Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

PCC has the mom of a lawmaker on staff

Photos and story by Dana Haynes

I’ve been crowing that PCC has three solid links to the 2009 Legislature: Sen. Margaret Carter is a former counselor at the Cascade Campus; Rep. Larry Galizio teaches at Sylvania; and Rep. Michael Dembrow teaches at Cascade.

But, it turns out I miscounted.

Friend-of-the-blog Mark Schwebke pointed out that we have a fourth connection. Ann Kopel is a part-time instructor in the Adult Basic Education Program at the Southeast Center. And when she’s not doing that, she’s the mom of freshman lawmaker Jules Kopel Bailey.

Rep. Bailey was elected for the first time this November and takes the seat that was vacated by Diane Rosenbaum. She, in turn, has moved over to the Senate side of the Capitol.

Bailey’s district is in central eastside Portland: sort of the Burnside, Hawthorne, Powell areas, smack against the east side of the Willamette River.

And he pulled some good committees in this, his freshman year. He’s on the Environment and Water Committee, the Sustainability and Economic Development Committee and the Transportation Committee. More impressively, he’s vice-chairman of the Revenue committee, and that’s huge. Rookies don’t often get vice-chairs. And Revenue is an important committee this year, when many people are clamoring for comprehensive tax reform in Oregon.

If, for instance, we see a new tobacco tax dedicated to health care for Oregon youths in poverty, that likely would see the light of day in Rep. Bailey’s committee. If Oregon implements a new corporate minimum tax, Revenue is the likely committee.

I asked Ann if I could “out” her as a House member’s mom. “You can mention that PCC has a lawmaker’s mom.” She said. “I know that he is very proud of the work I do with immigrants at PCC and that workforce development issues and funding are very high on his list of priorities.”

I also asked if she was proud of her kid for getting elected (it makes the top 5 list of stupid questions I’ve asked in my lifetime). “Indeed, I’m proud,” she said (well, der…), “but much more than that I’m extremely hopeful because of the makeup of this session’s Oregon Legislature and because of the new leadership in Washington.”

Well said, Ms. K.