This content was published: June 19, 2009. Phone numbers, email addresses, and other information may have changed.
Crazy last weeks of the legislative session
Photos and story by Dana Haynes
This is classic last-week-of-session material.
It’s been an awfully tough week so, Thursday, I decided to stay home in the morning, do a little fiction writing, play with my cats. And as soon as my coffee pot gets perking, I get the emergency call from the Oregon Community College Association.
“We need you down here now! It’s a disaster!”
I shower, throw on a suit and break several traffic laws to get there. As I pull up to the OCCA office, their lobbyist John, wanders past. “That? Oh, we solved that. Never mind.”
Like I said: Classic.
I hung around the Capitol for the next disaster and, sure enough, here it came. Somebody told lawmakers that we hadn’t really hired any actual contractors with the deferred maintenance money the Legislature gave us in February.
It’s a good thing I had the list of contractors with me. We had, in fact, hired 25 Oregon contractors, creating 52 jobs for Oregonians, which led to 16 projects going to Minority, Women and Emerging Small Businesses. Oh, and that was just for April.
But this is the way it goes during the last few weeks of every session. Crises emerge, bills get held, hearings get postponed, and it’s either rush-rush or you’re sitting, bored, waiting for the next volcano to blow.
Oddly enough, I love these last few weeks.
dana
About Dana Haynes
Dana Haynes, joined PCC in 2007 as the manager of the Office of Public Affairs, directing the college's media and government relations. Haynes spent the previous 20 years as a reporter, columnist and editor for Oregon newspapers, including ... more »