2008 Legislative Agenda
Article 1: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Individuals and Family Members
Shelter, Food, Health Care and a Living Wage: Securing the Basic Necessities of Life
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Adopt a comprehensive Oregon health care system that provides universal coverage accessible to all Oregonians which includes a publicly owned publicly administered, not-for-profit health care plan as one of the options available to Oregonians.
Provide incentives to encourage the sustainable production and consumption of locally grown foods, which will both boost and diversify local economies and reduce dependence on fossil fuel transportation.
Define a living wage adequate to meet the minimum requirements of housing, food, health care and other necessary services for families and individuals in all regions of the state.
Ensure basic food and shelter needs are met for all seniors.
Provide full funding to address the ongoing needs of veterans, including members of the Oregon National Guard and Reservists who have returned from active duty, for medical care, mental health services, dental care, basic housing, and other programs that assist in their transition back into civilian society.
Require Oregon cities and counties to develop a plan intended to end homelessness in 10 years. Provide financial support throughout the State to counties, individuals, and families for facilitating programs aimed at preventing and ending homelessness.
Article 1: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Individuals and Family Members
Human Rights: Guaranteeing Equal Rights for all People
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Extend the Right of Habeas Corpus to any individual held against their will by the United States Government, or any governmental entity with the power of incarceration, or any contracted entities of the United States Government. We oppose executive orders, administrative actions or legislation that permits otherwise.
Require the U.S. Government, its military personnel, agents, and civilian contractors to ban torture and rendition, and strictly adhere to the Geneva Conventions and U.N. Convention on Torture. Principles of these conventions shall apply to all individuals, wherever held by such entities.
Guarantee equal legal status and equal treatment to all committed relationship partners in State and Federal Constitutional Law and Legislation. We support amending the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to include gender identity, and support passage of hate crimes legislation to include sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes.
Provide oversight of prison contractors. Address the crisis of our burgeoning prisoner population, inhuman prison conditions, emphasizing sustainable reform, rehabilitation training, and after-prison job programs, which provide sustainable post-prison results. Ban the death penalty.
Ensure individuals have the right to make birth control, reproductive, and end of life decisions without interference.
Address the epidemic of homelessness in our communities, including measures to reach out to those affected by economic collapse. Legislation shall mandate support critical to the homeless, including emergency response and training to facilitate their reentry into productive roles in their communities.
Article 2: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Members of a Community
Public Education: Taking Responsibility to Prepare for Life Long Learning
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Provide for financial stability, adequacy and equity for all Oregon public education students, based upon the Quality Education Model level, a K-12 school year of at least 175 full instructional days with smaller class sizes, supporting in-state students, restoring lower tuition and vital programs in public higher education.
Provide for the breadth and depth of services Oregon's students need, including parenting and early childhood education, Head Start for all who qualify, pre-school programs, and adequate counseling. Include instruction in critical thinking, citizenship (civics), art, physical education, music, vocational, special education, and library services at every school.
Restore and expand federal and state scholarship, grant (including Oregon Opportunity Grant) and loan programs so that students from all economic backgrounds can attend and graduate from public vocational, community college, college and university programs.
Provide, at all education levels, for the replacement of antiquated public education facilities and equipment, repair of existing facilities, and new construction to meet changing needs of our population.
Resist unfunded mandates and insist the Federal Government fulfill its promises to fund previously mandated programs.
Provide educational access for all through equity of services and courses available, providing for distances from the university, central offices, cultural, social, economic and language backgrounds or disability of students, while recognizing the unique needs of each student.
Article 2: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Members of a Community
Revenue Policy: Paying a Fair Share and Endowing Future Generations
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Repeal the double-majority requirements that restrict the right of voters and elected representatives to adopt legislation related to raising revenue and adjusting the tax system.
Require that initiatives include a fiscal impact statement and identify the revenue source.
Place the individual and the corporate tax kickers into a permanent rainy day fund.
Support restoration of the Secure Rural Schools Self Determination Act, which provides assistance to formerly timber-dependent counties in wake of declining timber sales, to allow counties sufficient revenue to maintain adequate levels of service for schools, police, roads, libraries and other services.
Sunset and periodically review all tax expenditures, loopholes and credits for businesses and individuals to verify that they are still serving a valid purpose and repeal or reform as needed.
Return to the three factor formula for calculation of corporate income tax.
Article 3: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Workers and Business People
Business and Economic Development: Creating a Viable Economy
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Support a sustainable plan with long-term goals to generate green business practices and economic development. Promote transfer of ecologically sound technology to new business development.
Continue to invest in intelligent transportation systems, highways, bridges, rail, aviation, marine and transit projects across the state to keep Oregon’s transportation infrastructure competitive, building on “Connect Oregon II” passed in 2007.
Increase the number of highly qualified workers through Oregon's education system and apprenticeship programs and improve small business success through assistance with business planning, marketing, and financial management.
Protect the thousands of present jobs and billions of dollars now earned for Oregon's economy in commercial shipping, fishing, manufacturing and trade that will be jeopardized by the exclusion zones, priority passages, navigation delays and dangers from LNG mega-tankers.
Increase the BETC (Business Energy Tax Credit) cap for those businesses that use, develop or promote sustainable alternative energy. Those that do not should be taxed.
Restore funding and authority to the Oregon Economic and Community Development Department to at least pre-2006 levels, and distribute funds equitably to rural, urban and suburban communities throughout Oregon, to foster business innovation and economic strength in promotion of the statewide common good.
Article 3: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Workers and Business People
Forest, Field, Range, and Fisheries: Supporting Oregon’s Farmers, Ranchers and Foresters
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Make forest restoration a priority. Oregon’s remaining old growth forests must be preserved. Best forest practices should be followed in all logging to protect the watersheds.
Prevent the further privatization of Oregon's public water supply. All resource management should recognize Oregon’s responsibility to manage the sustainable allocation of water and to maintain the highest water quality standards.
Protect Oregon’s critical forest, range and farmlands from loss or development that will further jeopardize the needs of future generations.
Protect Oregon’s fisheries so naturally spawning, native fish stocks are maintained and increased, using fish reserves, or marine protected areas, dam removal or improvements, habitat restoration, and pollution reduction measures.
Continue to manage Oregon’s fresh and salt water fisheries in a sustainable fashion using the best available science because they are important for economic and recreational reasons.
Provide startup capital to “demonstration projects” for Oregon landowners and companies serving the farming, ranching, and forestry communities to support transition to the use of sustainable alternative energy sources made from existing (local) agricultural waste streams.
Article 3: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Workers and Business People
Labor: Ensuring Workers Rights, including Retirement Security
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Oppose the privatization of Social Security. Prohibit employers from avoiding their pension responsibilities and collective bargaining contracts through the bankruptcy courts.
Support the Employee’s Free Choice Act, granting workers “card check” to gain union representation without penalty or interference from the employer. Prevent employers from hiring strikebreakers during a labor dispute.
Oppose any dilution of the Davis/Bacon Act and Oregon’s Prevailing Wage laws. Support the statutory application of Oregon’s Prevailing Wage law to Enterprise Zones construction projects, and define “tax abatements” and “tax incentives” as “public funds”, in the definitions of ORS 279. Increase funding to state labor enforcement agencies.
Demand a moratorium on any existing and future trade agreements with other nations that supersede democratic principles or local or national laws until all existing and future trade agreements include definable, accountable, and enforceable labor standards to protect the rights of all workers both US and Foreign.
Support government programs and tax structures that will create jobs in the United States by developing sustainable state infrastructure and by providing incentives to sustainable industries.
Require disclosure of factory locations by contractors and subcontractors who provide goods to the state or its agencies, prohibit them from maintaining sweatshop conditions by violating labor and employment, health and safety, or environmental laws or standards, and require their compliance with minimum wage and other employment and labor standards.
Article 4: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Active Citizens
Election Reform: Opposing Privatization of the Vote and
Guaranteeing Transparent Elections that Reflect the Will of the People
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Require voter verified paper ballots and audits for all federal elections.
Allow voters to register and vote at any time prior to the election until polls close on Election Day.
Direct the Oregon Secretary of State to acquire, use and maintain public ownership of publicly auditable software in all aspects of elections, including election management, creation of ballot definition files and vote tallying, and to provide funds for these activities.
Establish a Citizen’s Review Panel, appointed by the Secretary of State, to oversee the implementation of the new audit provisions in the ORS code of HB 3270; prepare a report on how the audit works during its first election cycle in 2008 and recommend future improvements.
Restore the Fairness Doctrine.
Institute an instant runoff ballot system.
Article 4: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Active Citizens
Public Safety, Justice and Civil Liberties: Preserving Our Personal Freedoms, While Ensuring our Safety
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Repeal all portions of the USA PATRIOT Act that infringe on constitutional rights, including surveillance without warrants, no- fly lists, and sneak and peek searches.
Repeal the portions of the No Child Left Behind Act that require schools to allow military recruiters to be present in schools and have access to students and their private information.
Support the legislative referral SB 1087 and oppose Kevin Mannix's Ballot Measure 40 creating mandatory minimum sentencing for property crimes.
Ensure that police in Oregon cities, towns, campuses and counties do not become deputized by the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or other federal agencies.
Prohibit all LNG facilities in areas that present natural hazards from landslides, earthquakes, tsunamis, flooding, and unstable soil compositions.
Study and report on statistics relating to race, age, cultural, economic, and mental health that are related to detaining, arresting, and incarcerating Oregonians, and the measures taken to mitigate disparities when they are discovered.
Article 4: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Active Citizens
Government Accountability and Oversight: Demanding Honesty, Integrity and Competence in Government
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Support legislation to reverse the consolidation and concentration of media ownership in order to protect an effective Fourth Estate with a free and fair press (i.e., newspapers, broadcast, talk radio, internet).
Require full disclosure of State government contracts of economic development subsidies and grant agreements to include cost/benefit reporting in a free, online searchable database accessible to all ordinary citizens and the press.
Support the rights of individual, natural persons over any and all rights that have been extended to artificial entities. Congress should pass legislation to establish that corporations shall not be considered “persons” protected by the Constitution or the US or by any state Constitutions.
Overturn Buckley v. Valeo, or amend the US Constitution to reflect that money is not a form of free speech.
Require non-profit corporations receiving public funds to increase transparency and accountability by opening board meetings to the public, and strengthen the protections for whistle blowers who report unsafe, unethical and wasteful business practices.
Institute annual budgeting and legislative sessions.
Article 5: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Global Citizens
Ecology and Natural Resources: Providing for Our Needs, While Preserving the Earth
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Develop safeguards to prevent the transfer of lands and resources of the Commons to private for-profit corporations. This includes, but is not limited to, beaches, parks, public lands, water resources and territorial seas, national parks and refuges, forests, oil reserves and mineral estates.
Support the participation of the United States in international negotiations leading to a sound treaty to reverse the trend toward global warming.
Provide adequate funding to state and federal agencies to effectively implement all state and federal environmental laws (Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, Resource Conservation Recovery Act, etc.).
Reduce the amount of waste going into landfills. Expand the Oregon Bottle Bill to include all plastic and glass beverage containers. Ban the giveaway of “free” non-recyclable plastic bags by commercial outlets. Government policy should promote the use of sustainable packaging.
Create a network of marine protected areas and marine reserves in Oregon's coastal waters, based on the best available scientific resources, in order to ensure the long-term health and biodiversity of our ocean. Oregon is currently the only west coast state without a system of marine reserves and protected areas.
Give priority to human health and environmental protection as a matter of government policy and mandate improvement to the quality of our air, land and water rather than simply maintaining the status quo.
Article 5: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Global Citizens
Energy and Transportation: Practicing Conservation While Tapping Human Ingenuity to Fuel the Future
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Provide federal funding for a national rail system to upgrade and expand our current system with a reliable, low-cost passenger friendly, fuel-efficient comprehensive alternative. Ensure that a national rail system, including high-speed rail, is reliable, low-cost, and can carry passengers and freight to both urban and rural locations.
Create, expand, and subsidize effective low cost mass transit systems appropriate for each city/region and for commuters, passengers, and goods transportation, and provide incentives for their use. Increase CAFÉ standards for all cars and trucks, and regulate fuel quality.
Invest in Oregon industry based on the development, production and use of low-carbon alternative fuels and renewable energy technologies, such as solar, waste stock-based biofuels, high energy yield windmills, wave and low-impact hydro energy systems. Discourage the use of natural gas, coal, and nuclear plants for electricity production.
Support and promote policies that place maintenance and repair of our highways and bridges as the highest priority before new construction can continue to have road users pay for the damage they cause, according to ODOT’s cost responsibility studies.
Return siting control of liquid natural gas terminals, pipelines and other energy generation facilities to state and local authorities. Ensure that the costs of traditional fossil fuel based energy installations are fully borne by the energy industry, including replacing property tax exemptions for impacted landowners with industry royalties to county and private landowners.
Support sustainable energy technologies beyond those broadly known today; focus on technologies that are deployed as distributed electricity or heat generation. Examples include low profile windmills or aerobic digestion of agricultural waste.
Article 5: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Global Citizens
Foreign Policy and National Security: Engaging the World through
the Strength of Diplomacy, Justice and Rule of Law
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Call on the President to involve the United Nations in negotiating a ceasefire among combatants in Iraq, to provide ethnically appropriate forces for security during expedient withdrawal of occupation personnel, to resolve conflict among Iraqi factions and to accomplish other changes needed to restore Iraq to full sovereignty.
Significantly reduce the sale and supply of United States arms to other nations. Ban the sale and use of weapons that target or have foreseeable negative impact on civilians and long-term livability of the environment such as cluster bombs, land mines and depleted uranium. Provide leadership in cleanup of dangerous war residue.
Establish a cabinet-level Department of Peace to evaluate conflict situations at national and international levels and to recommend creative, non-violent ways to peace.
Ban use of private corporations from military functions requiring use of weapons.
Call on the President to sign and the Senate to ratify major international treaties: the International Criminal Court, the Mine Ban Treaty to outlaw use of anti-personnel land mines, Law of the Sea Treaty, Future Climate Change protocol, and Covenant to Eliminate all Forms of Discrimination Against Women.
Call upon the President to help Israel and Palestine write a framework agreement to involve neighboring nations and all legitimate political parties within Israel and Palestine to seek resolution of final status issues: Settlements, Refugees, Borders, and Jerusalem. Full recognition and security guarantees by all sovereign entities must follow negotiations.
Article 1: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Individuals and Family Members
Shelter, Food, Health Care and a Living Wage: Securing the Basic Necessities of Life
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Adopt a comprehensive Oregon health care system that provides universal coverage accessible to all Oregonians which includes a publicly owned publicly administered, not-for-profit health care plan as one of the options available to Oregonians.
Provide incentives to encourage the sustainable production and consumption of locally grown foods, which will both boost and diversify local economies and reduce dependence on fossil fuel transportation.
Define a living wage adequate to meet the minimum requirements of housing, food, health care and other necessary services for families and individuals in all regions of the state.
Ensure basic food and shelter needs are met for all seniors.
Provide full funding to address the ongoing needs of veterans, including members of the Oregon National Guard and Reservists who have returned from active duty, for medical care, mental health services, dental care, basic housing, and other programs that assist in their transition back into civilian society.
Require Oregon cities and counties to develop a plan intended to end homelessness in 10 years. Provide financial support throughout the State to counties, individuals, and families for facilitating programs aimed at preventing and ending homelessness.
Article 1: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Individuals and Family Members
Human Rights: Guaranteeing Equal Rights for all People
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Extend the Right of Habeas Corpus to any individual held against their will by the United States Government, or any governmental entity with the power of incarceration, or any contracted entities of the United States Government. We oppose executive orders, administrative actions or legislation that permits otherwise.
Require the U.S. Government, its military personnel, agents, and civilian contractors to ban torture and rendition, and strictly adhere to the Geneva Conventions and U.N. Convention on Torture. Principles of these conventions shall apply to all individuals, wherever held by such entities.
Guarantee equal legal status and equal treatment to all committed relationship partners in State and Federal Constitutional Law and Legislation. We support amending the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to include gender identity, and support passage of hate crimes legislation to include sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes.
Provide oversight of prison contractors. Address the crisis of our burgeoning prisoner population, inhuman prison conditions, emphasizing sustainable reform, rehabilitation training, and after-prison job programs, which provide sustainable post-prison results. Ban the death penalty.
Ensure individuals have the right to make birth control, reproductive, and end of life decisions without interference.
Address the epidemic of homelessness in our communities, including measures to reach out to those affected by economic collapse. Legislation shall mandate support critical to the homeless, including emergency response and training to facilitate their reentry into productive roles in their communities.
Article 2: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Members of a Community
Public Education: Taking Responsibility to Prepare for Life Long Learning
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Provide for financial stability, adequacy and equity for all Oregon public education students, based upon the Quality Education Model level, a K-12 school year of at least 175 full instructional days with smaller class sizes, supporting in-state students, restoring lower tuition and vital programs in public higher education.
Provide for the breadth and depth of services Oregon's students need, including parenting and early childhood education, Head Start for all who qualify, pre-school programs, and adequate counseling. Include instruction in critical thinking, citizenship (civics), art, physical education, music, vocational, special education, and library services at every school.
Restore and expand federal and state scholarship, grant (including Oregon Opportunity Grant) and loan programs so that students from all economic backgrounds can attend and graduate from public vocational, community college, college and university programs.
Provide, at all education levels, for the replacement of antiquated public education facilities and equipment, repair of existing facilities, and new construction to meet changing needs of our population.
Resist unfunded mandates and insist the Federal Government fulfill its promises to fund previously mandated programs.
Provide educational access for all through equity of services and courses available, providing for distances from the university, central offices, cultural, social, economic and language backgrounds or disability of students, while recognizing the unique needs of each student.
Article 2: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Members of a Community
Revenue Policy: Paying a Fair Share and Endowing Future Generations
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Repeal the double-majority requirements that restrict the right of voters and elected representatives to adopt legislation related to raising revenue and adjusting the tax system.
Require that initiatives include a fiscal impact statement and identify the revenue source.
Place the individual and the corporate tax kickers into a permanent rainy day fund.
Support restoration of the Secure Rural Schools Self Determination Act, which provides assistance to formerly timber-dependent counties in wake of declining timber sales, to allow counties sufficient revenue to maintain adequate levels of service for schools, police, roads, libraries and other services.
Sunset and periodically review all tax expenditures, loopholes and credits for businesses and individuals to verify that they are still serving a valid purpose and repeal or reform as needed.
Return to the three factor formula for calculation of corporate income tax.
Article 3: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Workers and Business People
Business and Economic Development: Creating a Viable Economy
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Support a sustainable plan with long-term goals to generate green business practices and economic development. Promote transfer of ecologically sound technology to new business development.
Continue to invest in intelligent transportation systems, highways, bridges, rail, aviation, marine and transit projects across the state to keep Oregon's transportation infrastructure competitive, building on "Connect Oregon II" passed in 2007.
Increase the number of highly qualified workers through Oregon's education system and apprenticeship programs and improve small business success through assistance with business planning, marketing, and financial management.
Protect the thousands of present jobs and billions of dollars now earned for Oregon's economy in commercial shipping, fishing, manufacturing and trade that will be jeopardized by the exclusion zones, priority passages, navigation delays and dangers from LNG mega-tankers.
Increase the BETC (Business Energy Tax Credit) cap for those businesses that use, develop or promote sustainable alternative energy. Those that do not should be taxed.
Restore funding and authority to the Oregon Economic and Community Development Department to at least pre-2006 levels, and distribute funds equitably to rural, urban and suburban communities throughout Oregon, to foster business innovation and economic strength in promotion of the statewide common good.
Article 3: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Workers and Business People
Forest, Field, Range, and Fisheries: Supporting Oregon's Farmers, Ranchers and Foresters
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Make forest restoration a priority. Oregon's remaining old growth forests must be preserved. Best forest practices should be followed in all logging to protect the watersheds.
Prevent the further privatization of Oregon's public water supply. All resource management should recognize Oregon's responsibility to manage the sustainable allocation of water and to maintain the highest water quality standards.
Protect Oregon's critical forest, range and farmlands from loss or development that will further jeopardize the needs of future generations.
Protect Oregon's fisheries so naturally spawning, native fish stocks are maintained and increased, using fish reserves, or marine protected areas, dam removal or improvements, habitat restoration, and pollution reduction measures.
Continue to manage Oregon's fresh and salt water fisheries in a sustainable fashion using the best available science because they are important for economic and recreational reasons.
Provide startup capital to "demonstration projects" for Oregon landowners and companies serving the farming, ranching, and forestry communities to support transition to the use of sustainable alternative energy sources made from existing (local) agricultural waste streams.
Article 3: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Workers and Business People
Labor: Ensuring Workers Rights, including Retirement Security
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Oppose the privatization of Social Security. Prohibit employers from avoiding their pension responsibilities and collective bargaining contracts through the bankruptcy courts.
Support the Employee's Free Choice Act, granting workers "card check" to gain union representation without penalty or interference from the employer. Prevent employers from hiring strikebreakers during a labor dispute.
Oppose any dilution of the Davis/Bacon Act and Oregon's Prevailing Wage laws. Support the statutory application of Oregon's Prevailing Wage law to Enterprise Zones construction projects, and define "tax abatements" and "tax incentives" as "public funds", in the definitions of ORS 279. Increase funding to state labor enforcement agencies.
Demand a moratorium on any existing and future trade agreements with other nations that supersede democratic principles or local or national laws until all existing and future trade agreements include definable, accountable, and enforceable labor standards to protect the rights of all workers both US and Foreign.
Support government programs and tax structures that will create jobs in the United States by developing sustainable state infrastructure and by providing incentives to sustainable industries.
Require disclosure of factory locations by contractors and subcontractors who provide goods to the state or its agencies, prohibit them from maintaining sweatshop conditions by violating labor and employment, health and safety, or environmental laws or standards, and require their compliance with minimum wage and other employment and labor standards.
Article 4: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Active Citizens
Election Reform: Opposing Privatization of the Vote and
Guaranteeing Transparent Elections that Reflect the Will of the People
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Require voter verified paper ballots and audits for all federal elections.
Allow voters to register and vote at any time prior to the election until polls close on Election Day.
Direct the Oregon Secretary of State to acquire, use and maintain public ownership of publicly auditable software in all aspects of elections, including election management, creation of ballot definition files and vote tallying, and to provide funds for these activities.
Establish a Citizen's Review Panel, appointed by the Secretary of State, to oversee the implementation of the new audit provisions in the ORS code of HB 3270; prepare a report on how the audit works during its first election cycle in 2008 and recommend future improvements.
Restore the Fairness Doctrine.
Institute an instant runoff ballot system.
Article 4: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Active Citizens
Public Safety, Justice and Civil Liberties: Preserving Our Personal Freedoms, While Ensuring our Safety
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Repeal all portions of the USA PATRIOT Act that infringe on constitutional rights, including surveillance without warrants, no- fly lists, and sneak and peek searches.
Repeal the portions of the No Child Left Behind Act that require schools to allow military recruiters to be present in schools and have access to students and their private information.
Support the legislative referral SB 1087 and oppose Kevin Mannix's Ballot Measure 40 creating mandatory minimum sentencing for property crimes.
Ensure that police in Oregon cities, towns, campuses and counties do not become deputized by the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or other federal agencies.
Prohibit all LNG facilities in areas that present natural hazards from landslides, earthquakes, tsunamis, flooding, and unstable soil compositions.
Study and report on statistics relating to race, age, cultural, economic, and mental health that are related to detaining, arresting, and incarcerating Oregonians, and the measures taken to mitigate disparities when they are discovered.
Article 4: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Active Citizens
Government Accountability and Oversight: Demanding Honesty, Integrity and Competence in Government
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Support legislation to reverse the consolidation and concentration of media ownership in order to protect an effective Fourth Estate with a free and fair press (i.e., newspapers, broadcast, talk radio, internet).
Require full disclosure of State government contracts of economic development subsidies and grant agreements to include cost/benefit reporting in a free, online searchable database accessible to all ordinary citizens and the press.
Support the rights of individual, natural persons over any and all rights that have been extended to artificial entities. Congress should pass legislation to establish that corporations shall not be considered "persons" protected by the Constitution or the US or by any state Constitutions.
Overturn Buckley v. Valeo, or amend the US Constitution to reflect that money is not a form of free speech.
Require non-profit corporations receiving public funds to increase transparency and accountability by opening board meetings to the public, and strengthen the protections for whistle blowers who report unsafe, unethical and wasteful business practices.
Institute annual budgeting and legislative sessions.
Article 5: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Global Citizens
Ecology and Natural Resources: Providing for Our Needs, While Preserving the Earth
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Develop safeguards to prevent the transfer of lands and resources of the Commons to private for-profit corporations. This includes, but is not limited to, beaches, parks, public lands, water resources and territorial seas, national parks and refuges, forests, oil reserves and mineral estates.
Support the participation of the United States in international negotiations leading to a sound treaty to reverse the trend toward global warming.
Provide adequate funding to state and federal agencies to effectively implement all state and federal environmental laws (Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, Resource Conservation Recovery Act, etc.).
Reduce the amount of waste going into landfills. Expand the Oregon Bottle Bill to include all plastic and glass beverage containers. Ban the giveaway of "free" non-recyclable plastic bags by commercial outlets. Government policy should promote the use of sustainable packaging.
Create a network of marine protected areas and marine reserves in Oregon's coastal waters, based on the best available scientific resources, in order to ensure the long-term health and biodiversity of our ocean. Oregon is currently the only west coast state without a system of marine reserves and protected areas.
Give priority to human health and environmental protection as a matter of government policy and mandate improvement to the quality of our air, land and water rather than simply maintaining the status quo.
Article 5: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Global Citizens
Energy and Transportation: Practicing Conservation While Tapping Human Ingenuity to Fuel the Future
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Provide federal funding for a national rail system to upgrade and expand our current system with a reliable, low-cost passenger friendly, fuel-efficient comprehensive alternative. Ensure that a national rail system, including high-speed rail, is reliable, low-cost, and can carry passengers and freight to both urban and rural locations.
Create, expand, and subsidize effective low cost mass transit systems appropriate for each city/region and for commuters, passengers, and goods transportation, and provide incentives for their use. Increase CAFÉ standards for all cars and trucks, and regulate fuel quality.
Invest in Oregon industry based on the development, production and use of low-carbon alternative fuels and renewable energy technologies, such as solar, waste stock-based biofuels, high energy yield windmills, wave and low-impact hydro energy systems. Discourage the use of natural gas, coal, and nuclear plants for electricity production.
Support and promote policies that place maintenance and repair of our highways and bridges as the highest priority before new construction can continue to have road users pay for the damage they cause, according to ODOT's cost responsibility studies.
Return siting control of liquid natural gas terminals, pipelines and other energy generation facilities to state and local authorities. Ensure that the costs of traditional fossil fuel based energy installations are fully borne by the energy industry, including replacing property tax exemptions for impacted landowners with industry royalties to county and private landowners.
Support sustainable energy technologies beyond those broadly known today; focus on technologies that are deployed as distributed electricity or heat generation. Examples include low profile windmills or aerobic digestion of agricultural waste.
Article 5: Our Responsibilities and Rights as Global Citizens
Foreign Policy and National Security: Engaging the World through
the Strength of Diplomacy, Justice and Rule of Law
Legislative Action Items
Create, fund, or enforce legislation to:
Call on the President to involve the United Nations in negotiating a ceasefire among combatants in Iraq, to provide ethnically appropriate forces for security during expedient withdrawal of occupation personnel, to resolve conflict among Iraqi factions and to accomplish other changes needed to restore Iraq to full sovereignty.
Significantly reduce the sale and supply of United States arms to other nations. Ban the sale and use of weapons that target or have foreseeable negative impact on civilians and long-term livability of the environment such as cluster bombs, land mines and depleted uranium. Provide leadership in cleanup of dangerous war residue.
Establish a cabinet-level Department of Peace to evaluate conflict situations at national and international levels and to recommend creative, non-violent ways to peace.
Ban use of private corporations from military functions requiring use of weapons.
Call on the President to sign and the Senate to ratify major international treaties: the International Criminal Court, the Mine Ban Treaty to outlaw use of anti-personnel land mines, Law of the Sea Treaty, Future Climate Change protocol, and Covenant to Eliminate all Forms of Discrimination Against Women.
Call upon the President to help Israel and Palestine write a framework agreement to involve neighboring nations and all legitimate political parties within Israel and Palestine to seek resolution of final status issues: Settlements, Refugees, Borders, and Jerusalem. Full recognition and security guarantees by all sovereign entities must follow negotiations.