POLICY POSITIONS: No word salad.
REGENERATIVE ECONOMY
The problem:
Oregon has never found a common economic direction since timber. We keep organizing for the inorganic economy of the past instead of building towards a sustainable future.
What I think we should do:
• Treat care, housing, and workforce development as economic infrastructure, not ‘charity’
• Build on Oregon's strengths in emerging markets: plant medicine integration, regenerative agriculture, circular manufacturing, sustainable forestry
• Reform regulatory culture away from endless rule-making to public partnership; regulators should help Oregon businesses compete beyond our borders, not just comply with our petty bureaucrats
• Replace the Prosperity Council model (closed-door panels of insiders) with more public support for the innovators already actually building things
ORECORPS: OREGON CIVIC LABOR COMPACT
The problem:
Oregon faces critical workforce shortages in healthcare, trades, legal services, infrastructure, and education. Young Oregonians face debt, credential barriers, and no clear pathway into stable work.
What I think we should do:
• Create OreCorps: a structured civic labor compact for 17-24 year olds
• Five pathways: healthcare, legal administration, trades, civil engineering and infrastructure, education
• Participants receive: living stipend, stackable college and licensing credit, loan forgiveness, tiered certifications that build toward full credentials
• 3, 5, or 7 year service contracts — longer service, greater benefits
• Administered through community colleges, with university partnerships and Department of Education oversight
• PPP funding model — PERS investment as potential capital source
• Connects to high school credit flexibility — a softer on-ramp to adulthood