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2025-26 Legislative Priorities

2025-2026 Legislative Priorities Approved by LOC Board of Directors

As part of the legislative priorities, the LOC Board added one additional priority in response U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Johnson v. Grants Pass. This issue was not part of the original ballot because there was no decision from the court at the time ballots were created. The LOC Board of Directors reviewed options to address this issue during its October 16 meeting, and passed a resolution represented in Legislative Priority #9 below.

The following represent the top priorities the LOC will advance over the next two years. It’s important to understand that in addition to the top nine issues below, the remaining legislative recommendations brought forward by the seven policy committees remain part of the overall focused advocacy effort from the LOC’s lobby team. We also use the LOC’s Municipal Policy and Organizational priorities to evaluate all legislation.  Listed below each priority description are the primary LOC contacts for each:

1)    Community Infrastructure and Housing Development Funding - The LOC will advocate for a comprehensive infrastructure package that supports increased water, sewer, stormwater, and road investments from the state. Without continual infrastructure investments, communities cannot build needed housing; these two priorities are inherently linked. To this end, the LOC will advocate for continued state investments to support the development and preservation of a range of needed housing types and affordability.

Michael Martin – mmartin@orcities.org
Alexandra Ring – aring@orcities.org
Jim McCauley – jmccauley@orcities.org

2)    2025 Transportation Package - The LOC will support a robust, long-term, multimodal transportation package focused on: stabilizing funding for operations and maintenance for local governments and ODOT; continued investment in transit and bike/ped programs, safety, congestion management; and completion of projects from HB 2017. This objective includes support for a transition from gas tax to road user fee and improved community safety and livability.

Jim McCauley – jmccauley@orcities.org

3)    Recreational Immunity - The LOC will introduce legislation to protect cities and other landowners who open their property for recreational purposes from tort liability claims.

Scott Winkels – swinkels@orcities.org

4)    Behavioral Health Enhancements - The LOC will support legislation to expand access to behavioral health treatment beds and allow courts greater ability to direct persons unable to care for themselves into treatment through the civil commitment process.

Scott Winkels – swinkels@orcities.org

5)    Lodging Tax Flexibility - The LOC will advocate for legislation that increases the flexibility to use locally administered and collected lodging tax revenue to support tourism-impacted services. These services include public safety, community infrastructure, and housing-related investment.  

Jenna Jones – jjones@orcities.org

6)    Shelter Funding and Homeless Response - The LOC will support a comprehensive homeless response package to fund the needs of homeless shelters, response efforts statewide, and capital projects. Funding will include baseline operational support to continue and strengthen coordinated regional homeless response and include a range of shelter types and other related services.

Alexandra Ring – aring@orcities.org

7)    Address Energy Affordability Challenges from Rising Utility Costs - The LOC will support actions to maintain affordable, reliable, and resilient energy resources and invest in programs and new technology that support energy efficiency, renewable energy, battery storage, and resilient communities. These efforts will help address members’ concerns about increased costs associated with energy usage.

Nolan Pleše – nplese@orcities.org

8)    Operator-In-Training Apprenticeships - The LOC will advocate for funding apprenticeship training programs and expanding bilingual training opportunities to promote the workforce development of qualified wastewater and drinking water operators.

Michael Martin – mmartin@orcities.org

9)    ORS 195.530 Johnson v. Grants Pass - The LOC will advocate public policy that allows cities to respond to the unique needs of their community’s housed and unhoused members. This advocacy will include adjustments to ORS 195.530 to provide cities with the necessary tools to address unsafe camping conditions, safeguard public spaces, and protect the health, safety, and wellness of all community members.

Alexandra Ring – aring@orcities.org
Jim McCauley – jmccauley@orcities.org
Scott Winkels – swinkels@orcities.org

Detailed descriptions of each priority are available here.

Get Involved - Join the LOC's Advocacy Efforts in 2025!

As we enter the 2025 session, member grassroots advocacy will remain a key factor in the LOC’s ability to achieve our top legislative priorities and protect our members from continued efforts to reduce “Home Rule” authority. The LOC lobby team will reach out throughout the session and in the interim to ensure we can expand our reach with every state elected official. Those local-state relationships in your communities are critical to the overall outcome of the legislative process.

Stay tuned during the session for weekly legislative reports and calls to action. We’ll schedule Friday Zoom meetings beginning the second week of January and as needed throughout the session.

Attend City Day at the Capitol on January 28 in Salem. We’ll have a full slate of activities for members, including an opportunity to hear from Governor Kotek, legislative leadership, and the LOC’s lobby team. There will also be sessions to learn more about lobbying, how to secure funding for your communities and opportunities to meet directly with your state legislators. In addition, Irma Esparza Diggs, Senior Executive and Director of Federal Advocacy from the National League of Cities (NLC) will be sharing the latest on federal advocacy. Registration opens December 3.

Your lobby team is up to the challenge, and I’m confident every member city is as well. Join us in our efforts to represent your local community’s interests.

Contact: Jim McCauley,  Legislative Director jmccauley@orcities.org

LOC Organizational Priority

In addition to adopting legislative priorities for 2025-26, the LOC Board has adopted an overarching organizational priority that will be a focus for grassroots advocacy between cities and their respective legislators, and for the LOC’s advocacy team to use as a key message with legislative leadership and the governor’s office.

The purpose of this organizational priority is to make it clear to the state that cities play an integral role in providing critical core services to our citizens, but are being asked to do more with fewer resources.  In past legislative sessions, the LOC has  seen unfunded mandates, attacks on local revenues and preemption of local control. Many cities are facing significant budget challenges that have been intensified by  recent events, but the need for critical core service delivery remains and is more even more important due to these unprecedented times. The LOC is urging the state to partner with us, and more importantly, to avoid legislation that could further restrict a city’s ability to meet core service delivery and address the challenges of city budgets.

The LOC’s Intergovernmental Relations team will be communicating the following specific principles below as part of this organizational priority.

• Reform Oregon’s Property Tax System.  The LOC Board added this organizational priority to elevate it as a priority for organizational change. The current system based on Measures 5 and 50, which 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. As a result of recent and past legislative action, cities have been inundated with mandates that require additional resources to implement new programs or work without the necessary funding to support these new programs and workload. This shifts resources away from important core service delivery.
• Preserve Local Decision-making and Problem-solving Authority. Local control and decision-making remain a core function of local government and must be preserved to most effectively address challenges that Oregonians face. What works in one city may not work in another. While cities often experience similar overall challenges, the factors that drive those challenges are often unique and, as a result, solutions need to be tailored to address the unique aspects of each community.
• Preserve Local Revenue Streams. Only a few tools are available for cities when it comes to funding essential, local services. It’s critical that cities remain in control of finite revenues from state shared revenues, franchise/right-of-way fees, lodging taxes, system development charges, rate revenues and property taxes. These revenue streams should be preserved at all costs. Cuts or limitations to these revenue resources represent cuts to the core services that our citizens rely on and expect.
• Serve in a Supportive Role to Provide Local Tools and Resources. We ask the state to partner with us to recognize the budget realities and constraints of local governments, and to work with us to identify opportunities for targeted investments and tools to address needs at the local level. The cost of providing services has increased and revenues have not kept pace.
• Avoid Shifting Additional Costs to Local Government Partners. Decreased general fund and lottery revenues could result in further shifting of state programmatic costs onto local governments. This includes programmatic and agency funding that currently relies on 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 citizens, or further cuts to the services they rely on.