Where can Oregon step up to support women serving in office?

Low pay for legislators limits the number of people who can even consider running

As the Legislative Session limps forward in the wake of Republican legislators denying quorum, the need for strong leaders to lead a similarly strong state government has never been more apparent.

As someone who has worked in the state Legislature and extensively on legislative campaigns in Oregon, I know how much we depend on the Legislature to provide oversight and prioritize the needs of Oregonians.

As a state, Oregon’s needs are great. Securing federal funding and crafting our state budget, improving access to affordable housing and quality health care, addressing climate change and shortages in child care and improving education are just a handful of the immediate needs.

We need more invested and highly qualified people serving in the Oregon Legislature and at every level of government to address our most pressing needs. Not just leadership experience, but also lived experiences that are similar to what Oregon families face today. We need leaders who bring fresh ideas, new perspectives and are committed to showing up every day to do their jobs. We need leaders who reflect our incredible and diverse state.

So, how does Oregon build a bench of strong leaders who reflect our communities and are committed to solving seemingly intractable problems?

For many years, the central question has been one of recruitment: How can we recruit more women and people of color to run for elected office? Fantastic programs have been built to answer this call. They achieved remarkable successes reflected in statistics, including that in 2023 the number of women in office in Oregon remains among the highest in the country.

Thanks to those programs and the leadership of community-led organizations who built a solid candidate bench across the state, today Oregon is successfully electing a more diverse group of state leaders. We can and should continue to do better in this critical area. But while the problem of recruitment is not and will never be solved, there is a new challenge that we must address in tandem, and that is one of retention. 

Every year, Oregon is losing brilliant leaders who were devotedly engaged in policies that directly addressed their constituents' needs because they simply can’t afford to continue serving in the Legislature. As many will remember vividly, three women in Oregon’s Legislature resigned from their positions in 2022. Their letter cited that as full-time legislators, they couldn’t make it work on the $33,000 annual salary. In their resignation they pointed out that “most people cannot afford to even consider this job,” and it was clear that these leaders did not feel supported even as they worked tirelessly to ensure that the challenges of their constituents were acknowledged and addressed.

Rep. Karin Power, Rep. Anna Williams, and Rep. Rachel Prusak. These women were all lawmakers who brought to the table their lives and professional experiences as an attorney, social worker, and nurse practitioner, respectively.

Even during their short time in office, these leaders accomplished great things, such as Power’s key role in crafting House Bill 4005, a package designed to enhance financial support for child care providers and allocate funds for recruitment and training. With Oregon facing a child care workforce shortage and high costs, Power’s memorable speech on the House floor gave voice to the struggles that many working parents and families struggle with daily, reinforcing the urgency of these issues.

We need more of that. But it will be impossible to sustain if elected officials who reflect our communities can’t afford to stay in office.

The reality is that the lack of living wages for elected officials is a huge barrier that disproportionately affects women, people of color, LGBTQIA+ people, people with disabilities, and people with other lived experiences that are underrepresented in our Legislature. Generational wealth has not historically favored women or people of color. Democracy can only flourish if it is fairly represented, and right now, it is unbalanced in favor of wealthy individuals, mostly men, who can afford to accept lower wages for critical leadership positions.

I have spent my career in Oregon helping new leaders get elected. I’ve seen firsthand the incredible work of organizations dedicated to electing strong candidates to serve at the federal, state, and local levels. With all our collective investment of time and energy in recruiting members of our communities and winning campaigns, it’s time to put some energy into retaining talented leaders. And it starts with better pay.

Kathleen Stuart is the founder and CEO of Stuart Collective, a strategic advocacy communications firm in Oregon focusing on advancing campaigns in inclusive democracy, social justice and civil rights, racial and gender equity, elections and campaigns, infrastructure, health care, and education.