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The bills I’m tracking this legislative session

by sports••0
The bills I’m tracking this legislative session
Legislators and cycling advocates assembled outside the capitol building in Salem in 2009. (Photo: Jonathan Maus/BikePortland)

Hoping to wipe out the stains of the 2025 session, lawmakers who care about transportation have their work cut out for them this session. For a short session, it feels like there are a lot of significant bills up for consideration in Salem right now. With just about a month left for laws to be passed — or be passed over — the tight deadlines mean we’ll know soon which bills have a shot. But as of right now, everything is still in play.

Given that, I figured I’d share the list of 12 bills I’m tracking so far. I’ll start with the House first and then the Senate. If you know of any other interesting bills related to transportation or something else you think I should know about, please pass them along.

House Bill (HB) 4007 – E-Bike Bill

As I reported yesterday this bill does several important things around electric bike regulation and legislation. The big one is that it defines “powered micromobility device” and should add much-needed clarity around separating bicycles from all the other types of vehicles being used on streets these days. HB 4007 also lowers the legal age for e-bikes (Class 1 only) to 14. The reasons for doing so (to acknowledge reality of the market and open up educational opportunities when kids need it most) make sense, but I could see that making some lawmakers nervous.

HB 4008 – Transit Funding Task Force

This bill would create a new, 21-member task force to, “Determine the level of funding needed to maintain adequate transit service statewide that is reliable, safe and accessible and allows for population growth over time; and explore funding mechanisms to achieve the funding needs…” Transit funding is a hot topic in Salem right now as Democrats caved to Republicans last session by supporting a sunset on the existing payroll tax that funds transit statewide. Governor Tina Kotek has said as ODOT moves money around to keep the lights on and fund maintenance, transit funding is the only thing that can’t be touched.

HB 4009 – EV Road User Charge for E-Commerce Deliveries

This bill would, “phase in a mandatory per-mile road usage charge for owners and lessees of electric and hybrid cars and delivery vans engaged in e-commerce. The Act would allow a flat annual fee in lieu of the per-mile road usage charge.”

HB 4063 – Legalize Kei Trucks

Kei trucks are delightfully small Japanese workhorses that have become sought after by many Americans. But because of auto regulations, these trucks aren’t currently allowed. This bill has a ton of bipartisan cosponsors and it was vetted in the previous session, so I’d bet on it passing.

HB 4081 – Photo Radar in Highway Work Zones

This bill would allow ODOT to create a photo radar program that specifically targets work zones. Given the folks most impacted by unsafe work zones are very popular with politicians, and its broad bipartisan support, this bill is on track to pass.

HB 4085 – Self Driving Vehicles

This is the bill I wrote about yesterday that would help autonomous vehicle companies like Waymo unleash fleets of robotaxis by pre-empting local governments.

HB 4090 – Eliminates Vehicle Registration Fees

Three democrats (including Senate Committee on Transportation Chair Chris Gorsek) sponsor this bill. It appears to be a way for Dems to talk up affordability by exempting lower-income folks from payment of county vehicle registration fees.

HB 4126 – Road Usage Charge Rate

10 Democrats (four from the House, six from the Senate) sponsor this bill which would require ODOT to come up with a rate for a per-mile road usage charge every other year starting this September. The rate would need to be set at a level that, “that would sustainably raise the revenue necessary to maintain the public highways in this state.”

HB 4129 – Clean Fuels Program

This is a Republican-backed effort to slow down ODOT’s clean fuels program, which mandates carbon reductions in fuels by certain amounts and certain dates. Current law requires a reduction of GHG emissions in fuel by 10 percent below 2010 levels by the year 2025. This bill would cap that reduction by at no more than 10 percent and remove the goal year. This bill also takes direct aim at Portland’s fight with Zenith oil by proposing to make it illegal to outlaw, or limit the size of, fuel storage tanks.

  • Bill overview
  • Status: In House Committee on Climate, Energy, and Environment.

HB 4175 – Gut and Stuff for Transportation Funding Legislation

This is a placeholder bill (don’t be fooled by the “speed bump height study” nonsense) where lawmakers will stuff any legislation they propose around a new transportation bill.

Senate Bills

SB 1542 – ODOT Governance “Measure What We Drive”

This is a bill created by transportation reform advocates and Senate Committee on Transportation leadership that seeks to improve accountability and transparency among the Oregon Transportation Commission (OTC) and ODOT. It directs the OTC to create a 10-year Capital Investment Plan (CIP) that scores and ranks projects before they are added to the ODOT Statewide Transportation Improvement Program (STIP). The regional Advisory Committees on Transportation (ACTs) would play a crucial roll in this process. This is intended to weed out staff that partake in “safety washing” their projects — that is, calling something a “safety project” when it actually isn’t. I’ll have more on this bill in a separate post.

SB 1543 – ODOT Debt Policy: “Guardrails for Good Governance”

A tandem bill with SB 1542, this would establish Oregon’s first debt management policy for transportation investments. ODOT debt has skyrocketed by 400% since 2007 as they lose traditional funding mechanisms and lean even harder into using their credit card to pay for megaprojects. Advocates and senators who understand the risks this poses (namely, that debt must be repaid first and obligates finances for 25 years that could be spent on other things) want to make sure ODOT’s debt practices are more sound by providing more checks and balances and by having clear policies in place.

SB 1544 – Gut and Stuff for Transportation Funding Legislation

This is the Senate version of HB 4175 and is a placeholder for any major funding legislation to come.

SB 1580 – Save Oregon Journalism

Championed by Portland Senator Khanh Pham, this bipartisan bill seeks to compensate Oregon journalism outlets whose work is used by Google and Facebook in search results and AI products. In order to avoid a lawsuit, these massive companies would have to have a signed agreement with the outlet. The bill would give an outlet (or a consortium of outlets) the right to sue for damages and it would create a grant-making body to help fund Oregon news outlets.

SB 1599 – Referendum Vote

Democratic party leaders Senator Rob Wagner and House Rep. Julie Fahey are the sponsors of this bill that would move the elected date for the referendum on HB 3991 to May. Petitioners who successfully gathered signatures to block the new taxes and fees in HB 3991 planned on the vote being in November, where it would have more voters and a greater political impact on the general election. But Democrats want it to happen during the May primary. The party line is that an earlier vote would provide much-needed clarity around ODOT funding, but everyone understands this is a political maneuver from Democrats to thwart the chances of it passing (Senate President Wagner admitted this in a press conference last week).

That’s it for now. I will add others as I find them. If you know of ones I missed, let me know.

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