OREGON
Thursday, January 20, 2022
ThE OBsErVEr — A7
Kotek: ‘I believe in the things we have done’
Departing House
speaker says her run
for governor will
focus on continuity
and implementation
By PETER WONG
Oregon Capital Bureau
SALEM — Even a short
list of the bills passed by the
Oregon Legislature during
the record nine years Tina
Kotek has been speaker of
the House would read much
like the achievements of a
two-term governor.
But it’s no coincidence
Kotek is yielding the speak-
ership a year early to focus
on her bid for the Demo-
cratic nomination for gov-
ernor in the May 17 pri-
mary. Her final day in the
House is Friday, Jan. 21.
She has held the District 44
seat in North and North-
east Portland since 2007
and has led the House since
2013.
“We’ve done a lot of
good things for Orego-
nians. It’s definitely been
a productive run,” Kotek
said in an exit interview.
“But we have to complete
our promises. That is what
the next governor has to
do. I believe in the things
we have done and I want
to make sure they continue
and get fully implemented.”
Under a House rule,
Kotek could not raise
money for her campaign if
she remained for the 35-day
2022 session, which starts
Feb. 1. According to the
Oregon Elections Division,
she had $758,000 on hand
by mid-January, compared
with $460,000 for state
Treasurer Tobias Read. A
total of 11 Democrats have
filed so far, excluding Nich-
olas Kristof, the former
New York Times colum-
nist, who was deemed inel-
igible to run by Secretary
of State Shemia Fagan. The
Oregon Supreme Court
Townnews.com Content Exchange
Tina Kotek is yielding the speakership a year early to focus on her bid for
the Democratic nomination for governor in the May 17, 2022, primary. Her
final day in the House is Friday, Jan. 21. She has held the District 44 seat in
Northeast Portland since 2007 and has led the House since 2013.
soon will determine the
fate of Kristof’s candidacy,
which has reportedly raised
more than $2.5 million.
Some opponents allied
with business have taken
aim at Kotek with the mon-
iker “no special K,” though
it’s unclear who they prefer.
No Republican has won the
governorship in 40 years.
Former Democratic Sen.
Betsy Johnson of Scap-
poose, who plans an inde-
pendent bid, has raised at
least $2 million.
Democratic Gov. Kate
Brown is barred from run-
ning again after almost two
full terms. The other major
official in the lawmaking
process is Senate President
Peter Courtney, a Democrat
from Salem who is retiring
after a total of 38 years, a
record 20 of them as Senate
leader.
The previous record
tenure for a House speaker
was six years (1985-91) by
Democrat Vera Katz, who
went on in 1992 to the first
of three terms as mayor of
Portland. Katz died in 2017
at age 84.
Kotek says she is run-
ning as the candidate who
understands the process
and the issues — and can
get things done.
“With new legislative
leadership in 2023, it will
be helpful to have a gov-
ernor who has been in the
Legislature and has been
in their positions,” Kotek
said. “There is going to be
change, but I hope there is
continuity provided by a
governor who understands
what it means to be a legis-
lative leader.”
Making the leap
Of Oregon’s nine most
recent governors going
back to Republican Mark
Hatfield in 1959, all but
two were in the Legisla-
ture first. But only Vic
Atiyeh went directly from
the Legislature to the gov-
ernorship in 1978, and the
former Senate Republican
leader lost his first state-
wide bid in 1974. Demo-
crat John Kitzhaber left the
Senate presidency before
his first election as gov-
ernor in 1994. The other
five, including Brown, held
statewide office first.
Courtney and Kotek did
not always see eye to eye.
But in a statement after
Kotek’s Jan. 6 announce-
ment, he said, “She has
been an advocate in many
ways before anything else.”
Before she won her
second bid for the House
in 2006 — she lost in an
adjoining district in 2004
— Kotek was an advo-
cate for the Oregon Food
Bank and Children First for
Oregon. In her first term in
2007, Kotek led the effort to
overhaul how Oregon gives
cash assistance to low-in-
come families. In the 2009
and 2011 sessions, prior
to becoming Democratic
leader and then speaker,
she co-led the human ser-
vices budget subcommittee.
“It is an amazing
journey from being an
advocate to the person who
can write the bills and pass
the budgets to do these
things. We have protected
very important safety-net
programs for Oregonians,”
Kotek said. “Certainly we
have plenty of things we
have to continue to work
on. I believe the status quo
is not sufficient. I want to
make things better.”
Among the non-budget
bills Kotek says help
working families are paid
sick leave in 2015, a three-
tiered minimum wage in
2016, rent stabilization and
paid family and medical
leave, both in 2019. The
latter program is scheduled
to start paying benefits in
fall 2023.
House Democrats
replaced Dave Hunt with
Kotek as their caucus
leader the day the 2011 ses-
sion ended. She became
their choice for speaker
after the 2012 election,
when Democrats gained
four seats to take control.
Her majorities have ranged
from 34 to 38, the latter
in 2019 tying the Dem-
ocratic mark reached in
1975. Democrats currently
number 37 — and women
from both parties consti-
tute a majority in the entire
chamber.
She is the first lesbian
in the nation to lead a state
legislative chamber.
Problem-solving focus
Despite accusations of
partisanship — predictably
from Republicans, some-
times from fellow Demo-
crats — Kotek said her leg-
islative focus has always
been on problem-solving.
“If I spend 10 minutes
to celebrate the passage of
an important bill, my next
question is: What’s next?”
she said. “For me, it’s:
‘How do we fix it? What
do we need to do?’ I think
people respond to that.”
Kotek said the numbers
of Democrats do not tell the
whole story.
“I may have made it
look easy,” she said. “But
it’s a lot of hard work —
constant conversations
with people, and constant
discussions to keep them
engaged. It was gratifying
that we could get so much
done.”
Among the legislative
achievements during her
tenure was the 2019 pas-
sage of the Student Suc-
cess Act, which tied $1 bil-
lion raised annually from a
new corporate activity tax
to specific improvement
programs to boost stu-
dent performance. Gover-
nors and legislatures have
sought ways to boost school
funding for decades, and
particularly after Oregon
voters in the 1990s imposed
limits on local prop-
erty taxes and shifted the
burden of school operating
costs to the state budget.
The 2021-23 budget con-
tains a record $9.3 billion
for the state school fund,
excluding proceeds from
the new tax.
“This Legislature has
really stepped up and pri-
oritized public education,”
Kotek said. “It would have
been nice to have done that
two years earlier. Then it
would have been in place
before the pandemic hit,”
when new staffing for
schools has taken a back
seat to keeping schools
open.
Recent sessions also
approved hundreds of mil-
lions more in state aid for
housing and homelessness
programs during the pan-
demic. But Kotek said there
is more to be done, given
that housing is in short
supply and rose in cost
drastically.
“Resolving the housing
crisis is such an integral
part of the future of this
state, so I will be working
on it” if she is elected gov-
ernor, she said.
Frustrations
If there is one frustration
Kotek has encountered as
a legislative leader, it is the
slow pace of change. Many
of the bills she lists as
achievements took three to
five years to come together.
“Sometimes I wish
things could go faster,
because people need help.
People wonder why things
take so long, but it’s not for
lack of trying,” she said.
Even with a mostly sup-
portive governor, Kotek
said, bills have to pass
the House and the Senate,
where majority Democrats
also have been split.
“You have to work
together as a team to get
things done,” she said.
One other event will
mark Kotek’s tenure. On
June 10, 2021, the House
voted 59-1 to expel Rep.
Mike Nearman, a four-
term Republican from Polk
County, after he was found
to have aided anti-lock-
down protesters — some
of them armed — into a
closed Capitol during a
Dec. 21, 2020, special ses-
sion during the pandemic.
It was the first expulsion
since Oregon became a
state in 1859.
“I think it sent a strong
message that as a bipartisan
group, someone putting
people at risk like that was
unacceptable,” Kotek said.
“Once it was clear what
Rep. Nearman was doing,
there was no question he
needed to be expelled.
I hope we never have to
experience that again.”
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