3A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, MARCH 24, 2017
State Senate passes bill
to raise smoking age to 21
Bipartisan
support in
the House
By PARIS ACHEN
Capital Bureau
SALEM — The state Sen-
ate Thursday passed a bill to
raise the smoking age to 21.
If the House concurs, Ore-
gon would become the third
state in the nation to prohibit
the sale of tobacco to people
younger than 21.
“The is pure and simple a
public health bill,” said the
bill’s chief sponsor, state Sen.
Elizabeth Steiner Hayward,
D-Beaverton.
The bill passed 18- 9,
with all Democrats and two
Republicans, Sen . Jackie
Winters of Salem, and Sen.
Bill Hansell of Athena, vot-
ing in favor. Winters and
Democrat swing vote Sen.
Betsy Johnson of Scap-
poose changed their votes. A
Republican, Rep. Rich Vial
of Scholls, co-sponsored the
bill with Steiner Hayward.
Both lawmakers have said
they lost loved ones to tobac-
co-related diseases.
Sen. Alan Olson, R-Canby,
argued the bill looked like the
work of a “nanny state.”
“I
appall
smoking,”
Olson said. But the senator
said he felt people have the
right to make that choice for
themselves.
Sen. Ted Ferrioli, R-John
Day, said people who are old
enough to serve in the mili-
tary ought to be able to decide
whether they want to smoke.
He said the law change would
create a new illicit market for
people between the ages of
19 and 21.
Steiner Hayward, who is
a family physician, retorted
that states have prohibited
people younger than 21 from
drinking alcohol and that
alcohol is less addictive than
tobacco.
Recent research, including
some from the U.S. Surgeon
General’s Offi ce, shows that
brains under age 26 are more
susceptible to addiction.
The legislation would
impose fi rst-time civil pen-
alties of $50 for clerks and
$500 for managers who sell
to minors.
“We made a conscious
decision not have criminal
penalties because we know
that tobacco companies tend
to target low-income com-
munities who can least afford
it,” Steiner Hayward said.
Taking 18- to 20-year-
olds out of the legal market
would result in an estimated
loss in tobacco tax revenue
of $1.6 million every two
years, according to a projec-
tion by the Legislative Reve-
nue Offi ce.
An increase in the tobacco
tax proposed by Gov. Kate
Brown could offset some of
that loss.
In 2015, Hawaii became
the fi rst state in the nation to
raise the smoking age to 21.
California followed suit last
year. An additional 210 cities
and counties, including New
York City and Boston, have
similar laws.
The Capital Bureau is a
collaboration between EO
Media Group and Pamplin
Media Group.
Advocates, legislators seek more
money for Oregon veteran services
By CLAIRE
WITHYCOMBE
Capital Bureau
SALEM — Oregon vet-
erans’ groups have been up in
arms since the governor’s bud-
get reduced allocations to the
state Department of Veterans’
Affairs from the state’s general
fund and backfi lled it with most
of the lottery fund dollars set
aside for veterans’ services by a
voter-approved ballot measure.
Now they’ve brought
their concerns to a Legisla-
ture busy trying to fill a $1.6
billion shortfall.
Measure 96 amended the
state’s constitution to allo-
cate 1.5 percent of state lot-
tery net proceeds to direct
services for veterans.
Advocates have been
vocal about what they say is
a need for more support —
such as for veterans’ services
officers, who help returned
veterans sign up for federal
benefits.
Byron Whipple, a vet-
erans’ services officer in
Union County, told legis-
lators last month that in his
area of northeastern Ore-
gon, veterans face problems
accessing travel to get med-
ical care.
In February, community
members housed a 75-year-
old veteran with dementia
for five days because local
agencies could not arrange
services for him sooner,
Whipple wrote in testimony
to the Ways and Means
Subcommittee on Trans-
portation and Economic
Development.
“We do not have local
missions and shelters that
certain cities and counties
have,” Whipple wrote. “We
do not have the extra tax dol-
lars to fund these emergen-
cies. Last November, we did
have hope.”
Warrenton hears
school bond options
School district
tries to cope
with growth
By EDWARD
STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
WARRENTON
—
Rick Yeo, a principle
with R&C Management
Group who has worked
on more than 300
school building proj-
ects, told the Warren-
ton-Hammond School
Board Thursday that any
new academic building
would likely cost about
$600 per square foot.
Yeo was brought in to
advise the Warrenton-Ham-
mond School Board, which
faces the challenge of how
to accommodate a quickly
growing student popu-
lation, on what the dis-
trict might be able to do
with a drastically scaled-
back potential bond from
what members had been
considering.
The school district
had discussed the pos-
sibility of asking voters
for a large bond to relo-
cate the district to higher
ground, similar to Sea-
side School District’s
$100 million move to
an uphill K-12 cam-
pus away from the tsu-
nami zone. But Warren-
ton-Hammond recently
learned from state bond
expert Carol Samuels
that the local assessed
property value of $690
million would only
allow a $69 million bond
at maximum. Superin-
tendent Mark Jeffery
said Samuels explained
the biggest bond the dis-
trict could realistically
get voters to support is
between $20 million and
$30 million.
Yeo said the first thing
the district should do is fig-
ure out the millage rate,
used to calculate taxes on
property. He said bonds
costing property owners
about $2.50 per $100,000 in
assessed property value are
the sweet spot for smaller
districts.
Yeo shared a budget for
the new school building his
company is working on for
Gaston School District for
nearly $17 million. “That’s
about a 30,000-square-
foot building we’re build-
ing. We’re spending $560 a
square foot. That’s in Gas-
ton. Your buildings here cost
upwards of 10 percent more.”
Jeffery said the district
is looking to add eight or
nine classrooms over what
it has now, to accommo-
date growth 20 years down
the road. The district has
focused on adding the space
at Warrenton High School,
where it would relocate
middle school grades to
ease congestion at Warren-
ton Grade School, now one
of the most populous K-8
schools in the state with
more than 700 students.
Yeo said 30,000 square
feet would be needed to
add that many rooms, with
the district likely tearing
down an old part of the high
school and building a new,
two-story structure. He said
a budget of about $600 per
square foot would cover all
the various engineers, archi-
tects, testing, construction
and other costs. At such an
estimate, a 30,000-square-
foot building would cost
about $18 million.
The district recently
took out a $2 million
bond financed in-house
to add several classrooms
at the grade school in the
interim. The bond included
a set-aside of $200,000 to
$250,000 to prepare for a
potentially larger, voter-ap-
proved bond.
Yeo said that while the
public generally doesn’t
like school districts spend-
ing money, they do want dis-
tricts to be prepared before
asking for public funding.
“If you wanted to move
forward, the next step would
(be to) bring an architect out
here and start going through
your facilities,” Yeo said.
At the end of the meet-
ing,
Jeffery
reminded
school board members that
the district has about five
years before a glut of 100-
plus classes reaches the
high school. District staff
has estimated class sizes
in Warrenton, previously
in the 60s, will average
about 90 for the foresee-
able future.
“It does sound like we
need to keep nudging this
forward,” Jeffery said,
“because I don’t think any-
thing has changed in our
estimation that enrollment
is going to continue to
grow.”
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