Gov. Kotek's housing package passes house as legislative session winds down

SALEM, Ore.– Lawmakers are in the final week of this year’s short legislative session.

With Measure 110 reform on the governor’s desk, legislators will be looking for any leftover funding.

This year’s legislative session ends this coming Sunday.

Governor Tina Kotek also officially passed her housing package after it passed the senate last week.

Senate bills 1537 and 1530 were passed by the state house of representatives Monday.

The housing package will invest $376 million in total toward addressing the housing crisis.

Governor Kotek said in a statement today quote:

“Oregonians are struggling under the pressure of an increasingly unaffordable housing market. After hearing this concern directly from Oregonians from across our state last year, I knew we had to make major progress on our housing crisis during this year’s legislative session. I want to thank legislators for meeting the urgency of this moment and providing much-needed funding that will boost housing production throughout the state.

“These bills offer a menu of tools that will provide the support needed to ease our housing crisis and help all our communities thrive. I believe this package will make meaningful progress in fixing our housing shortage while also preserving our land use system and ensuring strong environmental protections. But this is not the finish line. We have more work ahead to solve our housing and homelessness crises – and I will keep pushing for more because the need is so great. Oregonians are counting on us to deliver.”

Medford Representative Kim Wallan also feels positive about what the bill will be able to do, “there is definitely things about that that I like, there are things about that that I don’t love, but it’s not really a surprise to me where it landed. That we passed out both the policy and the money, we did today.”

Wallan said the rest of her week will likely be spent on the floor debating bills or in the rules committee.

She said they may be able to get a bill passed that would put the state on standard time year-round by the end of the session.

Some legislators said there will not be much funding left now that the housing package and Measure 110 reform have been passed

But local lawmakers tell NBC5 they want to secure funding for wildfire mitigation and summer school programs this week.