Truly addressing these barriers means acknowledging that local and state governments are participating in the problem. Government needs to facilitate and empower affordable housing projects which are best driven by a governor who will lead in support of real solutions. Currently, the government does more serving of itself than it does at serving the needs of hard working Oregonians. Under my leadership, affordable housing projects will proliferate in a manner that everyday Oregonians will see. These outcomes will go along ways to solving the housing shortage as well as restore the confidence of the Oregon people in their government.
Bob Tiernan Lake Oswego Businessman, Consultant, Attorney The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? Mark Twain’s famous comment, “Water is for fighting. Whisky is for drinking” still applies today because the foundation of much of what we do in Oregon depends on our state’s most valuable natural resource—water! Whether it’s traditional industries like agriculture that need water for crops or modern-day high-tech in the Columbia Gorge which require lots of water for cooling data centers the state needs to focus on for positive solutions. I would look at current sources, such as preventing the destruction of our dams and reservoirs, working with tribes and conservation groups to mitigate any ongoing concerns about threatened species or habitat. Increase conservation measures and turn to the experts for more water storage options where possible. As governor I would also enhance efforts to build more reservoirs and other ways to capture water and deliver it where it’s needed. Perhaps we can encourage conservation with tax credits for water recovery from residential and commercial rooftops. There could be opportunities to build salinization plants along Oregon’s coastline. One of the things I’ve done in my business consulting career is turn to experts for answers on various topics. As governor I would do the same on this and other topics. Bring in the stakeholders, experts on drought conditions, farmers, weather, soil, aquifer, habitat and other professionals; together we can find answers. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I wouldn’t renew the current governor’s cap and trade executive order and I would rescind programs already in place that hurt Oregon businesses and families. We all want (to) help our environment and reduce the impact of climate change, but government leaders need to watch for unintended consequences of their actions. That means watching out for Oregonians’ livelihoods, pocketbooks, their ability to heat their homes, and other activities. The state agencies running new bureaucracies for the governor’s orders are imposing new limits on greenhouse gas emissions on Oregon’s largest energy producers. Translation? Once fully implemented, the cost of electricity, natural gas, and transportation fuel will go up even more as a result. Not only will homeowners pay the price, but also farmers who run tractors to produce crops, and the list goes on and on. How many additional businesses will flee to a state without these unreasonable rules? The process is also a concern of mine. This governor enacted the executive order despite tens of thousands of Oregonians protesting at rallies and testifying the state capitol. Dozens of lawmakers boycotted the legislative session in protest and there was a huge push to send the issue to a statewide vote. However, the governor imposed this massive policy change over all those objections. This is no way to enact policy of this magnitude. With technological innovations and looking at what other states are doing, I’m confident Oregon can find other proactive ways to reduce emissions with less impact on energy costs. Some groups like Timber Unity suggested tax incentives for companies to install more energy efficient equipment, upgrade recycling of manufacturing materials, and reducing the amount of road travel by state agencies. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? The governor is only one leader among many when it comes to dealing with causes and solutions surrounding Oregon’s wildfire issues. Forest management is a multi-jurisdictional topic involving state, federal, regional and local government, as well as private landowners. In addition, there are others to consider that often make their interests known in the court system, permit appeals and so on. Oregon has experienced some of the worst fire seasons in history over the past few years. While we debate the reasons looking for answers, as Oregon’s next governor, I’ll open to hearing all sides on important issues like this. At the end of the day, I’m not going to do as the current governor and lean way over to one side and shut out the concerns of others. While not listing specific groups name (because I don’t want any to feel left out) I’d have discussions with forest researchers, timber and logging interests, wildlife and habitat experts, tribal leaders, conservationists, weather and firefighting specialists, homebuilding professionals, power companies, campground and parks managers, federal, state and local agency representatives, public and private forest fire management experts, as well as wildland firefighter trainers. There may be others to add to this short list, but these representatives are a good start to help me, as governor and my new state agency executives move forward with procedures that can prevent and put out wildfires moving forward. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? Measure 110 needs to be repealed and to be put back on the ballot ASAP. By the time I’m governor, Oregonians will have had a chance to judge for themselves the consequences of this failed liberal policy which includes out of control drug use (including more teen addiction), collateral crime, and increased homelessness. If not a statewide vote, then I will push for a legislative overhaul. We need carrots and sticks to provide assistance to those who need it and hold drug users and state agencies accountable. This misguided measure is harming those it was meant to help and others victimized by its implementation. Voters across the state tell me they were sold Measure 110’s bill of goods, feeling sorry for low-level drug users, hoping they would get treatment. Instead, I can count on both hands and feet the number of individuals who actually requested treatment through a hotline to avoid a $100 drug possession penalty. This isn’t about a baggie of pot; Measure 110 decriminalized certain amounts of hardcore drugs including heroin, cocaine, meth and oxycodone. Some cops don’t even issue tickets because many offenders fail to show for court? Meanwhile, others not on drugs face more property thefts and other crimes from the users feeding their habits. Substance abuse and mental health services were already severely lacking, so it’s shameful state leaders didn’t provide more support before the measure started. Addicts now have even more problems finding help because the state is just now trickling out nearly $300 million to providers. Ironically, Measure 110 funding was intended for additional not current substance abuse services. Yet, the money for 110 is coming out of the legal marijuana revenues and diverted from existing drug abuse programs, state police, local government s and schools. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? I would leave no stone unturned; our children deserve no less. This includes reducing harm, boosting law enforcement, assisting communities, and public awareness without more taxes and fees. The current governor proclaims emergencies for nasty weather, but not when kids are dying from a lethal synthetic poison they’re buying over social media. Sadly, governor Brown denied a request from top addiction doctors about the fentanyl crisis. Children experimenting with drugs and adult addicts don’t know the dangers since counterfeit fentanyl pills are usually tasteless and odorless. My emergency fentanyl declaration would involve several measures and potential funding from recent drug company opioid court settlements. These include distribution of Naloxone/Narcan kits in every police car, school building, health facility, and other places someone might potentially overdose from fentanyl or other opioids. Special fentanyl test strips should also be widely available to prevent overdoses. The state helped reduce meth labs over the past few decades, and we can combat this deadly threat by cutting off the supply. State Police need more resources, along with local law enforcement and prosecutors, to investigate and lock up the perpetrators. When violent crime caused a public safety emergency in Oregon, I didn’t sit by and take “no” for an answer. As Chair of the Crime Committee in the Oregon House, I co-sponsored Ballot Measure 11 implementing tougher sentences for serious felonies and crime dropped 50%. Watch for the same “can-do” attitude toward fentanyl. A state strike team will be deployed when clusters of fatal or non-fatal overdoses are detected to help local health representatives with prevention efforts. Leading an awareness campaign as governor to help families is critical. Like most children, my grandkids will probably take risks at some point, but they should know the facts about this stuff that could kill them in seconds. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? Many Oregon K-12 public schools are pressure cookers. Some have exploded with student fights; others have seen school board meltdowns over political agendas. Much of this stress in Oregon’s K-12 public schools was brewing pre-pandemic with lagging test scores, graduation rates, lack of mental health supports and other factors. As governor I would look for ways to relieve the tension for teachers, students and parents with solutions to befit all these partners in the learning process – especially students. When COVID shutdowns happened, parents experienced a front-row seat to their children’s education during distance learning. Parents became empowered seeing how their children learned and what they were learning. Families know what is best for their kids, and parents should have the final say in their learning needs. We should support our public schools while giving families more learning choices because competition is healthy in pushing for excellence in education. As governor, I will push for more access to charter schools, homeschooling assistance, online schools, vouchers and other education options. The state can increase support for teachers by modifying all the extra duties, mandates and other things that prevent them from doing what they do best— teach kids. To ease staff shortages, perhaps students seeking college teaching degrees could be classroom aides or more incentives for teacher retention and recruitment. The ones who’ve suffered most are the children. Oregon’s diploma has become a national joke, employers hire out-of-state workers because there aren’t enough home-grown skilled graduates. It’s time to get serious about giving our kids the tools needed to learn, whether it’s a reading specialist or advanced math. They only get one chance at an education. We must do better. As parents and grandparents, I think we all want that. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? Absolutely not. First, the public school system in Oregon is already struggling just to handle its current responsibilities. As discussed in previous questions, there aren’t enough teachers, counselors and other staff across the state to handle the load. We’ve seen enrollment dropping due to frustrated parents leaving the system. Schools are being pushed to provide full-day kindergarten, preschool, dual-college courses, health care, teen mom programs and other social services. Why would the state want to pile another unfunded mandate on top of our already stressed-out school system and ask them to add day care for little ones? No thank you. The privately-owned, non-profit in-home, neighborhood, church and child care centers and others have been the heart and soul of Oregon’s system for decades. Families I know value choices where they can decide if they want an intimate neighborhood feel or a more formal child care center in a commercial setting. Is the current system perfect? Of course not. The existing providers have struggled even before the pandemic hit, due to low pay, lack of training, and other issues. Once coronavirus happened many families kept their kiddos home and that hurt many of these small operations, who waited sometimes months and months for financial aid from the state. Ironically several public schools were allowed to provide day care services often at no cost for low-income families, even though students were doing distance learning. I’m not sure how any of that made sense, but I’m glad it’s over. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? Being governor is an important position, but job one for me every day is being a dad. As a father of three, grandfather to seven children, I know what we do for them matters; they are the future. Helping families support their children and be able to go to work, knowing they have quality, affordable child care is something the state should be able to help figure out. From what I know, high turnover and low pay have plagued this profession for a long time and like many sectors, the pandemic exacerbated the problems. Are these barriers that we can overcome as a state? I hope so. As I’ve mentioned before, I often seek advice from certified smart people that have answers in their areas of expertise. Gov. Tiernan would reach out to representatives from the child care industry, community colleges, high school programs, and other groups to gather ideas. According to state employment experts, after many day care providers shut down or went out of business entirely during COVID, it’s been hard to scale back up and find skilled workers. In addition to fact-finding for solutions from industry experts, will work with legislative leaders to explore other options for getting more high-quality individuals to fill the shortage in the child care sector. I’ve heard one area of particular concern is specialized training for providers to care for high-needs children, so they may take some targeted attention. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? Leadership: I’ve been a successful business leader by listening and learning. To build a stronger economy for rural Oregon, I want to understand the challenges. As governor, I pledge to set up my office for two weeks at a time in different geographical areas around the state each year. That way I can experience rural Oregon’s economic problems and possible solutions first-hand. Agriculture Overtime: Although this law just passed, I hope by the time I’m governor, farmers, worker and advocates on both sides of the issue will have a crop season to consider the unintended consequences. Rural farmers emerging from the pandemic now face skyrocketing fuel costs and shipping problems. This law may push farmers to cut production, go out of business, or leave the state. None of these options is good for Oregon’s rural economy. The law is phased in over five years starting in 2023, so hopefully, there’ll be change I can push for in the 2023 legislative session. Administrative rule changes at the State Agriculture Department, or other agencies are also possible. I’ll help farmers as well as workers who don’t want their hours or wages cut as part of those unintended consequences. Wolf Management: Rural ranchers, especially in Eastern Oregon need assistance through the wolf management compensation program. It established a decade ago after these predators were reintroduced to Oregon. I would appropriate at least $1 million from the legislature’s emergency fund or a special governor’s fund for this effort. … Most of the current funds were used for prevention or deterrence. We should encourage cattle ranching not send a message that rural Oregon is closed because wolves have taken over. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 0) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 1) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 0) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 1) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? *) Other (be specific) There are huge shortages of skilled workers for targeted areas such as health care, construction, tech, education, and other trades. The state can do more to boost apprenticeship, training and college programs to assist in getting qualified job applicants into the workforce where employers need to fill those positions. Government should play a role in the basic infrastructure needs to encourage businesses to locate and expand in our state. But industry also needs to pay its fair share in partnership on large-scale projects. Broadband and similar access to technology, especially to keep small rural businesses and schools connected is especially critical for a healthy Oregon economy. *I don’t believe it’s government’s job to pick winners and losers; it’s just not fair and we’ve seen the consequences recently. For example, large corporations such as Intel that receive huge tax breaks appeared to do well during the pandemic while many small businesses were closing up shop. Assistance was also earmarked for some small business owners the past couple years because the governor felt they were from certain historically disadvantaged populations and deserved special consideration, while others were left out. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? So many steps, so little time. First I think the new governor needs to call a housing summit, like Gov. Goldschmidt did for worker’s comp. Only this time I may have to lock all the parties into the state fairgrounds for a couple of weeks because it’s that big of an issue involving so many different stakeholders. Second, this incoming governor doesn’t like the idea that government has all the answers— seems like the laws of supply and demand often work better when it comes to housing. For example, Oregon imposed rent control but yet rents are up by 50% on average according to a recent annual survey. Other overregulation for climate change policies, energy efficiency rules, permit problems, and SDCs, all drive up costs for home builders. I’m sure these are all concerns would come up at the housing summit. Finally, I would can deal with those concerns to increase access and affordability for low and middle-income housing. In addition, land use laws continue to be the biggest factor for many in this equation. Among other options, I support expanding a pilot program which allows for 50-acre extensions of the urban growth boundary using public-private partnerships to create more opportunities for affordable housing in limited cases around Oregon. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? Homelessness is a multifaceted problem. It’s turning our streets and neighborhoods into third-world-looking landscapes. It must stop. Allowing the homeless to live on the streets in squalor, is not being compassionate. Homeless individuals deserve better. There is a lot of innovative thinking going on around the state to help craft short and long-term solutions to homelessness. As governor, I would support these local efforts to create options for homeless individuals such as tiny homes, and designating camping sites. We should be doing more. I’m surprised that we haven’t resolved the proposal to utilize unused parking at the Portland Expo Center. I’m sure there are other large parking areas with non-profit organizations willing to assist in communities around the state. In my role as governor, I would explore possible state facilities and properties suitable for parking sites, or emergency shelters with necessary services. My approach is to look for a short-term solution to get homeless campers off the streets and into more stable, safer, cleaner temporary shelter areas. I would then convene a special task force to propose a long-term action plan with a set timeline complete with measurable outcomes to resolve the issues facing the homeless population. As for funding, I think it’s frustrating to fathom the hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars the state has spent in recent years on programs dealing with homelessness, yet the problem seems worse than ever in Oregon. In the Tiernan administration, there will be an audit of all those dollars and the results of that spending. Before we spend another dime there must be accountability measures in place for the funds allocated whether they are federal pass-through, state, or grants to local agencies. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? I mentioned in an earlier question the friction home builders often have when government mandates get in the way of supply and demand. One example of cities trying to increase density for affordable housing is inclusionary zoning in Portland, but many feel that may have only discouraged building new apartments. A recent statewide law allowing apartment buildings in single-family neighborhoods has many concerned about their property values, and overwhelmed infrastructures. The best of intentions may not have the desired results. If elected governor, I would have to carefully consider each proposal to see if the supply of housing will actually go up. State leaders, like the governor, can often make housing more affordable by studying and listening to builders and contractors—they know the factors that are driving up the cost of housing. They also have ideas for how to attack those problems to drive down those costs. I think state government often gets in the way and allowing the private sector and non-profit organizations to step up can often produce creative solutions. At the end of the day what we’re doing now for housing affordability in Oregon isn’t working and we need to fix it.
Betsy Johnson Scapoose Former State Lawmaker The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? It is time to stop being shocked and amazed that drought hits parts of Oregon on a regular basis. It’s been a sad reality for as long as I can remember. More than a third of the state experienced severe drought or worse between 2000 and 2020, and five counties – Klamath, Crook, Morrow, Jefferson, and Jackson – have already declared drought emergencies for 2022. People are going to need help, and we will deliver without bureaucratic nonsense. Every year, the bureaucrats in Salem can’t seem to get their act together until the predictable problems have become full-scale emergencies. As governor, I will not wait for the reservoirs to dry up before delivering drought relief. All year long, I will be in regular communication with mayors, city councils, county commissions, and tribal leaders in the areas of the state with the greatest threats of drought to get a firm picture of what they are going to need. I will direct my agency heads to start relief efforts before the emergency happens. We’ll work with local leaders to reduce fire hazards before anything’s burning, and we’ll be ready to deliver financial assistance to impacted Oregonians before they’ve lost their homes or businesses. Growing up in Central Oregon, having run a helicopter company that helped fight fires, I have first-hand knowledge of these issues; they are not just policy issues for me, they are personal. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? As governor, I will call an immediate time out on the ill-conceived Kate Brown executive order. The Brown plan will cost family-wage jobs and jack up already rising energy prices and utility bills with no guarantee it will significantly reduce emissions. I also opposed Gov. Brown’s earlier cap and trade proposal because it would have killed thousands of blue-collar jobs and hammered working family paychecks. Oregon cannot solve global climate change on the backs of working people and rural communities. I believe climate change is real, but the cap-and-trade plan was not the right solution. As an independent governor, I will lead to reduce carbon pollution with the best ideas from both parties. I know that we can develop solutions that will actually reduce emissions without unfairly targeting working families. I will not be bound by the dogmatic extremes in either party. I will seek practical solutions – starting with better managing our forests to reduce the threat of wildfires that contribute to carbon pollution. I will do the hard work of bringing people to the table, building on the good ideas of both Democrats and Republicans, compromising where we disagree, and coming up with a plan that makes sense for Oregonians and provides emission reductions we can count on. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? Oregon must do a better job of managing our public forests – for the health of our forests, our climate, our jobs, and our rural communities. Each year, catastrophic fires not only destroy valuable forestlands, but they pump dangerous carbon pollution into our air and threaten lives, livelihoods, and communities. Wildfires are a greater threat to our climate than any farmer, fisherman, logger, millworker, or truck driver will ever be. To craft forest management policies, I will bring together the best experts in forestry – from the practical to the academic. I will surround myself with smart people who I expect will argue, debate, and disagree. That is my job as governor – to listen to all points of view, weigh the pros and cons, balance competing interests and then decide and lead to implement solutions. I will not be a governor who only listens to people who agree with me. I want to hear from everyone, and then I will do the job Oregonians elected me to do. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? Oregon has the dubious distinction of being number one among the 50 states for drug addiction and number 50 for mental health treatment. With those facts, someone has to explain to me why it made sense to legalize drug use. Our state’s mental health services, including drug treatment options, were in a sorry state long before Measure 110 passed because the bureaucrats at the Oregon Health Authority don’t have their priorities straight. As governor, I will fix that. I will set the right priorities and work closely with local health authorities to deliver expanded mental health and drug addiction services. It is long overdue. The current situation with BM 110 is unacceptable. People are literally dying while state government fails to show up. I oppose BM 110 and remain concerned that the effective legalization of hard drugs is a big mistake for our state. But, given the current law, Oregonians need the treatment and recovery programs they were promised – it’s life and death. As governor, I will not deflect this responsibility as Gov. Brown is doing. But that’s ten months from now. I believe Gov. Brown should immediately convene agency leaders, legislative leaders, addiction recovery leaders and law enforcement leaders to hammer out an emergency plan to stand up services and distribute funds within 60-90 days. Voters took a risk in approving this law, now government is proving itself incapable of implementing it. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? Anybody who deals in illegal drugs, fentanyl, or anything else, belongs in jail. And if they are selling to our kids, the penalties should be stiffer. We need more mental health and addiction services to help users break their habits, but we also need to go after the people bringing the drugs into our communities. I will work with local leaders to make that a top priority for our law enforcement agencies, and I will work (with) my fellow governors in the west to develop a plan for going after the pushers who are moving the drugs from state to state. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? In Oregon, we have become good at legalizing drugs and bad at graduating kids from high school. Oregon’s problems in education, particularly our high school graduation rates, began long before the pandemic and I refuse to use COVID as an excuse for poor-performing schools. The worst mistake we made during the pandemic was to close down schools for two years. It was unfair to ask parents to serve as teachers in “remote school” when they were trying to figure out how to keep their real jobs, and we should have known kids would fall behind, as they have, with the most vulnerable kids getting hit the hardest. We need to return to school full-time, which means saying NO to the education union bosses who want (to) force a four-day workweek – starting in Portland. I will tie funding to performance in our schools and appoint educators who will challenge the status quo – not defend it. Gov. Brown is bragging about better performing schools, but we are doing it by lowering academic standards. I will demand higher standards. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? Absolutely not. Oregon’s K-12 system has top-tier expenses and it’s producing bottom-of-the-barrel results. The worst thing we could do is hand the care of our youngest kids over to the union bosses who have made a mess of the K-12 system so they can screw that up too. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? The biggest mistake we can make is assuming there is a one-size-fits-all approach to delivering child care. For some families, child care centers work well, but others want in-home services for their kids. We need to start by respecting what the parents want for their families. We have a lot of tremendous child care providers in Oregon, private companies, non-profits, and families who take kids into their homes. I will pull them together to see what support they need and how we can work together to provide more services in every corner of Oregon. Most importantly, I will talk with the families to make sure the services match their needs and what they want for their kids. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? The tone of the question suggests you are dismissing the future of the agriculture, wood products and tourism and hospitality industries in our rural communities. I disagree. Oregon farmers and forest landowners are innovators and as much a part of Oregon’s future economy as they have been in the past – perhaps greater. The nation and the world need safe, high-quality foods to eat and innovative wood and building products for housing – our people are creating them. Oregon nursery producers are the best in the nation. Having represented communities that create food, wood products and include some of the state’s most prized tourism and hospitality destinations, I know the value of these creative people and industries. Our tourism and restaurant industries are the best representatives of our state’s rich cultural diversity. I am not about to say that any of those industries are past their prime. As governor, I will know there is an Oregon east of Bend and south of Eugene. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 3) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 4) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 5) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 2) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? 1) Other (be specific) A governor who listens and doesn’t take jobs and job creators for granted. What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? Oregon has a housing affordability crisis because we have a housing supply crisis. As governor, I will lead to increase the supply of housing to decrease the cost of housing – all types of housing choices. We cannot overcome our massive housing supply deficit simply through publicly funded or subsidized housing programs. And the legislature needs to stop telling homebuilders how to build homes. We need to unleash the power of the private marketplace to meet the growing demand for housing that exists across Oregon. We cannot make housing even more expensive with excessive rules, mandates, taxes, and fees. Unfortunately, this is something that has become all too common in Oregon. As governor, I will convene conversations with local mayors, city councils, county commissions, and tribal leaders, as well as the home building industry, about what is standing in the way of creating more housing – and lead to remove those barriers. We must face the reality of our situation and recognize we cannot continue doing the same thing and expect a different result. We are proud of our land-use system that has protected farms and wilderness, but if a lack of land for housing has made Oregon unaffordable for families, it is time to talk about targeted adjustments. Leading to make Oregon more affordable for people who work paycheck to paycheck – especially housing – will be one of my highest priorities. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? As governor, addressing Oregon’s homeless and public safety crisis will be my top priority – starting in Portland and moving across the state. On day one, I will direct ODOT to clean up the highways around Portland and across the state within 60 days. I support local leaders being more creative – and urgent – in addressing the homeless crisis facing communities across the state. Tiny house construction and designated camping areas are part of the solution. But let’s be honest: tiny homes alone are not going to solve the homeless crisis and dangerous camping occurring on our streets. To address the homeless crisis, we need a range of options to end camping in public places – designated camping areas, tiny home villages, navigation centers, low and high barrier shelters, transitional housing, and permanent housing. What we cannot accept is to continue to allow people to live unsheltered on our streets. I am absolutely willing, as governor, to talk about a state role in paying for shelter beds, but that money will come with strings attached: there has to be an end to the unsanitary, unsafe, and inhumane tent camping along our highways, in our parks and on our sidewalks. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? The legislature has not been making it easier to build more housing, it has been making it harder. We’ve got to stop trying to legislate economic behavior. It doesn’t work and it’s often counterproductive. Politicians don’t know how to build homes and they need to let the people who do meet the demand. Oregon has a housing affordability crisis because we have a housing supply crisis. We must build more housing of all types – single-family and multi-family to rent and own – at prices that people who work paycheck to paycheck can actually afford. Some of this can be achieved through greater density – but without more land for more housing, we will continue to have a housing supply deficit. As an independent governor, I will lead on housing with the best ideas from both parties – rejecting dogma and negotiating sensible changes to land use regulations designed to support more housing for more people.
Julian Bell Ashland Medical Doctor The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? Our worsening drought is caused by climate change. Climate change must be fixed, aggressively, and rapidly – within the next 8 years, preferably 6 so that we’re not missing our deadline. This means we – all of us, with substantial support from the state of Oregon – must curtail the use of all fossil fuel. Without doing this any stop-gap measures will fail. Immediate damage control measures for farmers must focus on doing as much as possible with the water we have available. Of course, Oregon can’t fix a global problem like climate change alone. But the world can’t do it without the United States, including Oregon, making rapid progress. Look at it another way – worldwide, all the fossil fuel devices must be retired. It doesn’t matter where we start. What matters is how quickly we go, and to what extent we can take the rest of the world with us. Showing leadership is much more likely to set the right example and recruit other partners. And while we might think that other countries are not doing the right thing, the main partner that needs to be recruited is actually us, the United States. All of us must make strenuous efforts to demonstrate good faith. Although we like to think other people are not doing the right thing this judgment may be misplaced. For example, population centers in Oregon such as Portland are accustomed to believing they are doing a better job at limiting their greenhouse gas emissions than rural Oregon, but Lakeview, Or, generates more clean energy than the energy it consumes (please see othersideofthehillmovie.com) For people who are worried that these changes would mean the end of Oregon’s economy since the 1990s Oregon’s economic growth has not tracked with our greenhouse gas emissions. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? Yes, I would renew it. We need this plan and more. The industries who are challenging the plan may try to phrase their goals in terms that are less hideous, but their challenges are a threat to the survival of humanity. Without plans like EO 20-04 and even more aggressive steps throughout our nation, climate change will get worse, and worse, and worse. The emissions that we keep adding to the atmosphere that add further warming don’t go away for centuries. The rising global temperatures create positive feedback loops such as thawing of permafrost and release of methane that add even more fuel to the fire. We do not have any idea how altered our planet may become. There is good reason to think that without zeroing out or greenhouse gas emission – and developing as yet untested technologies that capture greenhouse gas emissions - the planet will be unable to support human life. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? Many Oregon timber companies (Green Diamond, Collins) are supportive of aggressive action to end climate change and have submitted letters in support of legislative efforts to decrease Oregon greenhouse gas emissions in recent years. After all, fires are a threat to their asset in the short and long term. I would be delighted to work with these companies and other partners to obtain the best data to guide our decision-making about forest management. I am concerned that we do not have a reliable concept of what our forests should look like to minimize risk of fire and maximize the resilience of the forest environment. Our planning should be based on data and strategic planning. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? In my view, the governor has a responsibility to ensure the state government is providing good customer service to the voters. This includes ensuring the service lines we have committed to such as mental health and behavioral health services are available for people with substance abuse. As governor, I would plan to connect with individuals the system has failed, and work my way backward from the point of view of the voter. My training as a physician is to solve problems on a person-by-person basis, and this would be no different. I plan to use this approach for any problems voters have with accessing state services. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? My focus will be on supporting substance users with the goal of minimizing the duration, severity and damage of drug addiction while aggressively pursuing the distributors of illegal substances. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? I plan to work with educators to identify the sources of the stress and plan effective strategies to relieve them. Many public infrastructure systems such as schools have become very complex during the pre-pandemic years, and the stress of the pandemic has made it hard to deliver these complex services with the additional burden of pandemic restrictions. I would advocate for providing essential services and support for staff to make it practical for our schools to deliver high-quality education to our children. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? The K-12 system has a process that can potentially be adapted to extend services to under 5-year-olds. The school system would need a lot of additional resources to do this. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? Child care is generally low-wage work. People on the low end of the income range in Oregon are unable to afford housing, health care and the keys to economic stability. For this reason, it is very hard for them to stay in the childcare industry and so they leave for better opportunities elsewhere and there is a perpetual struggle to find childcare providers. Increasing the availability of affordable workforce housing and affordable healthcare in Oregon would improve the availability of childcare. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? Work to convert our state to renewable energy. Essentially all the clean energy Oregon can, has been, and needs to be built in rural Oregon. Investing in clean energy infrastructure will grow Oregon jobs and grow our state economy. There is prosperity in clean energy and the main obstacle to converting to a clean economy is not that it isn’t possible, but that people have been hesitant to move away from legacy technologies to an unknown future. We must make the benefits and prosperity of a clean energy economy readily evident to Oregonians. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 4) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 3) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 1) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 2) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? Housing is an emergency across the state for many Oregonians. The problem with housing and homelessness in Oregon is lack of housing. We have been relying on a free market system to build housing in Oregon, but a free market only works if you can afford to be the highest bidder. With the appalling income inequality in America this is a recipe for disaster — the disaster we have. The state of Oregon, which is the custodian of the people’s tax dollars, needs to put these tax dollars to work to address voters’ most urgent issues, in this case, housing. In my view, there is no other way to make affordable housing available to low-income or working Oregonians other than to leverage the state’s resources to build housing units. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? Yes, in a limited way. I do not believe these are long-term solutions. We need housing that has water, sewage, electricity and the standard suite of city services rather than inhospitable residences that rely on propane and diesel, bottled water and port-a-potties. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? I believe in urban growth boundaries and preserving farmland and wildlands, however, we will need to use creative solutions in order to secure land to build on.
Wilson Bright Portland Retired The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? It is time the state debates and comes up with a plan that dictates what actions take place when, depending on the severity of the drought as it happens. Watering the lawns should be the first to be halted. All households should be mandated to install low flow toilets, showers, and faucets. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? I would rescind it. The governor should not be dictating action on the public except in extreme circumstances. There needs to be a long-term solution to the carbon problem, and it needs to come from the federal government, not the state. Carbon and global warming do not know the boundaries of a state, but if you put costs on businesses in Oregon they may just move to Idaho and produce the same carbon. I support a Federal Carbon Cap and Trade Program that hopefully, one day becomes a Global one. If you look at my homeless plan you will see, I guarantee a job for everyone some of these jobs will be picking up trash, working at the center or planting trees. Planting trees can play a major in carbon reduction. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? You must include the timber industry because they are the feet on the ground. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? I think Measure 110 was a terrible referendum. Requiring an addict to volunteer to get treatment is a complete delusional understanding of the mind of an addict. They want to get clean, but the pull of the drug is just too much. I have proposed a very safe drug-free facility in the countryside that forces addicts to get clean if they have no other options. It’s a form of tough love for sure, but after a couple of months once they have become clean and sober, they will say thanks. I believe to subsidize meth addicts’ addiction by giving them shelter without demanding sobriety is really a case of a state having a policy that knowingly enables an addict to destroy their functional mind with a high chance of dying. This is the exact definition of a crime against humanity. There are no fences at my village in the country. You can go home any time. But there will be no sleeping on public lands. There will be no public subsidizing of people who are testing positive for Heroin, Meth, Crack, and Fentanyl. There is plenty of help for those that stay clean. See my Rent to Own program. Keep in mind alcohol treatment centers in the country have been placed in the country for hundreds of years. For the drug-addicted, it needs to be removed from the city. There is too much temptation, accessibility to drugs in the city. This is not a new concept it is just that the problem has grown so large the facilities have to be that much larger and within a proximity so follow-up is readily available. Read deep into my plan and you will see how I accomplish this. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? See above What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? I believe in reforming the education system to be more personalized and accommodating. I think school buildings should be open 52 weeks a year, from 7:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Not because I want to extend the teachers hours, but because I want to foster a safe place for children to stay, that is open during the same normal business hours of a parent whose working hours do not stop at 3:30 or ends June 2nd through Labor Day. Children can still take vacation and leave when their education is finished each day, but doors will remain open until 6:30. We adapt the schools to accommodate children as young as 3 ½ months. Childcare becomes free, releasing the need for paying out of pocket for childcare. Children will receive 3 meals a day with snacks helping the food insecurity problems at home. Additionally, I want to fund the development of AI software that can further personalize education. I want to develop an app that tracks a child throughout their educational process, and the AI will learn how best to educate the child based upon their personal needs. Throughout the school day, children will carry around an iPad that contains this app, and it will facilitate their learning throughout the day. If someone falls behind, we will know instantly. The school system will never look the same. This system however should not promote at-home learning, as the social aspect of school is paramount to healthy child, and therefore, societal development. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? In my school system, we transform the school buildings to be able to accommodate children as young as 3 1/2 months old. That way childcare becomes free. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? N/A Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? We need to play a positive role in helping businesses develop, especially if we can incorporate rural Oregon. I propose a different model where the state uses its large investment fund and invests in small and medium-sized companies. The state takes stock, usually as a minority holder, but will expect returns over the long run which will feed into the “Oregon Peoples Fund”. The Peoples Fund, hopefully, one day will pay dividends to all Oregonians. Very similar to what Alaska does with its oil revenue fund. I believe that drones will become a major piece of equipment in almost all parts of industry. The state will use drones for land management. Farmers are going to use them more as agriculture becomes more sophisticated. I would like to make Oregon a hub for the innovation and manufacturing of drones. The beauty of this idea is the state could create collaborative partnerships with say a group of small drone manufacturers spread out over Eastern Oregon and/or Southern Oregon. We add funding to our university system to start to focus on the science of what I am talking about. We start to act as a team. If the state committed itself to buy from in-state manufacturers drones, we could create a lot of cutting-edge companies. I say we bring back manufacturing to our more rural areas. Rural areas have land that is less expensive, a more mechanical-minded population, and have community colleges which are necessary for quick training. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) N/A What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? My affordable housing plan is based on the theory that to reduce prices we must drastically affect supply. My proposal is the State of Oregon acts as the developer of affordable housing units. The state doesn’t want to be the landlord, the state wants to be the mortgage holder. We will focus on building 350-550 sq ft units that will have mortgages around $150,000 each. This results in a $270 - $300 per sq ft construction price. If we charge a 4% interest rate the monthly mortgage cost would be around $716.19 a month. According to my calculations, a full-time employee with working minimum wage should be able to afford such a cost. We plan that these properties will be a part of a Rent-to-Own system directed towards solving the homelessness problem. In this system, a down-payment is not required. After getting clean in our program, learning some occupational skills, maintaining a job and paying rent on time for 3 years, these citizens will have the opportunity to apply for the Rent-to-Own program. Stay clean (we test), work and pay rent for 3 years we will waive a down payment and your next payment becomes a mortgage payment. We will offer this same rent to own program to those who are working minimum wage jobs but do not make enough to save for a down payment. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? Once again, I stress, we have to ask why are they there. I the state, won’t support drug habits, but if they are just down on their luck, I am thinking we are going to have to change some land use planning to add more and more affordable trailer parks. I don’t think we should have sanctioned squaller. We should be able to produce better than that. Nice clean trailer parks are an easy solution with CC&Rs in place keeping every unit clean and free of garbage. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? Please see my Affordable Housing Plan
George Carrillo Sherwood OHA Program Manager The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? Climate change is a global emergency and we must take action now. We must commit 100% on renewable energy and invest in union-protected green jobs by 2040 and not approve further development on fossil fuel, coal, fracking, and other dangerous greenhouse gasses. We must align our efforts to tackle climate change with environmental justice. Violations will be met with strict enforcement. We need change for our future generations to be safe in a world we are living behind. The wildfires have resulted from an ongoing drought that Oregon has failed to respond to adequately. A commission has to be created to adequately address these issues now and for our future. Re-allocating state funds to ensure wildfire response and recovery have all the resources necessary to tackle the ever-growing wildfire season. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? Our beautiful state of Oregon has experienced a negative impact of climate change in the last century. The flow of meltwater into streams is declining and snowpack is melting earlier each year. As governor, my priority is the health and welfare of all Oregonians. I would uphold the executive order only until the legislature conducts an independent review to understand the effectiveness of the order. Then we will bring communities across the state to collaborate with the legislature and governor's office to develop a more effective, long term solution. We can have a house bill that focuses on reducing carbon emissions drafted with community input because everything we do affects our communities in one way or another. We want to make sure our future for our beautiful state of Oregon is left in good conditions for generations to come. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? In 2020, when wildfires burned over a million acres in Oregon, scientific research supported land management practices used by Indigenous communities called prescribed burns. Prescribed burns are the intentional burning of land every few years under controlled conditions to prevent the buildup of fuel and overgrowth; thus, preventing wildfire outbreaks and promoting fire-adapted ecosystems. As a result, a slew of bills aimed at wildfire prevention came into fruition. Bills that established funds and offered grant money to agencies and contractors. These bills excluded tribal efforts, such as the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde’s fire program which previously collaborated with Oregon Metro on prescribed burns. Bills that would require recommendations about wildfire prevention make no mention of consulting Indigenous scientists. I will ensure strategic alignment between federal, state, tribal, local governments, and the National Guard to ensure that we have adequate maintenance, prevention and response incorporated in forest management policy. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? Right now what we have to understand is that the implementation of Measure 110 is being led by a Community Actions Committee. This committee does not directly report to the Oregon Health Authority (OHA), but OHA provides government employees help assist. This implementation team was not adequately staffed nor supported. The problem we must fix is that we cannot allow the system to fail because we have not appropriately staffed state employees to support the Community Actions Committee. That's a failure of our state legislature for not providing positions to support as the legislature has to approve the positions and funding for the agency. These efforts must be led by our community and appropriately supported, we cannot quit on our community when we do not provide them with the necessary tools to be successful. I will provide resources, staff, and any other items the community action committee seems necessary to be able to complete the roll out of measure 110. I will work with both parties to ensure we have continued funding to support this ongoing effort as this cannot be a one time investment. We need to continue to invest in the continuum of care at all different levels of our behavioral health system so those struggling with substance abuse have the necessary, cultural and linguistic services. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? Fentanyl is a controlled substance therefore we need to hold pharmaceutical companies responsible. Law enforcement will tackle illegal narcotic trade and go after the criminal organizations to stop the distribution of fentanyl. It is necessary we reach all Oregonians struggling from fentanyl and complex substance use, but especially those Oregonians who have a difficult time accessing treatment programs and medical services. This is especially true to Oregonians in rural counties. Substance use is a complicated issue that is symptomatic of underlying social issues and challenges. It is no secret that Oregon lacks sufficient residential treatment facilities, intensive outpatient programs, and the necessary behavioral health services needed to address substance use in Oregon. We will continue to support Measure 110 and community-based organizations in the creation of residential and behavioral health facilities, in addition to their community outreach and community-based education. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? The pandemic exacerbated stress levels in educators, students, and parents. Current classroom sizes of over thirty students to one educator and the lack of adequate support for both educators and families will maintain stressful environments. We must ensure we have sufficient educators across the state for K-12 schools, I believe classroom sizes should not exceed 14 students. Should classroom sizes exceed 14 students to one educator, then schools will receive funding for teacher assistants to accommodate the needs of our children. I believe classroom sizes should be limited to a capacity of 20 students per class. Doing so will help educators focus on the students' education and students do not feel left out. Having many students in a classroom creates an overwhelming environment that students and staff do not deserve. Parents stress because they want their children to succeed and receive help when needed. During the pandemic, parents had to become educators at home and the educators had to learn how to teach virtually and monitor their student’s success from afar. Parents learned that a child’s teacher is more than just an educator, they are also a counselor, a nurse, a friend, a social worker, and a specialist. Educators should not be a counselor, a nurse, a social worker, or a specialist. Being an educator is hard enough. I will restructure schools to provide social services within school buildings for children and families in need. Doing so will allow an educator to focus on their teaching only and allow for better work-life balance that’s not at the expense of an educator’s wellbeing. Currently, children who are on IEP and 504 academic support plans receive minimal services during the school day. School districts do not allow families who are working with specialists to include them in their child’s academic support plan. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? I do believe the K-12 system should be involved in early childhood care to provide more child care options and education. This would be included in the restructuring of schools so that there are dedicated child care providers and early childhood educators available to families. By having childcare and early childhood educators, other staff do not need to take on additional work duties. There are already existing community-based organizations, such as the Oregon Child Development Coalition, that can be contracted with to provide child care and education services in schools for children ages infant to 4 years old. State incentives should be created for schools to provide culturally and linguistically appropriate child care and education services. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? Community-based organizations often are understaffed and/or underpaid. In order to create an adequate supply of childcare, workers must be adequately compensated. By creating a better job market with livable wages, Oregon can gain additional childcare and early childhood literacy staff. Another component to this aspect is providing access to education so that current care and early childhood providers can continue developing in their career and those interested in pursuing this career can receive the education necessary. A barrier to providing culturally and linguistically responsive care across the state will be in the implementation of equitable practices in both the recruitment and retention of staff. As governor, I will reform our government agencies and change our Human Resources department mission statement and policy to no longer mitigate risk to the agency, but rather do what is in the best interest of Oregonians. HR Specialists will focus on streamlining equitable practices that include recruitment, onboarding, retention, training, and leadership development of staff. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? Invest in infrastructure and housing in rural Oregon. Create opportunities to travel to our wonderful tourist cities. By building more affordable homes, more people will want to purchase and live in the rural parts of Oregon. As rural Oregon expands, we will help with funding to our rural county governments and community-based organizations to help remove systemic barriers to address access to services. Invest in clean energy to drive demand and lower inflation. We will help reopen our factories to produce clean energy parts and equipment. We will also invest in education to prepare our job market for these new jobs. Working adults who wish to learn a new clean energy program will receive free tuition. We need to lower the cost of PERS in the local municipalities to extend career options to work within the government. The more teachers we can hire, the more we will be able to reopen our closed schools. We will lower the number of children per class size to provide a more equitable solution. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 4) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 1) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 2) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 3) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? The housing shortage did not occur overnight. This is a massive failure by our Democratic party years in the making. They were aware of the community needs for many years, of which we are now seeing the long-term effects of housing shortages all across Oregon. When the problem was increasingly worsening, we didn’t step in with appropriate funding to build more housing, didn’t have a coordinated approach, nor create a transitional system and continuum of care that works for anybody. The specific steps I would take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians starts with protecting current renters so they can stay in their homes. This includes placing a 30% income limit on rent and ensuring renters have a protected right of access to court-appointed counsel. I will reinvest our Section 8 housing funds and other program funds to allow a tax break for landlords who continue to provide low-income housing. I will work towards ending gentrification and exclusionary zoning because this keeps affordable housing out of neighborhoods through land use and building code requirements and raises the price of rent, homes, and property values. For renters who experience houselessness, I will create new facilities throughout the state that provides on-site services to address the needs of our houseless community This includes expanding the concept of shelters by addressing the social determinants of health of an individual or family who is willing to engage. I will support funding to create diverse transitional housing throughout the state that provides on-site services to address the need of our houseless community and assist with the shift in becoming self-sufficient. This includes expanding the concept of shelters by addressing the social determinants of health of an individual or family willing to engage in services. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? The houseless population has been around for decades. Our current Democracy allowed this population to reach a crisis point and has ignored local communities' advocacy for affordable housing development for vulnerable populations. There have been many proposed solutions for houseless challenges: renovating vacant buildings, creating large capacity shelters, constant displacing of the houseless community, etc. The problem with these proposed solutions is that these are what state officials believe are needed. Not everyone wants to live in these suggested environments. We have to make efforts to understand our houseless communities' needs. We must ask the important questions: Who are you? How did you get to this point? What do you want to do from this point? What does your ideal situation look like? What is important to you? What does safe housing look like for you? How can we support you to be in a safe, sustainable living situation? We have to build trust and see our houseless population as our neighbors and fellow Oregonians to help them find safe housing and provide them with access to transitional services. As governor, I support these local efforts and ongoing state funding for these efforts. Community members and organizations are successful in helping vulnerable populations because they understand their communities, represent their communities, and learn to do much with little financial assistance. I will create an interagency council that addresses houselessness throughout the state. The governor will lead this and connect all state agencies, organizations, and resources to understand the needs of different populations (children and families, veterans, etc.). This interagency council will also seek to understand where people fall in the cracks of current support systems. I will support funding to create new facilities throughout the state that provide on-site services to address the need of our houseless community The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? No, it has not gone far enough. Legislature does not have a solid plan for transitional housing. They lack transparency with the public about how much this will cost and how long this will take. We need to be able to provide different temporary housing options that meet the needs of our underserved communities. We need to bring them to the table to understand their needs across the state. Once the legislature understands the barriers and challenges of cities across the state, we can better adapt practices, allowing more rapid and more dense construction. I support implementing housing navigation centers across the state. These centers must provide transitional services in conjunction with offering various housing options. Transitional services should include behavioral health services (substance abuse and mental health treatment), medical services (physical, dental, vision), employment supports, life skills training, budgeting education, and continued collaboration with community-based organizations for ongoing, sustainable support. Our houseless community can then decide which housing navigation center meets their needs, for example, tiny homes, individual living within a building, and outdoor camps. We also need to look at re-zoning commercial property in both urban and rural Oregon, specifically commercial property areas that are no longer in use. This is where we can provide housing growth in an area that’s already been developed and can be repurposed as a place where there can be affordable housing options. At the same time, we need to be responsible for protecting farmlands and farmers. As we become a greener society, we can have farmlands coexist in urban areas as we move towards a green model.
Peter Hall Haines City Council Member The Oregon governor’s office is usually reactive when it comes to dealing with drought. What specific steps would you take to provide long-term solutions for years of increasing drought? I would make a real assessment of what water would be available in the future and then present communities with the information and let them decide how it should be divided. This could result in taking farmland out of production and moving populations to areas that could provide water on a sustainable level. This process would also determine what water resources could be moved to some areas, but it may not be feasible to get water to many scattered communities. The state should then provide the financial aid and social services necessary to make the transition to sustainable communities in water poor areas. In the absence of action by the legislature, Gov. Brown created a climate protection plan by executive order to reduce carbon emissions. That plan is being challenged in court. If elected, would you renew that order or rescind it? Why? There are some elements I might leave in, but only those that can be done on a less intrusive level. I do not believe the governor should usurp the power of the legislature except in emergency situations and for a limited amount of time. I would rather work with the legislature to produce a plan that can be effective and reasonably accomplished despite pushback from special interests. In addition to climate change, scientists throughout the state have raised concerns that Oregon’s reliance on “clearing fuel” as a form of forest management contributes to worsening conditions. Conversely, timber industry groups continue to champion industrially planted forests and timber harvests as an important tool in suppressing wildfires. What stakeholders would you include in conversation as you develop your forest management policy? The problem is that nature is designed to have old growth forests be able to withstand wildfires. Younger forests do not have that ability. We will have to create buffer zones around forests that can stop fires from spreading. I would seek the input from scientists, local community leaders and timber interests in order to create the best outline for this. Measure 110 decriminalized drugs in Oregon while stepping up treatment. How would you confront the state’s failure to meet the intent of the law to ensure thousands of Oregonians get treatment? We have to remove the assumption that people want treatment. If someone does not go into treatment after being charged, then we must put them into a program of limited duration against their will in a locked down facility. It is quite possible that even this will not get people off drugs, but long term incarceration is not a proper solution. What state action would you direct to confront the threat to health and safety posed by fentanyl? This is an ongoing problem that the state can only do so much toward limiting. There has to be a coordinated level between local, state, national and even international entities in order to create restricted access to those ingredients that can produce the drug. We also want to ensure that we focus on the distributors of these drugs and put severe punishment on those who are involved in the illegal market. What steps would you take to address the stress of educators, students and parents and keep our public K-12 schools from imploding? I think the best you can do is to see to it that all communities have access to proper mental health care as well as other social services such as income subsidies as well as staffing aid in order to give them a sense that they are not alone and will be supported. Do you believe that the K-12 system in Oregon should get involved in early childhood care to help provide more child care options and education, and if so, how? I do not think it should be part of the K-12 system, but it should be a social service program that provides facilities or subsidies for all communities to meet their needs as they see them. What do you see as the two biggest barriers to creating an adequate supply of child care in Oregon, and what do you propose to change to help alleviate the shortage of child care? One problem is funding as some will not want to pay more to raise someone else’s child, and another is putting in a system that all can agree meets their needs. The best approach is to try and consolidate programs and providers as best you can in a way that can be supported by the community. Much of the economy of rural Oregon is based on agriculture, natural resource extraction and tourism. Agriculture is consolidating, natural resource extraction is in decline, and tourism provides mostly minimum-wage jobs. As governor, what are the first three steps you would take to build a stronger economy in rural Oregon? I am not concerned with the number of steps, but I will tell you my idea of what to do. I want to get businesses to go out to smaller cities and invest there, especially near interstate corridors rather than pack into already over populated urban areas. Let’s get growth out to where there is room to grow. We also need to work on supporting family farms against corporate domination and giving them the freedom to run their farms as they see fit and get the income they need to thrive. This means also pushing back against factory farms that risk a severe loss in product in the market due to disease or bankruptcy. It all comes down to spreading out resources to create a resilient system that benefits all. State government has a lot of tools to help the economy. Please rank the following to show your support, with 1 being the highest priory. Use 0 for any idea you do not support. __ Targeted tax breaks for key industries __ Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. __ Direct financial aid to specific businesses __ Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? __ Other (be specific) 5) Targeted tax breaks for key industries 8) Direct financial aid to education/job training programs. 4) Direct financial aid to specific businesses 9) Infrastructure and public works, such as broadband and transportation? What specific steps would you take to increase access to housing and housing stock for low and middle-income Oregonians? We need to spread out business investment so that those real estate developers will have an incentive to produce more housing in rural areas. We can also expand urban growth boundaries and planning codes to make more land available for housing in urban areas as well as create public/private partnerships to produce proper housing for a variety of citizens and their individual needs. How would you support local efforts to provide designated places for unhoused Oregonians including overnight parking sites, tent camping sites and tiny homes? Would that support include seeking state funding? I absolutely believe in supporting local communities in their efforts to meet their local needs. This can mean changing certain regulations as well as direct subsidies for proven housing solutions. The legislature has been working to make it easier to build more units of housing in cities, to close the gap between housing supply and demand. Has it gone far enough? Will you make it easier for cities to adopt practices allowing more rapid and more dense construction? I have already answered much of this question, but I will conclude with the problem of the NIMBYs. Part of what creates the problem of meeting growth demands is that many do not want to see growth. They may have located to a sparse suburban location in order to escape an urban area. Bringing it to them will create much resistance. This is why I like the idea of getting the increase in population and economic growth to places that want it. There is much talk of letting the market make the decisions, but when the market screams, ‘go away, we are full’, and people ignore it, the government has to step in and make people listen.
