LOC News
LOC Board Approves 2023 Legislative Priorities
At a special meeting today in Independence, the LOC Board of Directors unanimously adopted eight legislative priorities for cities for the 2023 and 2024 sessions. During the spring, seven policy committees met and selected a list of 28 legislative priorities for the LOC’s membership to rank. Cities submitted their ballots over the past 3 months, and the LOC Intergovernmental Relations team then developed a list of the top eight priorities where their efforts will be focused over the next two years. These priorities were based on the overall votes received, with 135 cities responding to the ballot ranking process and more than 80% of the registered votes coming from cities with less than a population of 20,000.
Please note - the remaining priorities will still be part of the LOC’s core advocacy work for over the next two sessions and will remain key issues for the LOC lobby team.
The following are the LOC’s top eight legislative priorities for 2023 and 2024:
1) Infrastructure Financing and Resilience
The LOC will advocate for an increase in the state’s investment in key infrastructure funding sources, including, but not limited to, the Special Public Works Fund (SPWF), Brownfield Redevelopment Fund, Regionally Significant Industrial Site program, and set asides through the SPWF for seismic resilience planning and related infrastructure improvements to make Oregon water and wastewater systems more resilient. In addition, the LOC will advocate for funding resources of critical infrastructure that provides incentives for needed housing so there are more affordable housing options available.
2) Local Funding to Address Homelessness
The LOC will seek funding to support coordinated, local responses to addressing homelessness. The LOC recognizes that to end homelessness, a statewide and community-based coordination approach to delivering services, housing, and programs is needed. Addressing homelessness will look different and involve different service provider partners from one city to the next, but one thing is consistent, addressing the crisis requires significant financial resources.
3) Address Measure 110 Shortcomings
The LOC will support restoration of criminal justice incentives for seeking treatment for addiction, while ensuring a path for expungement for successfully completing a treatment program.
4) Economic Development Incentives
The LOC will support legislation to preserve and strengthen discretionary local economic development incentives including the Enterprise Zone (EZ), Long Term Rural Enterprise Zone (LTREZ) and Strategic Investment Program (SIP).
5) Community Resiliency and Wildfire Planning
The LOC will support investments for climate and wildfire resiliency planning, as well as infrastructure upgrades, to fill existing gaps and assist cities in planning for extreme weather events and wildfire.
6) Transportation Safety Enhancement
The LOC supports legislation that improves the overall safety of the transportation network in communities. The LOC will achieve this outcome by expanding authority for establishing fixed photo radar to all cities, increasing flexibility for local speed setting authority, and increased investment in the “safe routes to schools” and expansion of the “great streets” programs.
7) Full Funding and Alignment for State Land Use Initiatives
The LOC will support legislation to streamline and fully fund local implementation of any recently adopted or proposed state land use planning requirements, including administrative rulemaking.
8) Lodging Tax Flexibility
The LOC will advocate for legislation to enhance flexibility in how cities may use transient lodging tax revenues. The goal is to help cities better serve visitors and improve local conditions that support the tourism industry.
Organizational Priorities
Oregon’s cities are concerned by the state’s growing reliance on local governments to implement new state policy with little or no resources to support the changes at the local level. Cities have been challenged by new state requirements for expanded service delivery of homeless services, extensive and unfunded land use planning updates, changes in public safety policy, and land use updates for wildfire risk reduction. Cities will play a critical role in implementing changes in policy, but the state needs to recognize the limitations of local resources and support cities in these efforts.
In addition to the legislative priorities listed above, the LOC Board adopted a set of organizational priorities, including the addition of property tax reform, which was second in the overall membership rankings. By adding property tax reform to the priority list, the board has effectively elevated the significance of the issue. The following are the adopted organizational priorities:
- Reform Oregon’s Property Tax System. The current system based on Measures 5 and 50 that were adopted by voters in the 1990s is inequitable to property owners and jurisdictions alike, is often inadequate to allow jurisdictions to provide critical services, removes meaningful local choice, and is incomprehensible to most taxpayers. Reform has been a longstanding priority for cities and the LOC will continue to advocate for constitutional and statutory reforms to enhance local choice, equity, fairness, and adequacy.
- Avoid Unfunded Mandates. During recent legislative sessions, our cities have been inundated with mandates that require them to take on additional work and shift priorities away from locally identified priorities to those that the state deems to be of greater importance.
- Preserve Local Decision-Making and Problem-Solving Authority. While local communities often face similar challenges, the solutions and tools necessary to address those challenges are rarely the same for each local community. What works in one city, may not work in another.
- Preserve Local Revenue Streams. Local governments only have a few tools in their toolbox when it comes to sources that fund essential city services. With federal pandemic aid coming to an end and inflation at historic levels cities will start to rely more on the finite revenues from state shared revenues, franchise/ROW fees, lodging taxes, and property taxes. Therefore, these revenue streams should be preserved at all costs.
- Support Policies that Provide Local Tools and Resources. We recognize that the state budget is severely constrained, and we are committed to recognizing this reality as we pursue legislative and programmatic investments. We ask that the state similarly recognize the budget realities of local governments and work to identify opportunities for targeted investments and tools to address needs at the local level.
- Avoiding Shifting of Additional Costs onto Local Government Partners. We are concerned that decreased general fund revenues could result in further shifting of state programmatic costs on local governments. This includes program funding that includes a split of general fund and fees that may be paid by local governments. Any increase in fees to support state programs should be accompanied by an equitable increase in general fund investment. Increased costs to local governments mean increased costs for our residents, or further cuts to the services they rely on.
Survey results from the Priority Ballot can be accessed here.
Contact: Jim McCauley, Legislative Director - jmccauley@orcities.org
Last Updated 8/26/22