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Session long, but little else Not much to applaud, unless you like bickering BY PETER WONG SALEM -- What is now the third longest session of the Oregon Legislature is expected to end this week in the proverbial whimper. "This is the whimpering end of a session that has been uninspiring," said Bill Lunch, a political science professor at Oregon State University and a commentator on Oregon politics. The session was in its 189th day today, having passed the 187-day mark of the 1983 session. But it is not expected to surpass the 203 days in 1981 or the record 207 days in 1993. The whimpering has been preceded by partisan whining between the Republican majorities in both houses and Democratic Gov. John Kitzhaber, fresh from a landslide second-term victory. Though the Republican majority dropped by three seats in the 30-member Senate, it went up by three seats in the 60-member House -- and the influx of new members resulting from term limits has shifted the House to the right. Of the 34 Republicans in the House, half are new. Republicans have supplied most of the votes for, and Democrats against, nearly all of this session's key bills. With 20 vetoes so far this session and 115 in five years, Kitzhaber has surpassed the modern record for vetoes for a governor. Republican Gov. Vic Atiyeh vetoed 108 bills produced by Democratic-controlled legislatures between 1979 and 1987. Lunch said divided government in Oregon now mirrors that in Washington, D.C., where a Democratic chief executive also threatens vetoes of Republican legislative proposals and budgets. "A relatively small Legislature has functioned here because the members got along with each other personally, if not ideologically," he said. "Now we have enormous ideological gulfs, not only between more conservative Republicans and a moderately liberal Democratic governor, but even within Republican ranks." The Rogue Valley's members say there are several causes for the kind of session this has been. Among them are inexperience of new members and leaders, particularly in the House, confusion about their roles, and a lack of personal relationships, especially across party lines. "We have new members in the House who get up all the time and talk about things they know nothing about," said Rep. Judy Uherbelau, a Democrat from Ashland. Though only in her third term, Uherbelau is one of 17 senior members in the first House session affected directly by a 1992 law that limits lifetime service in the House to three terms. Twenty-six are newcomers, the most since 1973. "We have had high levels of turnover before," Lunch said. "But there would be 10, 15, 20 members who had been around for awhile, who knew how the Legislature worked and how the budget is structured. Those people are gone." Southern Oregon lost four members with a combined 67 years in the House -- the speaker pro tem, co-chairman of the joint budget committee, chairman of a budget subcommittee and chairman of another committee. The Senate has six new members this session, but because five came from the House, only one is a true newcomer. It will lose five members, including Senate President Brady Adams, R-Grants Pass, to term limits next year. Sen. Lenn Hannon of Ashland, the Senate's senior Republican and one of its two senior members, said many newcomers think the Legislature should dictate policies and operations of local schools, which now receive 70 percent of their support from the state. "Some of them feel this is what their role is and they should tell schools how things should be done," said Hannon, who's been a senator 25 years. "But one size does not fit all. I came here to be a legislator, not a member of a super school board." The leaders of both houses also bring less experience with them. Of the presiding officers in the past three decades, most have had three or more sessions before they ascended to their positions. Senate President Adams and House Speaker Lynn Snodgrass, R-Boring, each served two sessions before they became presiding officers, the preceding one as leaders of their party caucuses. Hannon and Uherbelau have been around long enough to cultivate relationships with legislators across party lines. But many Republicans and Democrats have not. To win legislative clearance of a ballot measure that would let cities and counties zone sex-related businesses, Rep. Rob Patridge, a first-term Republican from Medford, built alliances with some Democrats from Portland. Patridge, a former aide in the Oregon Senate, said he also has tried to learn from such legislative veterans as Hannon and Sen. Gene Timms, R-Burns. "But even from 10 years ago, when I worked here, there have been few friendships built across party lines or even within political parties," Patridge said. "There has not been the opportunity, or the time, to do that." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA