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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (July 17, 2009)
JULY 17, 2009:NWLP 7/14/09 10:27 AM Page 6 Working Family Party gets bill to start ‘fusion’ voting SALEM — The Oregon Working Families Party is ready to get more ac- tive in electoral politics next year, thanks to an election reform that took three years to pass. Oregonlive.com reported July 9 that Gov. Ted Kulongoski intends to sign Senate Bill 326, which will restore a kind of “fusion” voting to Oregon. Un- der fusion voting, candidates can be nominated by more than one political party. It’s a practice that opens up the two-party-dominated political system and makes minor parties like the union- backed Oregon Working Families Party more competitive. Oregon Working Families Party co- chair Barbara Dudley told the Labor Press SB 326 isn’t all they’d hoped for, but it’s enough that the party can get ac- tive nominating candidates for the No- vember 2010 elections. Full fusion, which the Oregon Work- ing Families Party lobbied hard for in the 2007 session of the Legislature, would give minor parties the option of using their own ballot line to cross- nominate a candidate. In a hypothetical example, voters completing a ballot might fill in the circle for candidate Rick Metsger where his name appeared as a nominee of the Democratic Party, or where it appeared a second time as nominee of the Oregon Working Fami- lies Party. When ballots were counted, Metsger would know how many voters Q backed him because of the Oregon Working Families Party nomination. This kind of fusion existed in Oregon and other states in the 1800s, and con- tributed to the election of populist politi- cians. In 2007, advocates of fusion had commitments from bipartisan majori- ties in each legislative chamber, but couldn’t get Democratic leaders to al- low a vote. That leadership opposition contin- ued this year, so fusion backers pushed a compromise proposal instead, which they called “aggregated fusion” or “fu- sion lite.” As spelled out in SB 326, bal- lots will list, after candidates’ names, all parties that have nominated them. So voters will see that a candidate has more than one party’s backing. “It gives voters information about candidates,” Dudley said, “but doesn’t give candidates information about vot- ers.” The Oregon AFL-CIO stayed neu- tral on the proposal, but the bill had the support of the groups that back the Ore- gon Working Families Party: United Food and Commercial Workers Local 555, Pacific Northwest Regional Coun- cil of Carpenters, Operating Engineers Local 701, Teamsters Local 206, Com- munications Workers of America, Ore- gon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals, and International Long- shore and Warehouse Union. In the end, it passed 42 to 17 in the Quest Investment Management, Inc. House and 25 to 5 in the Senate. There was some doubt about whether the governor would sign it. Leaders of the Democratic Party of Ore- gon were calling for a veto. But fusion backers took their case to the editorial boards of the Oregonian and the Eugene Register-Guard, both of which penned strong calls for the governor to sign the bill. And Dudley got a statewide radio audience for her arguments July 8, with a guest appearance on Oregon Public Broadcasting’s Think Out Loud. Once the bill is signed, Oregon Working Families Party will turn its en- ergy to putting theory into practice. The idea of the party is that working people’s interests aren’t well enough represented by the Democratic or Republican par- ties, and need a party that will focus on bread-and-butter issues. The Oregon Working Families Party doesn’t take po- sitions on social issues that sometimes divide working people politically, like abortion or gun rights. Instead, its plat- form calls for: • Health care for all Oregonians without private profit; • Debt-free higher education and technical training; • Creation of green family-wage jobs; • Affordable housing and an end to predatory lending; and CORRECTION In the July 3 issue of the Northwest Labor Press, an article about the just- concluded Oregon legislative session incorrectly reported that the state’s new top tax rate on personal income will be 9 percent. In fact, 9 percent is the exist- ing top tax bracket, on income over $125,000. The new rate will be 10.8 percent on income over $125,000 and 11 percent on income above $250,000, for tax years 2009, 2010, and 2011, and after that, it will be 9.9 percent on all in- come over $125,000. The Oregon AFL-CIO applauded the change as a move toward greater tax fairness, since it means the well-off will pay an in- creased share of the taxes that fund things like schools and public safety. 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The party collected enough signa- tures to earn statewide ballot status in 2006, but it has been reluctant to run “spoiler” candidates — candidates who are unlikely to win themselves, but might take enough votes away from the more favorable major party candidate to result in a win for the less favorable ma- jor party candidate. However, to maintain its ballot sta- tus, the party did run one statewide can- didate in the 2008 election, and the re- sults proved quite interesting. J. Ashlee Albies, a Portland civil rights lawyer and Working Families Party supporter, was the party’s candidate for Oregon at- torney general. Fellow candidate John Kroger was virtually assured of victory, because he was running with the nomi- nation of both the Democratic and Re- publican parties, plus the support of or- EE R F BARGAIN COUNTER Free classified ads to subscribers DEADLINE: Friday prior to publication Published 1st and 3rd Fridays Now accepting e-mails Send to: Michael492@comcast.net Mail to: NWLP, PO Box 13150, Portland OR 97213 (Please include union affiliation) • 15-20 words • No commercial or business ads • 1 ad per issue • All lower case (NO CAPITAL LETTERS, PLEASE) • Ads MUST include area code or they will not be published Automotive ’99 VW EUROVAN GLS, good shape, 26- 31 mpg hwy, 15-16 mpg town, $9,000. 503-746-4430 ’04 NISSAN FRONTIER crew cab XE 4x4, tow package, 5 speed, 53,500 miles, good condition, $12,995. 360-687-4830 ’56 CHEVY DUMP TRUCK, V-8, two spd rear end, five yarder, $2,500 503 949-6447 KUIK-WAY VALVE and seat grinding equip, all you need to do automotive top end jobs, works well. 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To keep its ballot status, the Working Families Party needed 1 per- cent of the statewide vote; it got almost 11 percent, 161,655 votes — more than twice that of the Green Party candidate and very near the turnout for the con- servative Constitution Party. And the level of support for the Working Fami- lies Party was higher — above 16 per- cent — in counties that tend to vote Re- publican: Crook, Grant, Harney, Klamath, Lake, Malheur, Morrow, Umatilla, Union and Wheeler. Dudley said those results seemed to validate the premise of the party — that working people alienated by the two major parties might be willing to vote for a party that sticks to core issues of economic justice. Miscellaneous SHOP SMITH, all in one machine, lathe, drill press, saw w/ 8 lathe cutters. $600 cash OBO. 503 775-1821 CRAFTSMAN 40” riding mower, motor good, needs gov., $100 OBO. 503 656- 2502 CHIPPER/SHREDDER, 8HP, very good cond, MTD, $175. 503 775-7457 JULY 17, 2009
