News Former Oregon Supreme Court Justice Michael "Mick" Gillette has injected some momentum into Gov. John Kitzhaber's quest to reduce public employee pension benefits by hundreds of millions of dollars during this legislative session.The back story: the big driver of Kitzhaber's proposed cuts is a plan to reduce cost-of-living increases on pension benefit that exceed $24,000 annually. Public employees ...   More

News Last night marked a giant leap forward for proponents of the $3.5 billion Columbia River Crossing project, which will include a new Interstate 5 bridge between Portland and Vancouver, an extension of light rail to Vancouver, a fix for five major freeway interchanges. Lawmakers on a special CRC committee voted 14-2 to move House Bill 2800 to the floor of both chambers for votes. The bill commits $450 ...   More

News After more than a decade and $160 million spent on planners, consultants and lobbyists, the proposed $3.5 billion Columbia River Crossing’s moment has finally arrived.  When lawmakers c   More

News Hundreds of raucous Democrats, crowded into the cavernous downtown Hilton Hotel ballroom for their election-night victory bash, roared...   More

News Backers of the proposed $3.5 billion Columbia River Crossing project suffered a defeat in Washington last night when Clark County voters rejected a ballot measure that would help pay for operations of the light-rail component of the project. The latest numbers show the measure, which would provide $2.5 million annually for operations of the proposed Portland-to-Vancouver MAX expansion, failing 56 percent ...   More

Oregon House Democratic leadership responded today to allegations that Rep. Mike Schaufler (D-Happy Valley) groped a female employee of the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries last week at the AFL-CIO statewide convention.  Co-House Speakers Arnie Roblan (D-Coos Bay) and Bruce Hanna (R-Roseberg) this afternoon stripped Schaufler, 51, of his co-chairmanship of the powerful House Business and ...   More

News Former House Speaker Dave Hunt (D-Gladstone) has a big decision to make. Hunt's seat—which he has held since 2002—is safe if he wants to keep it next year. But the 2009 speaker of the Oregon House lost his gavel last year to Rep. Arnie Roblan (D-Coos Bay), and last month got pushed out of his Democratic majority leader's position by Rep. Tina Kotek (D-North Portland). So Hunt, 43, who works for ...   More

News Oregon lawmakers brought the 76th Legislative Assembly to a close today at 2:50 p.m., 153 days after starting work. Shortly afterward, House Democrats convened their caucus to select leadership for next February's session. The fallout for Rep. Dave Hunt (D-Gladstone), who served as House majority leader in 2007 and House speaker in 2009, continued. Last year, after contentious caucus elections, Dems ...   More

News The House Judiciary Committee yesterday killed a bill that would grant local police the authority to shut down troubled bars and nightclubs immediately after an incident and keep them closed for 72 hours. Rep. Tina Kotek (D-Portland) has been pushing this concept for a couple sessions. After a high-profile January killing at Club 915 gave fresh impetus to the concept, Kotek and co-sponsors re-introduced ...   More

News As the April 18 tax filing deadline rapidly approaches, many Oregonians are looking forward to refunds. But some of them, chances are, will fall into a trap more costly than taking out a payday loan.  The Portland advocacy group, Economic Fairness Oregon, has looked into what are called Refund Anticipation Checks. Such checks are effectively a way for cash-strapped taxpayers to borrow the cost ...   More