SALEM – Maybe it’s the influence of the recent Winter Olympics, but listening to the hallway chatter about Oregon’s annual legislative sessions is like channeling Nancy Kerrigan after her 1994 knee-whacking. Complaints about the additional even-year meeting have increased as the session winds down, with the overriding concern that the hurry-up schedule could cause bad legislation to slip through. "We've had entirely new policy concepts introduced," said Alan Tresidder, a veteran lobbyist with State Street Solutions. "If you look at the Voters’ Pamphlet statement and what was said about annual sessions, it wasn't any of this stuff. We're dealing with stuff all over the map." Tresidder isn’t the only one who has soured on what was supposed to be the Legislature’s big move toward greater relevance. Other lobbyists talk about the session as though it’s one big political rally for the upcoming election season. A Republican leader described it as "a political free-for-all" and said the compact timeline shortchanges Oregonians, especially those outside the Portland-Eugene corridor, on meaningful participation.
www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2014/03/oreg...rpt-1
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