The Oregon State Legislature met in its final session this past Friday. So what was on the docket?
According to KLCC, one major change came in the form of a preliminary injunction against Oregon’s House Bill 2550. The bill in question prevents “love letters” between real estate sellers and buyers. District Judge Marco A. Hernández says that this “likely violates” the First Amendment rights of real estate agents.
Hernández later continued, saying that, “It is not in the public interest to enforce a law that is likely unconstitutional, even one aimed at the laudable goal of reducing unlawful discrimination in housing.
This law was the first of its kind in the U.S. The idea was that it would prevent “love letters” or personal photographs from perpetuating housing discrimination due to a buyer’s race, religion, sexual orientation, or marital status.
In fact, many real estate agents simply wouldn’t accept such a letter before the bill was passed, due to their potential to bring about a housing discrimination claim.
Hernández made a point of acknowledging Oregon’s “long and abhorrent history” of racist housing discrimination, pointing to laws that outright prohibited people of color from owning land.
The primary issue that Hernández took was that the bill was simply too broad. Rather than limiting “love letters,” the law actually bans all written communication outside of “customary documents,” and the bill doesn’t clarify what qualifies as “customary.”
He suggested two alternatives that were originally included in Pacific Legal Foundation’s claim. Legislators could allow love letters while requiring real estate agents to edit anything that could reveal a buyer’s race, religion, sexual orientation, or marital status. Alternatively, lawmakers could prohibit buyers from providing personal photos to sellers.
This preliminary injunction can’t be enforced until Hernández makes a final decision.
Among other decisions on the slate for Friday were:
- Establishing how to give overtime to farmworkers,
- A child care package to help recruit and train new child care workers,
- A means for renters and low-income households to have access to air conditioning units,
- Helping low-income Oregonians buy homes (roughly $400 million)
- Roughly $200 million to help historically marginalized groups find work through educational, training, or apprentice programs,
- Additional $600 payments to Oregonians who were especially impacted by the pandemic.
The $2.5 billion budget also included the Democratic party’s “olive branch” of $100 million for Republicans to use as they see fit. OPB politics reporter Lauren Dake told JPR, “The Republicans were able to essentially craft a package that funded projects in their part of the state.”
Dake continued, “They were just really able to identify certain priorities that matter to them and get the money to fund them.”
Whether this olive branch will break the frustrating partisan gridlock in Salem recently is yet to be seen, but it would appear that this year’s massive budget is aimed at a number of projects.
By Ethan Hauck
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