Here’s a roundup of the most notable stories and trends the Capital Chronicle covered this year.
A red wave nationally, but not in Oregon
Republicans won the U.S. House, U.S. Senate and the presidency, but they did poorly in Oregon. U.S. Rep Lori Chavez-DeRemer, R-Oregon, to Democratic state Rep. Janelle Bynum, giving Democrats five of the state’s six U.S. House seats. Republicans also : Democrats will hold 18 of 30 Senate seats and 36 of 60 House seats in 2025 after winning a Bend-based Senate district and Woodburn-based House district held by Republicans. And Democrats Tobias Read, Dan Rayfield and Elizabeth Steiner swept statewide races for , attorney general and treasurer.
Democrats including legislative leaders and Gov. Tina Kotek, who was not up for election this year, view the election results as proof that Oregonians support their policies. Kotek’s for the next two years doubles down on spending for housing, homelessness and mental health.
Oregon starts new approach to drug addiction
Oregon lawmakers, alarmed by the state’s crisis of fentanyl addiction and fatal overdoses, made major changes to the state’s drug policy. The Legislature, through , recriminalized low-level drug possession and allowed counties to that allow police to steer drug users into treatment instead of jail.
So far, 28 of Oregon’s 36 counties have started or plan to start deflection programs. From rural, conservative counties to blue Portland, the law allows local officials the flexibility to set up deflection programs as they see fit, including determining who is eligible. Local officials say they are starting small and urged the public to for the programs to succeed. As the 2025 legislative session starts, counties will seek more funding, saying it’s needed for long-term results.
More than have started the program.
Wildfires burn millions of acres — and a hole in the state budget
The year in environmental reporting and ended with the same question: Who will pay for the state’s longer, more intense, more expensive wildfires? For now, the answer is . Meanwhile, in the state is becoming increasingly difficult and expensive due to the threat of wildfires, which burned a record of nearly 2 million acres in 2024, mostly in central and eastern Oregon shrub and grasslands.
The hotter, drier, windier conditions fueling fires are due in large part to climate change, an issue state officials will be able to tackle more aggressively in the next year by reinstating the Climate Protection Program after it was brought by gas companies.
One-third of Oregon Senate barred from running for reelection
On the eve of the 2024 legislative session, the Oregon Supreme Court arguments from Republican senators that they should be allowed to run for reelection despite missing nearly six weeks of floor sessions during a 2023 quorum-denying walkout. Voters frustrated with the increasing use of walkouts approved a constitutional amendment in 2022 to punish any lawmakers with 10 or more unexcused absences by barring them from reelection, and 10 Republican senators responded with the longest walkout in state history to protest bills on abortion, gender-affirming care and guns.
Six of the senators — Brian Boquist of Dallas, Lynn Findley of Vale, Bill Hansell of Athena, Tim Knopp of Bend, Dennis Linthicum of Klamath Falls and Art Robinson of Cave Junction — will leave the Legislature, at least temporarily, in January. Senate Minority Leader Daniel Bonham of The Dalles and Sens. Cedric Hayden of Fall Creek, Kim Thatcher of Keizer and Suzanne Weber of Tillamook have two years left on their terms before they’re barred from running for reelection.
Forest enters the carbon market
It was a good year for trees in Oregon’s state forests, more of which will be spared from intensive logging. The Elliott State Research Forest is being under an agreement to reduce logging, which should allow the forest to capture and store more carbon dioxide, in exchange for millions of dollars in carbon credits. The Capital Chronicle published a into the growing interest in Oregon forests for carbon markets and some of the challenges and opportunities they present.
Another win for forests and the animal species that depend on them was a long-awaited for Western state forests, which will reduce logging by 30% on average across 630,000 acres of state forests in the next 70 years. One tiny school district in the heart of the Clatsop State Forest, however, , alleging the plan would cut into its budget, which is funded entirely with timber revenue from logging on state forests.
First lady’s role leads to exodus of top staff
In March, Kotek’s chief of staff and two other top employees quit or took leave. Public records released by the governor’s office a month later that Kotek’s top staff were concerned about the growing role of Aimee Kotek Wilson, Kotek’s wife, in influencing policy and acting as a public face for the governor.
Kotek announced to hire an aide for Kotek Wilson and create an official “Office of the First Spouse,” then after weeks of pushback. The Oregon Ethics Commission on whether to investigate ethics complaints against Kotek and later advised Kotek that nothing in state law prohibits Kotek Wilson from acting as a volunteer, as long as she doesn’t use that role for personal financial gain.
Record education funding, but schools still struggle
It was a record funding year for Oregon’s 197 public school districts, where students are still in core subjects since the COVID pandemic. Schools got to work implementing new reading and writing programs to boost literacy rates among elementary students, while cell phones were phased out in many schools and the Oregon Department of Education directed districts to to get them away from students during class.
Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek wants another year of record for 2026-2028, including money to cover more than half-a-billion dollars in required from schools to the state’s public pension program, which is struggling with insolvency in the face of historic policy challenges and underperforming investments in recent years.
No more $1 million checks: Lawmakers pass campaign finance limits
Former House Speaker Dan Rayfield often referred to his efforts to pass campaign contribution limits as tilting at windmills — but that quixotic quest succeeded, to widespread surprise, this year. The threat of a ballot measure s among labor unions, the business lobby, good government groups and lawmakers during the five-week legislative session.
The final ,which was passed on wide bipartisan margins and signed by Kotek, takes effect on Jan. 1, 2027. Individuals and corporations will be limited to giving a candidate no more than $3,300 per election, or $6,600 for a candidate who appears in both the primary and general elections while small political committees that accept up to $250 per year from individuals will be able to give up to $10 per donor per election to statewide candidates and $5 per donor per election for other candidates. Unions and other membership organizations will be allowed to give $26,400 per election to a statewide candidate and $13,200 per election to non-statewide candidates.
But that didn’t stop the flow of money this year, with Oregon’s richest man offering gifts for Republicans. While lawmakers debated campaign finance limits, Nike cofounder Phil Knight to a political action committee that tries to elect Republicans to the statehouse.
Oregon Department of Human Services settles class-action lawsuit
The Oregon Department of Human Services settled a five-year-old class-action lawsuit, promising to make reforms to its system that cares for 4,500 children in the state’s foster care system.
The 2019 lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Eugene, alleged the department, agency director Fariborz Pakseresht and the child welfare system failed foster children as they bounced among foster homes, were put up in hotels to home and failed to receive appropriate services. The case, which started the accounts of 10 foster children, gained class-action status in 2022.
Under , the state agency will work on improvements for years with an outside expert and two groups that represented the children in court: Disability Rights Oregon and A Better Childhood, a national nonprofit advocacy group.
Oregon Department of Corrections medical system faces problems
The Oregon Department of Corrections faced a cloud of scrutiny in 2024 for its care of inmates.
In February, an outside accrediting organization found Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Wilsonville, Oregon’s only women’s prison, had of hundreds of medical appointments and months to wait for imaging work. The agency said it would make improvements to its care.
But questions persist for the agency that is responsible for 12,000 inmates in a dozen facilities across the state. Two top in the agency went on administrative leave in December amid an investigation, and officials said an outside expert would investigate management of the agency’s health care system.