PROSPECTORS JUMP TO 6-0 IN CONFERENCE – PAGE B1
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Kate Brown
Knute Buehler
Calls herself a
consensus builder
Rejects
‘partisan labels’
D
OREGON
GOVERNOR
By Paris Achen
By Paris Achen
Oregon Capital Bureau
Oregon Capital Bureau
emocratic Gov. Kate Brown —
the nation’s first openly bisexual
governor and the face of progres-
sive policies such as no co-payments for
reproductive health care — is seeking a
final term as Oregon governor. On Nov.
6, she is up against a moderate Republi-
can, Oregon Rep. Knute Buehler
of Bend, who she defeated
in a 2012 race for sec-
retary of state.
As a Dem-
ocrat, Brown
enters
the
race with an
advantage
among the
state’s lib-
eral-leaning
electorate.
Her cam-
paign
has
focused on
her wealth of
political experi-
ence beginning in
1991 and has sought to
discredit Buehler’s claim to
support pro-choice policies.
In response to Buehler’s outreach to In-
dependents, nonaffiliated voters and even
Democrats, Brown has highlighted the
times when she brought conservatives and
liberals together to address shared prob-
lems. Last year, for instance, she negotiat-
ed with Republicans to secure their votes
for a $5.3 billion transportation package.
“I’m the only one in the race that has
a track record of bringing Oregonians
together to tackle difficult issues facing
Oregon,” Brown said during an editorial
board meeting at Pamplin Media Group
on Sept. 19. “I’m a consensus builder and
a collaborator. And that’s the same kind of
strategies I’ll use if Oregonians give me
the opportunity to serve as governor for
four more years.”
Here are the specifics on where she
stands on the issues:
Education
One of her top priorities for
another term is to improve
the state’s four-year
high school gradu-
ation rate. Only
74.8 percent of
high school se-
niors earned
a diploma in
2016, mak-
ing Oregon’s
the
third
worst
on-
time gradua-
tion rate in the
nation. The first
part of her strate-
gy is to follow the
statute that voters ap-
proved with Measure 98
in 2018.
Brown says she will seek to nearly
double the investment in high school career
and technical education to $300 million in
the next biennium. Secondly, she wants to
expand access to prekindergarten programs
to an additional 10,000 students. She wants
to expand the school year to 180 days.
Finally, she wants to look for ways to im-
prove teachers’ access to professional de-
velopment and mentoring.
D
espite running for governor on
the Republican ticket, state Rep.
Knute Buehler has increasing-
ly used the word “independent” to de-
scribe himself. Buehler says he rejects
the “narrow partisan labels” that have
increasingly polarized the nation.
“Oregon is hungry for an in-
dependent-minded leader
who is able to close a
lot of these divides
... and is a gov-
ernor for every-
one no matter
who you are,
where you
live, who
you love or
even how
you
are
registered
to
vote,”
Buehler said
during a recent
editorial
board
meeting of the Pam-
plin Media Group.
Since his election to the
Oregon House of Representatives in
2014, Buehler has voted both with and
against his party.
This is the second time he has chal-
lenged Democratic incumbent Kate
Brown for state office. That last time
they faced off was for Oregon secretary
of state in 2012, a race won by Brown.
Here are the specifics on where he
stands on the issues:
Health care
Education
Another of her priorities is to in-
crease the number of insured adults from
Buehler released an ambitious outline
earlier this year to boost the state’s public
education system from bottom five among
the states to the top five in five years.
See BROWN, Page A10
“
I’m the only one in the race that has a track
record of bringing Oregonians together to
tackle difficult issues facing Oregon.”
Health care
Buehler has pledged to protect Ore-
gonians from federal cuts to the Medic-
aid program, which provides health care
subsidies for low-income residents, and
to advance the state’s innovative coordi-
nated care organizations. He said
he wants to integrate men-
tal health care into the
Oregon Health Plan
— the state’s ver-
sion of Medic-
aid — and in
health care
delivered by
those CCOs.
He says he
supports
a
wom-
an’s right to
choose but
has been criti-
cized for voting
against the state’s
Reproductive Health
Equity Act, which bans
a co-payment for reproduc-
tive health care and also requires
the Oregon Health Plan to provide that
care to undocumented residents, without
charge.
Housing and
homelessness
Buehler has proposed creating 4,000
emergency shelter beds statewide to get
homeless residents off the streets, partly
with state funding and partly with fed-
eral and philanthropic contributions. He
supports measures to fast-track housing
See BUEHLER, Page A10
“
Oregon is hungry for an independent-
minded leader who is able to close a lot
of these divides.”
McLeod-Skinner brings message to Grant County
Walden’s Democratic challenger calls for consensus
By Richard Hanners
Blue Mountain Eagle
Unlike Republican Sens. Jeff
Flake and the late John McCain,
Rep. Greg Walden has chosen the
path of divisiveness, Jamie Mc-
Leod-Skinner told listeners at a
Sept. 26 town hall meeting in the
Canyon City Community Hall.
The Democratic candidate for
Oregon’s Second Congressional
District, one of the largest in the
U.S., McLeod-Skinner faces an up-
hill battle to defeat Walden, who has
won re-election nine times in a row.
She said she put 41,000 miles on
her car campaigning across Eastern
Oregon.
McLeod-Skinner
accused
Walden of failing to address the
issues constituents are concerned
about and being a top recipient of
campaign donations from the health
care industry.
Three core issues cut straight
across all Eastern Oregon counties,
she said — access to health care,
improved educational opportuni-
ties and “putting food on the table.”
Solving these issues
starts with good
ideas and building
consensus, she said.
McLeod-Skinner
suggested consol-
idating
insurance
Jamie
companies and nego-
McLeod-
tiating pharmaceu-
Skinner
tical prices to deal
with skyrocketing
health care costs. She noted that for
rural residents in Eastern Oregon,
access to health care means more
than cost — it also means physical
proximity. She called for retaining
Obamacare and addressing specific
problems in the affordable care pro-
gram.
Equipped with an engineering de-
gree, a master’s in regional planning
and a law degree, McLeod-Skinner
was a reconstruction and water pro-
gram manager in war-torn Bosnia
See MCLEOD-SKINNER, Page A10
Legislation delisting gray wolves passes House committee
By Dan Wheat
EO Media Group
Contributed photo/ODFW
A young female from the Walla Walla wolf
pack in northern Umatilla County. Legislation
that would take the gray wolf off the federal
list of protected species has passed a U.S.
House committee.
A bill to remove gray wolves
from federal threatened and en-
dangered species lists in the 48
contiguous states has passed the
U.S. House Natural Resources
Committee.
“The best available science
used by the U.S. Department of
Interior and U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service shows that the gray wolf
has recovered and is no longer
endangered,” said Rep. Dan New-
house, R-Washington, co-sponsor
of the Manage Our Wolves Act,
HR 6784, introduced Sept. 12. It
passed the committee 19-15 on
Sept. 26.
Newhouse said he continues to
work with the Washington Depart-
ment of Fish and Wildlife, which
has been asking for federal delis-
ting of the gray wolf since 2013.
“We must return management
of the species to states to allow
for more effective and account-
able management that responds to
the needs of the ecosystem, other
species and local communities,”
Newhouse said.
“Science, not politics, should
decide when to list and delist spe-
cies. Gray wolf recovery is well
underway, but the work is not
done,” said Jason Rylander, De-
fenders of Wildlife attorney. “If
Congress really is committed to
preserving and protecting wildlife,
it would spend its time finding the
funding needed to recover species,
not attacking the process.”
Other sponsors include Reps.
Cathy McMorris Rogers, R-Wash-
ington; Sean Duffy, R-Wisconsin;
and Collin Peterson, D-Minnesota.
Management of gray wolves
was transferred from states to the
federal government following two
2014 U.S. District Court decisions
that reinstated gray wolves under
the protections of the Endangered
Species Act.
The designations leave farmers
and ranchers in those states with-
out a legal avenue to protect their
livestock from wolves, Duffy and
Newhouse have said.
A Newhouse amendment to an
Interior appropriations bill, HR
6147, now in conference com-
mittee between the House and
Senate, also directs the Interior
secretary to delist gray wolves in
the 48 states. HR 6784 is another
legislative path and would require
delisting beyond fiscal year 2019,
a Newhouse aide said.