SALEM – The backlog of bills scheduled for a vote on the floor of the Oregon House has gotten so big, it would take nearly 24 hours of non-stop reading to catch up. And that doesn’t include the amount of time lawmakers will take to debate the measures.
For several weeks, House Republicans have refused to waive a requirement in the Oregon Constitution that bills be read out loud in their entirety before a vote. The rule can be bypassed if at least two-thirds of the chamber approves, but that threshold can only be reached with support from both Democrats and Republicans.
For many years, lawmakers routinely waived the requirement for the entire session. Recently, Republicans—who serve in the minority in both chambers—have granted waivers more selectively, as a way to slow down proceedings.
Reading the bills aloud has little practical benefit, as the measures are available online. During the read-aloud sessions, many lawmakers chat with colleagues or work on their computers.
About three weeks ago, Republicans in the Oregon House stopped waiving the third reading requirement altogether, with a handful of exceptions.
It means that House clerks must read bills out loud in their entirety, instead of just a very short summary of the bill. While many bills are less than five pages, some are much longer. It can take hours to read them aloud.
Or in some cases, days. Senate Bill 360 is a dense 54-page tome that makes a series of largely technical updates to Oregon’s laws governing non-profit organizations. Twice, the House adjourned for the day before the reading clerk could finish her task.
On the third day, it was finally time for Rep. Karin Power, D-Milwaukie, to make the case for the measure.
“Thank you for your rapt attention,” Power said to her colleagues. “There will be a quiz.”
After her brief speech, there was no debate and the bill passed 55-0 less than three minutes after the multi-day bill reading concluded.
Heading into Wednesday’s floor session, the House had 83 bills totaling 425 pages on its docket. On average, it takes about three minutes and 20 seconds for each page of a bill to be read aloud. That means it will take nearly 24 hours to simply read the bills.
Debate over those bills, which can range from minutes to hours, will stretch the amount of time needed to eliminate the backlog even further. And new bills are added to the list nearly every day.
The House is planning morning and afternoon floor sessions for the rest of this week and could hold a rare Memorial Day session next week, although no decision has been made yet, according to Danny Moran, a spokesman for House Speaker Tina Kotek, D-Portland.
Greg Stiles, the spokesman for House GOP leader Rep. Carl Wilson, R-Grants Pass, wouldn’t say how long Republicans plan to use the delay tactic. “The bottom line is this,” said Stiles. “The speaker has done a poor job of managing the minority.”
Ironically, the situation is quite different in the Senate, even though it had its share of partisan drama earlier this month. Republicans staged a weeklong walkout as a way to deny Democrats a quorum in a dispute over a $2 billion education funding bill.
But Democrats, led by Senate President Peter Courtney, agreed to spike two of their priority bills in exchange for the return of Republican Senators. With that agreement ironed out, Senate floor sessions have proceeded quickly.
Lawmakers still have more than a month to complete their work, with a hard deadline of June 30 to wrap things up. Many of the bills caught in the House backlog are policy bills that could be set aside if needed.
Budget bills, on the other hand, need to be passed or agencies and programs grind to a standstill. Most of the bills that set budgets for state agencies have yet to be finalized, however. Those bills tend to be very short, with supporting documents outlining the details of how the money will be spent.