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The voice of experience Sen. Lenn Hannon is nearing the end of a 26-year career in the Oregon Legislature. During that time, he's switched parties, survived two recall attempts - and quietly earned the respect of his colleagues in Salem. By JESSICA SMITH A Hannon timeline 1974 : In his first political race, Hannon, then a Democrat, bests incumbent Lynn Newbry, a Republican, to take control of Senate District 26. Hannon wins by 37 votes. 1975 : Frustrated by attempts to influence his votes on labor legislation, Hannon returns a $500 contribution to Oregon AFL-CIO organizers who backed him in 1974. 1978 : Despite mounting criticism from local Democrats for his stands on gun control, abortion and other issues, Hannon fights off challengers to retain his seat. 1979 : An effort to recall Hannon fails when critics miss a filing deadline. Critics wanted to unseat Hannon for refusing to support state control of federal land in Oregon. 1980 : Hannon defects to the Republican Party, saying local Democrats worked against him in the 1978 election. The switch makes him one of seven Republicans in the 30-member Senate. 1982 : Two years after his party switch, Hannon staves off a challenge from Jay Mullen, a Democrat, who lost to Hannon in the 1978 Democratic primary. 1986 : Hannon wins fourth term in office. He defeats current Jackson County Commissioner Sue Kupillas, then an Eagle Point school board member. 1987 : After 21 years, Hannon leaves his job as an equipment operator for the city of Ashland and goes to work as an insurance agent. 1990 : In his closest race since 1974, Hannon edges then-Jackson County Commissioner Jeff Golden to retain his seat for a fifth term. 1993 : The Oregon Citizens Alliance targets Hannon and other lawmakers in a recall effort that is dropped late in the year. Hannon irked the OCA when he supported a bill that prohibited local ordinances based on sexual orientation. 1994 : Hannon handily wins his sixth term. After 20 years in the Legislature, Hannon is the senior Republican in the Senate. 1995 : As Senate Republicans take control from the Democrats, Hannon is named president pro tem, traditionally awarded to the senior member of the majority party. 1998 : In a bid for his seventh and last term as a state senator, Hannon runs unopposed in the November election. 2001 : Hannon settles in for his last legislative session, and is named chair of the powerful Joint Ways and Means Committee, which shapes state spending for the next two years. SALEM - He pops a few black jelly beans into his mouth with a little sigh. The licorice taste, he confides, quiets cravings for cigarettes, which he gave up two days ago. It's 9 a.m. on a Tuesday and Sen. Lenn Hannon sits at his desk in the Capitol, taking a break from the budget wrangling that lately consumes his days in Salem. It doesn't last long. Dixie, Hannon's wife and longtime aide, steps into the office. The governor would like to see you, she says. Now. Grabbing the few jelly beans still sitting on his desk, the Senate's senior Republican hurries to Gov. John Kitzhaber's office, which is already humming with back-and-forth debate over an unexpected surplus that won't come close to covering unfunded budget items. Hannon joins the group and listens a few minutes before he speaks. The bottom line is the state can't pay for every legislator's pet project or program, Hannon says with a fierceness that quiets the room. Don't bother asking for money, he says, because it isn't there. From his end of the table, Kitzhaber looks to Hannon. With a little smile, the governor winks. People listen To an outsider, the moment with the governor more than any other illustrates the respect given Hannon, who's serving in his last legislative session after 26 years. Term limits will force Hannon, 57, to relinquish his office in 2002. "He keeps his own counsel," says John Watt, a lobbyist and former Medford representative who served with Hannon in the 1990s. "He's an extremely intelligent man, but he's quiet most of the time. Then it boils to the surface." And when Hannon talks, colleagues say, people listen. "One thing he has is tremendous respect from other legislators," says Brady Adams, a former Senate president from Grants Pass. "Lenn is the kind of person you can go to as a resource and a mentor, and you can always rely on him." This session, Hannon's stature in the Senate is reflected in his appointment as co-chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. At the Capitol, there's no committee more powerful. Ways and Means members shape the state budget. As chairmen, Hannon and Rep. Ben Westlund, a Republican from Central Oregon, make and break bills by deciding which ones receive a public airing and which ones never see the inside of a hearings room. Since 1985, Hannon has served in the Ways and Means process, making him one of the most experienced budget negotiators in Salem. "He knows stuff up here," says Cathy Shaw, a former Ashland mayor who now works for Rep. Alan Bates, an Eagle Point Democrat. "He knows where the money is." There are plenty of examples: $3.5 million in 2001 for a rest stop south of Ashland; $15 million in 1999 for a high-speed rail line between Portland and Eugene with bus connections to Medford; $5.6 million in 1997 for a visual arts center at Southern Oregon University. Just last week it was announced that Hannon had arranged for $15 million - 75 percent of what's needed - in state bond money to refurbish SOU's library. "Sen. Hannon has meant a great deal to us," says Ron Bolstad, SOU vice president for administration and finance. "He's taken our needs seriously and he's been there as we've needed him." Yet when the 2003 Legislature convenes, Hannon won't be there to walk the marbled Capitol hallways. Oregon's term limits will prevent him from seeking an eighth term in 2002. It's hard to know what effect Hannon's departure will mean for Southern Oregon, says Rep. Bates. Surely, the region will miss the influence Hannon has wielded as a senior legislator. "It's going to be a blow," Bates says. "I don't care who takes his job, they're going to have to rebuild that base. With term limits, that's going to be hard to do." His own man Standing on a covered patio outside the Capitol, watching rain fall from a gray sky, Hannon says it's going to be difficult to walk away from the position he's held since 1975. "I'll miss the process," he says. "But no one should ever feel like they own the office. It's given to them by the people to guard and protect. I know those are corny words, but that's what we're asked to do." Hannon takes seriously his job as a public servant, and colleagues say he's just as committed to preserving the integrity the job. Long before former Vice President Al Gore stood before the nation as his "own man," Hannon stood in Southern Oregon as just that. In 1974, labor organizers persuaded Hannon, then a Democrat, to challenge Republican Lynn Newbry for the Senate District 26 seat. Hannon, who worked then as a backhoe operator and truck driver for the city of Ashland, squeaked past Newbry at the polls, winning 37 more votes than the incumbent. When the Legislature convened the following year, the unions leaned on Hannon to vote for labor legislation that he didn't support. Hannon refused, and returned a $500 campaign donation to the Oregon AFL-CIO. "He's followed his own intelligence and his own philosophy and he hasn't listened to a lot of the baloney from special interest people who want to pressure lawmakers," says Newbry, now a Hannon supporter. Hannon's decision to switch political parties 21 years ago also says something about his independence. Amid mounting frustration with the Democratic platform, Hannon registered as a Republican on Feb. 13, 1980. "They said, 'If you don't embrace this, we won't embrace you,' " Hannon recalls. "I said, 'I prefer if you don't touch me.' " Over the years, Hannon has become a man "who increasingly knows where he is on issues," says Sen. Cliff Trow, who met Hannon in 1975 when both were freshman Democrats. "When he makes up his mind, that's generally it," says Trow. Supporters of a bill to build a major-league baseball stadium in Portland learned this session how difficult it can be to persuade Hannon once he's made a decision. Hannon has refused to give the bill a hearing, saying lottery-backed funds should not be used for the venture. "Baseball just isn't going to happen," he says. "Over my cold, dead body." Jay Mullen, an SOU history professor who ran twice against Hannon in the 1980s, praises the senator for taking sometimes unpopular stands. "I actually cheer the man," Mullen says. "Portland was trying to ram through money for a baseball stadium that's not really serving the state." But just as some constituents and former opponents applaud Hannon's independence, others have knocked the senator for his political views. A few weeks ago, after Hannon supported a bill that reduced the amount to be refunded to Oregonians under the income tax "kicker" law, angry constituents flooded his office with calls. In 1993, the Oregon Citizens Alliance targeted Hannon in a recall effort after he supported a bill that prohibited local ordinances based on sexual orientation. Criticism hurts, Hannon says, but the slings and arrows are less painful than compromising his principles. "There are very few who will stand up and say, 'I don't agree with you and here's why,' " says Watt. "But you always knew where Lenn was coming from. When he feels like something is the right thing, he does it." As the session winds down and Hannon prepares to leave the Legislature, he says that's how he'd like to be remembered. "They can say, 'We didn't always agree with the fat little SOB, but boy, did he care about people.' " Reach reporter Jessica Smith at 776-4481, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.