3A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • TUESDAY, MAY 23, 2017
Legislators pursue changing the
appointment authority for ODOT
Governor
would no
longer appoint
By PARIS ACHEN
Capital Bureau
SALEM – Legislators on
a joint committee to craft a
transportation package plan
to propose shifting authority
to appoint the director of the
Oregon Department of Trans-
portation from the governor
to the Oregon Transportation
Commission.
“If you are going to have
entity with fiduciary responsi-
bility, they need the ability to
appoint the CEO,” said state
Sen. Lee Beyer, D-Eugene, the
committee co-chairman.
Under the proposal, the
five-member
commission
would appoint the direc-
tor “in consultation with the
governor.”
The proposal is one part of
a transportation package that
would raise about $8 billion
over the next 10 years to pay
for projects to relieve conges-
tion and maintain roads and
bridges.
The 14-member committee
met over the past two weeks
to refine points they wanted
to include in the legislation,
which legislative counsel is in
the process of drafting. Law-
makers emphasized that their
agreement for the first draft of
Paris Achen/Capital Bureau
Left to right, Sens. Brian Boquist, R-Dallas, and Lee Beyer,
D-Springfield, talk at the Oregon Capitol earlier this month
before their presentation on the transportation package.
the legislation did not neces-
sarily indicate their support for
all of the provisions. Many of
the finer points will be hashed
out after the first draft is com-
pleted. Co-chairwoman Rep.
Caddy McKeown, D-Coos
Bay, estimated the first draft
would be finished by the end
of May, with public hearings
scheduled afterwards.
The money for the plan
would come from a combina-
tion of hikes in the gas tax and
registration and license fees,
tolls and new taxes on payroll
and purchases of new vehicles
and bicycles. The legislation
also would require a website
where taxpayers could follow
the progress and budgets of
projects in their area and cre-
ate an independent staff for the
Oregon Transportation Com-
mission, which sets policy for
ODOT.
Tammy Baney, the com-
mission’s chairwoman, ear-
lier this year asked Gov. Kate
Brown for a separate staff and
for more involvement in the
appointment of the ODOT
director.
The plan identifies a few
specific projects to ease con-
gestion, but other projects
would be prioritized by the
Oregon Transportation Com-
mission. Specific projects
would:
• Add lanes on Interstate 5
near Portland’s Rose Quarter
from Interstate 84 to Interstate
405.
• Add northbound and
southbound lanes on High-
way 217 through the Portland
metro area.
State House approves
tighter tracking for
medical marijuana
• Widen Interstate 205 to six
lanes from Oregon City to Staf-
ford Road.
• Widen and seismically
reinforce Interstate 205’s Aber-
nethy Bridge.
The plan raises an aver-
age of about $800 million per
year in additional transportation
funding.
The money would come
from increases in the gas tax
and vehicle fees and a set of
new taxes over the next 10
years, including:
• Gas tax increase from 30
cents to 44 cents.
• Tiered increase in title and
registration fees, with higher
increases for fuel-efficient vehi-
cles, which pay less in gas taxes.
• Statewide payroll tax of
one-tenth of 1 percent to pay for
mass transit.
• Tolls to be determined.
• Bicycle excise tax of 5
percent.
• Dealer privilege tax of
1 percent on new vehicle
purchases.
The state spends about $1.3
billion a year on transporta-
tion system maintenance and
upgrades. This proposal would
bring that amount up to about
$2.1 billion.
The committee’s co-chairs
have estimated a vote on the
package could happen as early
as mid-June.
The Capital Bureau is a col-
laboration between EO Media
Group and Pamplin Media
Group.
Child welfare director resigns after six months
By CLAIRE
WITHYCOMBE
Capital Bureau
SALEM — The director
of Oregon’s beleaguered child
welfare division of the state
Department of Human Ser-
vices is stepping down after
six months on the job.
Lena Alhusseini, who
joined the agency in early
November after it conducted a
national search, submitted her
resignation as child welfare
director Wednesday afternoon.
She did not return a phone
message seeking comment.
A department spokesman
declined Friday to provide
answers to further questions
about Alhusseini’s departure.
She will stay on at the
agency, leading an effort to
recruit diverse employees,
until September.
Department of Human Ser-
vices Director Clyde Saiki
announced Alhusseini’s depar-
ture in a statement Friday.
“I respect Lena’s vision
for child welfare — a frame-
work of community engage-
ment and support — and that
essential work will continue,”
Saiki said. “However, Lena
and I agree that we have not
been able to get the results we
need to achieve.”
Saiki himself is retir-
ing in September. He will be
replaced by the director of
the Oregon Youth Authority,
the state’s agency overseeing
juveniles in the criminal jus-
tice system.
Submitted Photo
Lena Alhusseini has resigned as director of Oregon’s be-
leaguered child welfare division of the state Department of
Human Services. She joined the agency in early November.
Both departures come as
the Department of Human Ser-
vices struggles to recover after
significant documented prob-
lems in child welfare. Starting
in 2015, news reports revealed
the agency did a poor job mon-
itoring management and safety
issues at a Portland foster care
provider, prompting further
scrutiny of the system and
calls for a culture change at the
agency.
Under Alhusseini’s direc-
tion, which began shortly after
the agency released a detailed
outside report on the foster
care system’s shortcomings,
the division seemed eager to
make improvements.
Alhusseini came to Ore-
gon from Brooklyn, New
York, where she was executive
director of the Arab-American
Family Support Center.
Earlier this year state law-
makers learned children being
screened after reports of abuse
and neglect remained in unsafe
situations after being deemed
safe by department staff.
In March, Alhusseini
unveiled a new training simu-
lation for social workers. Last
week, she announced an initia-
tive to equip caseworkers with
iPhones and tablets, in what
was portrayed as an effort
to increase productivity and
home visits.
Saiki said that the agency
would continue to emphasize
child safety.
“Moving forward, our
focus must be on the basics,”
Saiki wrote, including cor-
rectly screening reports of
abuse and neglect, ensuring
safe placements and “ensur-
ing ongoing oversight and
support in family foster care
and residential placements.”
“In addition, we must con-
tinue our efforts toward the
culture change needed to put
children’s safety at the center
of every decision and action,”
Saiki said.
According to a spokesman
for the department, Alhussei-
ni’s annual salary of $150,000
will not change with her new
position.
The agency’s deputy direc-
tor of child welfare, Lau-
rie Price, has been appointed
interim director of the division.
The governor set aside
about $1 billion for the child
welfare division in her spend-
ing plan for the next two years.
That figure may change as
state legislators attempt to
make cuts and raise taxes to
fill an overall $1.4 billion bud-
get gap in the upcoming two-
year budget cycle.
Discourages
diversion to
illegal market
By PARIS ACHEN
Capital Bureau
SALEM — The state
House of Representatives
Monday passed a bill 51-7
that requires medical mar-
ijuana to undergo the same
tight-looped tracking as the
recreational product.
“The core purpose of this
bill is to make sure that we
eliminate the illegal market
by enhancing tracking and
other associated things that
will prevent diversion from
Oregon’s legal marijuana
sector to the illegal market,”
said state Rep. Ann Lininger,
D-Lake Oswego, co-chair-
woman of the Joint Commit-
tee on Marijuana Regulation.
The effort to pass the
reforms took on more
urgency after the Trump
administration indicated it
could crack down on mar-
ijuana commerce in states
where the drug has been
legalized, legislators have
indicated.
The requirement is the
most significant of several
tweaks the bill makes to Ore-
gon’s marijuana regulations.
The Senate passed the bill
23-6 earlier this month.
Under existing law, med-
ical producers, processors,
wholesalers and retailers
have to self-report to the Ore-
gon Health Authority how
much marijuana they have.
The bill requires all of that
product to be tracked with
a bar code or computer chip
that follows the plant from a
seedling to its final product.
Pamplin Media Group
The state House Monday
passed a Senate bill tight-
ening regulations for the
tracking of medical mari-
juana. The bill goes to the
governor.
The bill exempts medi-
cal marijuana cardholders
and home growers from the
tracking requirements.
The legislation also
requires:
• Oregon Health Author-
ity to create an electronic
database to track medical
marijuana cardholder activ-
ity and to share that infor-
mation with the Department
of Revenue and the Oregon
Liquor Control Commission.
• Adding two commis-
sioners to the liquor commis-
sion from Eastern Oregon
and western Oregon.
• Financial disclosures
to the liquor commission by
people with a financial inter-
est in a marijuana business
applying for a license.
• The liquor commission
to pursue disciplinary action
against a former licensee
even if the license has been
revoked or suspended. The
liquor commission pre-
viously did not have that
enforcement authority over
former licensees.
The Capital Bureau is a
collaboration between EO
Media Group and Pamplin
Media Group.
W A NTED
Alder and Maple Saw Logs & Standing Timber
N orth w es t H a rdw oods • Lon gview , W A
Contact: John Anderson • 360-269-2500
30 MINUTES
on
MEDICARE BASICS
What Baby Boomers need
to know about Medicare!
Presented by: Teresa
Brown
Teresa Brown Insurance and Lawry/de Freitas Wealth Management, LLC
Seating is limited. Call today to reserve your spot
CALL: (503) 791-0997
CO M ING JUNE 2017 O UR 10 th A NNUA L
Lund - Belsche
David & Kimberly Lund of Astoria,
Oregon are happy to announce the
marriage of their son Dane Robert
Lund to Demi Lea Belshe which
took place on January 29, 2017.
The parents of the bride are
Wayne & Tracy Belshe of Ojai,
California. The ceremony along
with the reception was held at
the Edgewood Gold Resort in
South Lake Tahoe, Nevada.
Accompanying Demi on this
special day was her oldest sister Brittney Yeskie
as her Matron of Honor, and her twin sister Devan
as her Maid of Honor. Her Bridesmaids consisted of sister-in-law
Noelle Lund, cousin Corey Sanders and lifelong friends Natalie
Dwight, Jenn Johnson and Kacie Melton.
Dane’s Best Man was his older brother Hans, along with
groomsmen and close childhood friends Dylan Israel, Max Johnson,
Marcus Brown, Taylor Landwehr, Ian Erickson and Peyton
Gastelum.
C op ies d istrib uted throug hout the year to n orth coast hotels, m otels,
cham b ers of com m erce, visitors b ureaus, cam p g roun d s, restauran ts
an d stores an d in serted in T he D aily Astorian & C hin ook O b server
N ew th is Y ea r!
Boost you r visibility on n ea rly every
pa ge of ou r com m u n ity n ew s sites
a n d rea ch m ore tha n 165,000 people
a m on th on lin e w ith ou r:
F ea tu red Ad P ro g ra m
EX PAN D Y OU R
PALATE ONLINE
•
•
•
•
•
Visit our Virtua l Coa sta l M en u Guide on lin e
T urn th rough virtua l pa ges
Click on direct lin ks to resta ura n t w ebsites
Access a ddition a l in form a tion
coa stw eeken d.com /m en uguide
Dane’s Grandparents are Ardelle & the late Robert Phillips. Demi
has a large group of proud Grandparents Ray & Sandy Hoy living in
Salcha, Alaska, Gary & Pinky Belshe living in Ojai, California and
Dan & Margo Svikhart also living in Ojai, California.
R eserve yo u r a d sp a ce in o u r 10th a n n iversa ry ed i tio n :
The couple both graduated from Oregon State University and reside
in Astoria. The have careers with Bogh Electric & Guild Mortgage.
Con ta ct you r a dvertisin g sa les con su lta n t for m ore in form a tion :
OR E GON : 5 03 -3 25 -3 211• W ASH IN GTON : 800-6 4 3 -3 703
D ea d lin e: M a y 31