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Measure 120
ODOT funding
NO
The first thing to know about Measure 120 is that Oregon’s Democratic leaders, its presumptive supporters, have launched no organized campaign on its behalf.
A quick history explains why. Early last year, the Oregon Department of Transportation proposed a budget that called for new spending that would far outstrip its projected revenue. This came at a time when many were unimpressed with ODOT’s management—which, in just one example, acknowledged it had made a $1 billion revenue projection error on a $5.9 billion biennial budget.
But the funding plea also came as revenue realities were genuinely changing. Expenses were rising. And the actual income from the gas tax of 40 cents a gallon was vulnerable to inflation, greater fuel efficiency, and the rise of electric vehicles—the owners of which, of course, pay no gas tax.
So the question facing lawmakers in 2025 was: Bail out ODOT? And if so, how? There was great disagreement, rural-versus-urban tensions rose, and the proposal got skinned to the bone. Eventually, the Legislature managed to do nothing at all.
The immediate implications were unclear. ODOT director Kris Strickler told the agency’s 5,000 employees that layoffs loomed for hundreds of them—many of them maintenance workers who keep the streets in good working order—and a dozen maintenance stations faced closure.
In August, Gov. Tina Kotek called a special session to address the matter. The resulting law was more modest, but passed with various measures, including an increase in the gas tax from 40 to 46 cents—just below that of Washington state, and far below that of California.
But the story was not finished. State Rep. Ed Diehl (R-Stayton) led a remarkably successful Republican rebellion, garnering about 250,000 signatures rapidly, and soon Democrats were shifting into reverse and flooring the pedal. Fearing the gas tax would appear on the November ballot as she was running for reelection, Kotek tried to simply get the bill repealed. The attorney general said no, this was not constitutional. So Democrats decided to move the measure up to the May ballot. In the meantime, all but conceding they would lose in the election, they passed a “stopgap” measure in February to fund ODOT that did not raise taxes and averted mass layoffs.
Deep breath.
Clearly, Democrats have decided the measure is bad politics, which is why they are treating it as if smells like day-old roadkill and trying to keep it as far from the November election as possible.
But then there is the policy question. A few things are worth noting here. First off, the tax increase is simply not that big. Still, the taxes at play are regressive—they take more from the poor than the rich—and many people are already not feeling flush right now.
We think Diehl and his allies have played dirty pool by referring to the ballot only certain portions of the package—such as the 6 cent gas tax increase and fee increases and a small funding mechanism for public transportation. Meanwhile, other parts of the law remain in place, such as “accountability” for ODOT and EV mileage fees, as well as a fix to the weight-mileage tax that makes the system more fair to operators of 18-wheelers. In other words, they protected their base and shoved the pain up to Portland.
Yet Democrats have questions of their own to answer, the most pressing of which is: What would the tax even do? The budget bandaging in February makes us wonder if the department’s funding woes are as acute as its leaders suggest.
To be sure, the cuts that balanced the budget for now don’t all trim fat. One, for example, clips a fund to build infrastructure for safer routes to school.
But proponents of the measure have not made a strong case of what might go wrong if it doesn’t pass. In fact, the conversation in Salem has largely been driven by uncertainty around public sector jobs. Unions are doing their part by lobbying on that basis, but this is not a serious argument for why taxpayers should fund government agencies.
As we note elsewhere, the referendum system is a terrible way to make policy, and we think it’s disingenuous to take unpopular parts of a bill and put them to voters—eroding the good faith of future negotiations. But, for now, we see no alternative other than for these future negotiations to take place. It wasn’t pretty but, if nothing else, the saga might pressure ODOT and the Democrats to make a stronger case next time they ask taxpayers to shell out.
Measure 26-261
Oregon Historical Society levy
Yes
History repeats itself. So does the Oregon Historical Society every five years, when it asks Multnomah County voters to renew a property tax levy to bolster the museum’s operating budget.
Voters first passed the levy in 2011, when the Historical Society was in financial distress. They agreed to charge homeowners 5 cents for every $1,000 of assessed property value. The levy’s rate has held steady the three subsequent times Multnomah County commissioners have referred it to the ballot. If your home is appraised at $250,000, you pay $12.50 a year—about the cost of one month of Amazon Prime—to fund the nonprofit that operates a history museum on the South Park Blocks, maintains a voluminous archival collection, and partners with four other history societies in east county. (The Crown Point Country Museum opened just last month in a 3,500-square-foot log cabin in Corbett.)
The routine is starting to feel farcical. When the county asked voters for a museum bailout in 2011, OHS executive director Kerry Tymchuk pitched it to The Oregonian as a temporary fix: “If we have to ask for it again, we haven’t done our job.” The society is asking for a fourth time, and he still has his job. The society has plugged its leaks, but has come to rely on the special levy as a cornerstone of its budget.
Students of history (or readers of WW) will recognize this expectation creep as part of a wider pattern. The rest of you, please open your textbooks: Faced with the caps placed on property tax collection by the 1990s taxpayer rebellion that resulted in Measures 5 and 50, local governments have resorted to levies that allow popular causes to cut to the front of the line. (See also the county’s library taxing district, and the levies funding parks for both the city and Metro.) It’s not hard to view this as county leaders punting a hard budgetary decision over to voters.
The choice voters face is not existential. The museum is not going to close if voters reject this renewal. Instead, it boils down to a practical decision: Should Multnomah County residents pay for the history museum on their tax bill, or with an admission fee? The result of a “no” vote is that OHS would become a ticketed attraction, like the Oregon Zoo or the Portland Japanese Garden, instead of offering free entry to every county resident.
We prefer the levy to ticketing, for a few reasons. For one, it’s a more progressive funding mechanism (even if property owners pass the burden on to renters), and we don’t think the county’s low-income residents should have to decide between a gallon of gas or knowing where they came from. For another, museums are a civic good, with real political significance.
The Smithsonian is free. Whether it tells America’s whole story is increasingly dubious. Federal museums and national parks are under orders to whitewash history. OHS has a far superior track record: We remain impressed that it displays a Ku Klux Klan hood and compels visitors to confront Oregon’s racist foundation. It is not difficult to imagine a future in which even local museums are pressured to erase our sins from the record. Funding this one is one small blow against convenient forgetfulness. Five more years.
