Oregon's healthcare system is fragmented, expensive, and crisis-driven. Behavioral health, substance use, housing instability, and physical health are treated as separate problems by separate agencies. They are not. We spend so much on private administration and bureaucratic redundancy when we should be paying for care.

What I think we should do:

• Support the work of Healthcare for All Oregon to bring Universal healthcare in 2027, pass the legislation to transition from OHP and employer-sponsored insurance into a single pool

• Single-payer largely pays for itself through administrative consolidation and eliminating insurer overhead

• Integrate behavioral health, substance use treatment, and primary care under one system

• Ask hard questions about where we might replicate the status quo's mistakes

• Use the opportunity to pilot plant medicine and alternative modalities where evidence supports it

• Preventative care as both humanitarian policy and cost-saving strategy

EDUCATION

The problem:

Oregon ranks 47th nationally in academic proficiency while asking teachers to be educators, social workers, mental health providers, and crisis responders simultaneously. That is not sustainable.

What I think we should do:

• Treat care as the precondition for education — kids can't learn in crisis

• Pilot a four-term balanced calendar in willing districts — teachers rotate through three of four terms, not more work for the same pay

• Expand the credentialing pipeline for existing caregivers

• Partner with the Ballmer Institute model to embed behavioral health support in schools

• Flexible credit for farm work, volunteering, summer jobs, and apprenticeships

• Connect K-12 more directly to higher education through dual enrollment and civic internships

• Use federal Department of Education disruption as an opportunity to build something Oregon-specific

HOUSING

The problem:

Oregon is short roughly 140,000 homes. When supply is constrained, landlords keep rents high regardless of wages. Displacement costs are real — they show up in emergency rooms, schools, and city budgets — but they're paid by everyone except the people who cause them.

What I think we should do:

• Social depreciation tax on large institutional landlords — if you extract value from a community, you pay for the damage

• Rebuild SRO housing stock through an institutional owner / nonprofit operator model

• Expand community land trusts using patient capital — PERS investment as a potential vehicle

• Scale-based displacement penalties and maintenance deferral fees

• Community reinvestment requirements for large portfolio owners

HOMELESSNESS

The problem:

73% of Portland's homeless population lived in the tri-county area before they lost housing. This is primarily a housing supply and affordability crisis, not a services crisis — though services matter too.

What I think we should do:

• Housing supply is our main lever — support continued permitting reform and housing production

• Different interventions work for different people — rapid rehousing for some, intensive wraparound services for others

• End siloed services — coordinated intake across behavioral health, housing, and primary care

• Real-time shared data across agencies — monthly, not annual point-in-time counts

• Universal healthcare as the structural fix that makes coordination possible

• Rebuild the missing middle — SROs and transitional housing between shelter and apartment

• West coast regional coordination as federal support becomes less reliable

IMMIGRATION

The problem:

Unaccountable enforcement — masked agents with no identification operating without coordination with local law enforcement — creates conditions for violence, robbery, and sexual assault against everyone, regardless of status. That is not law enforcement. That is a public safety threat.

What I think we should do:

• Protect Oregon's sanctuary status — it reflects our values and I will defend it

• Accountability is not optional — no masked agents, visible identification numbers required, enforcement must be coordinated within jurisdictions

• Oregonians should be able to verify that people exercising authority over them are actually following the law

• This is not an anti-enforcement position — it is a rule of law position

PLANT MEDICINE

The problem:

Oregon has led the country on cannabis legalization and therapeutic psilocybin — then repeatedly strangled those industries with regulatory proliferation while offering no strategic support. Entrepreneurs took enormous personal risk to build something legitimate inside federal frameworks that are opaque, contradictory, and designed for a different era.

What I think we should do:

• Oregon should be a national leader in defining what good policy looks like for plant medicine integration — cannabis, hemp, and therapeutic psilocybin

• Regulators should help Oregon businesses compete, not just add friction

• Federal Schedule 1 classification creates market distortions that fall hardest on small operators — Oregon should actively advocate for federal descheduling

• Integrate plant medicine into healthcare where evidence supports it — this is both a wellness and an economic opportunity

• The people who built Oregon's legal cannabis industry deserve a governor who shows up for the conversation

DEMOCRACY AND POLITICAL REFORM

The problem:

Oregon's political system is pay-to-play. The voters pamphlet fee, campaign finance structures, and institutional gatekeeping make it harder for new voices and ideas to enter public life. Elected officials keep kicking the can down the road, and parties maintain false binaries and bureaucratic structures that exclude voters and new ideas.

What I think is important:

• No PAC money — unequivocal

• Competitive open primaries matter — they produce better candidates and better policy

• Time and Dignity Test applied to all public services: does this keep people housed, healthy, and treated with respect? Does it respect their time?

• Transparent, accountable government — metrics, data, and honest reporting on what's working

FEDERAL RESILIENCE / WE SAVE US

The problem:

Federal funding, mandates, and program structures that Oregon has relied on are becoming unreliable or actively hostile. Oregon needs to build resilience, not just resistance.

What I think we should do:

• Build state-level capacity to replace federal programs where necessary — healthcare, education, housing

• West coast coordination with Washington, California, and others on shared infrastructure and policy

• Treat federal disruption as an opportunity to design Oregon-specific systems that actually work for Oregonians

• Fiscal honesty — we need to know what we can fund at the state level and what requires new revenue mechanisms

Governing for Real Life

Dignity, Time, and Accountability in a System That’s Lost All Three

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