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Forty-six years ago today, Mount St. Helens blew her top. Those old enough to remember recall the vivid images on their TV screen. Betsy Johnson has different recollections, ones that not only are seared in her mind but also seared her eyebrows.

Oregon’s Department of Education was designed at statehood to lead Oregon’s students into adulthood with the educational skills necessary to succeed. But its toolbelt has neither a hammer nor a screwdriver. Instead, it leans heavily on masking tape, Gorilla Glue, and notes of encouragement.

Danielle Bethell, a Marion Couty Commissioner, has neither the name recognition nor financial war chest to be reasonably expected to win the primary vote over her well-funded competitors. That low expectation is her advantage at this time and in this circumstance. But winning in May is not anticipated nor needed. She’s prepping for a longer race.

Oregon’s Prosperity Initiative is beginning to show signs of substance, with bipartisan leadership and unfiltered input from more than 1,000 businesses, suggesting it may go beyond a performative exercise. The result isn’t just feedback, but a clear, consistent set of instructions on what needs to change.

This week marks 39 years since Edith Green’s passing. Few younger Oregonians likely have heard of her, but many owe their careers at least in part to the grit and determination of a woman who served Oregon for 20 years in the United States Congress.

Not all candidates running under the “R” or “D” label are genetically the same. On the national level, the MAGA faction has displaced the traditional Republican hierarchy while the far left, characterized by the socialist faction, is attempting to do the same within the Democratic Party.

May is Kentucky Derby time. Mint juleps, flowery bonnets, and thundering hooves. Oregon has its own derby of sorts this May, as candidates break out of the gate and jockey for position to be the state’s next Governor.

Jonas Salk invented the vaccine to prevent polio, Edward Jenner helped curb smallpox, and John Enders put the brakes on the measles. But it took Republicans and Democrats working together to inoculate against the scariest disease in politics — competition.

When Oregon’s Senate rules revealed a mysterious gap that’s lingered for nearly 20 years, it traced back to a quiet but dramatic stand by the late Sen. Avel Gordly. As partisanship rose and transparency faded, Gordly chose principle over party, leaving a lasting mark on the Legislature’s commitment to open government.

If the first week of session was defined by the arrival of the math, the second was defined by the arrival of the calendar.

The first full week of Oregon’s legislative session made one thing clear early. This would not be a session defined by delay.

The foundation of the Oregon Health Plan was the Prioritized List, which ranked covered medical services based on their cost effectiveness coupled with proven medical science efficacy. Now leadership at the Oregon Health Authority has brought forth HB 4003 to eliminate the list from everywhere in statute they can find.

Elected to the Salem City Council years before Mayor Julie Hoy took office, Nordyke is part of the governing body that presided over both the city’s fiscal crisis and its subsequent stabilization during the past year. That reality forecloses the outsider posture and presents a more delicate strategic course — arguing for a change in leadership when the city’s trajectory appears to be improving since the incumbent mayor took office.

For Mayor Julie Hoy, the race for Salem mayor comes down to whether the electorate feels her leadership has been a positive or negative influence on the direction of the city in her first term.

The Political Center is proud to partner with the Salem Business Journal and What’s Happening Salem. The debate will be live-streamed and free to access, continuing the Political Center’s commitment to expanding public access to meaningful, issue-focused civic dialogue.

Bridging the political divide in Oregon has become increasingly challenging in recent years. The task isn’t going to get any easier when the cost of the I-5 bridge balloons into the ozone.

Performing a feat rarely accomplished in modern Oregon electoral history, opponents of the legislature’s high-profile transportation tax bill have successfully used primarily volunteers to gather the necessary signatures to refer the action to the voters. What will Democrats do next?

Coordinated care organizations (CCOs) are valiantly working to ensure health care coverage for hundreds of thousands of Oregonians while facing headwinds of reduced federal funding, increased delivery costs, and the Oregon Health Authority (OHA), which keeps them so awash in expensive bureaucracy and new polices that will increase costs further. 

Bend-based NewSun Energy is calling on Oregon lawmakers to accelerate permitting for solar facilities as new federal policies pose a “massive chilling effect” for the industry.

Salem-Keizer’s transit district, known commonly as Cherriots, is eyeing significant tax increases to achieve more ridership. Currently, Cherriots receives about $16 million per year through local property taxes and another $13 million per year from a statewide tax on workers’ wages, for $29 million in revenue from those sources.

With nearly 1,000 on staff, Bay Area Hospital is the largest employer in the area, providing 27,620 emergency department visits, 138,332 outpatient visits, and 3,702 surgeries annually. Yet, financial challenges threaten its ability to continue this legacy of care.

Gov. Tina Kotek has called this Emergency Session of the Oregon Legislature to pass a funding bill for the fiscally challenged Oregon Department of Transportation. Efforts to solve ODOT’s financial woes missed the closing bell of the 2025 regular session, so Kotek has ordered legislators to summer school to finish their homework.

The Eastern Oregon Economic Summit has quickly become a must-attend annual event. The venue may be Eastern Oregon, but each year the Summit brings valuable and insightful voices from across the Pacific Northwest to share information and lessons.

They say timing is everything, and for advocates of a robust transportation funding bill, timing could not be worse.