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The Secretary of State’s Office is asking lawmakers for an initial $25 million to stand up key provisions of a law that will limit political contributions and increase the transparency of spending in Oregon politics – even as agency leaders concede they cannot say what implementation will ultimately cost.
A top agency official acknowledged that the agency couldn’t “provide a detailed cost estimate” or account for the law’s “ongoing costs,” raising the possibility that the eventual price tag could climb well above $25 million. The uncertainty stems from the fact the agency has not yet hired a contractor to carry out the extensive technological overhaul required by the 2024 law.
“Given the risk of the project, if we are able to generate respondents to the (request for bids) we anticipate high costs to achieve on-time delivery given the unique requirements of the policy,” Deputy Secretary of State Michael Kaplan said in a Dec. 8 letter to the Legislature’s top budget writers made public Wednesday.
The lack of detailed cost estimates less than a year before key provisions of the law are expected to go into effect raises questions about whether lawmakers could move to delay parts of the law during the session that begins Feb. 2, an option they briefly considered in the final days of last year’s five-month legislative session.
As written, the law will limit the amount of money that political candidates, corporations, unions, individuals and other groups can give to each other starting in 2027, among other provisions. It will also require the state to maintain a comprehensive, modernized system to track political contributions between such groups starting in 2028.
Without additional funding, Secretary of State Tobias Read has warned the rollout of the law could be botched. Oregon has a weak track record of standing up large technology-linked systems, most notably the state’s massive failure to launch the online health exchange Cover Oregon about a decade ago.
Read has told lawmakers for months that the price tag for the campaign finance system would be high. But his office is now short on time. Legislators approved the law in early 2024 knowing they would eventually have to fund its implementation, and some of its key provisions are set to go into effect on Jan. 1, 2027.
In his letter, Kaplan said the “largest driver of costs” behind the budget request is the tight deadline that a contractor would have to carry out the job. Documents show that the Secretary of State’s Office plans to put out a request to proposals from vendors by mid-January, with responses expected by mid-February.
The “novelty of the policy” and the arduous work required to build a system that can aggregate and monitor contributions might narrow the number of qualified vendors who will submit bids, which could hike up costs even further, Kaplan wrote. Also, the agency just finished a lengthy process to address numerous inconsistencies and gray areas within the law, but officials say they need further guidance from lawmakers to resolve remaining questions, which could also result in higher costs.
“We want to put power back into the hands of Oregonians and make sure that no one can buy the state’s democracy,” Read told lawmakers in November. “But we also know this: If we don’t get this law right, the public will likely see it as another broken promise. And that would do a lot more harm than good.”
An analysis from the Legislative Fiscal Office determined that the Secretary of State’s Office did not fully account for the lengthy rulemaking process and had initially planned for agency staff to develop the new technological infrastructure, instead of an outside contractor. The agency decided to initiate the bidding process after it realized its own staff could not carry out such an overhaul by the deadline.
Read entered office last January, nearly a year after lawmakers passed the legislation. His predecessor, LaVonne Griffin-Valade, made it clear before leaving office that the agency didn’t have the resources or capacity to implement the law.
The legislative analyst recommended that lawmakers wait to make a decision on the funding request until the secretary of state can provide more detailed cost estimates during the upcoming five-week session.
Lawmakers have a few options they might consider in the session. They could meet the funding request and work with the Secretary of State’s Office to address technical flaws in the law. They could also delay the law’s implementation date, which they weighed last year before receiving intense backlash from good government groups.
Dan Meek, a longtime campaign finance reform advocate who helped negotiate the law and participated in a group last year to address flaws in the bill, said he worried the large financial request might serve as an excuse for lawmakers and Read to delay the contribution limits or other parts of the law.
Lawmakers are entering the 35-day legislative session with a lot of priorities, including taking up policies related to federal immigration enforcement, transportation funding and a projected deficit in the state budget. It’s unclear if funding campaign finance reform will be a priority.
“The Speaker knows the stakes are high: public trust in our fair and safe elections is on the line,” said Jill Bakken, a spokesperson for House Speaker Julie Fahey. “We’re working closely with the Secretary of State’s Office to ensure that they’re able to implement the bill successfully, knowing that it’s a priority for voters that Oregon finally enact campaign contribution limits.”
Bakken didn’t specify whether Fahey, a Eugene Democrat, would support delaying some of the bill’s provisions. In 2024, Fahey’s office led the negotiations with business industry representatives, union leaders and campaign finance reform advocates who helped craft the law.
Legislators only began crafting the law in 2024 after it became clear that voters would see two ballot measures brought forward by competing groups that would have set contribution limits, but to different extents.
After passing the law, legislators pledged that they would return to address flaws in the bill and allocate funding. But they have taken no action on the law aside from approving $5.4 million in May 2024 for the Secretary of State’s Office to hire employees and purchase software.
With no campaign finance limits, Oregon has seen massive political contributions flow to candidates of both parties. For example, Read, a Democrat, raised nearly $1 million in 2024 while running for secretary of state. Sen. Christine Drazan of Canby, a Republican who proposed the delay in setting contribution limits last year, raised more than $22 million during the 2022 gubernatorial race that saw a record $70 million in spending.
Oregonians have long expressed support for restrictions on political spending. In 2020, voters with 78% approval passed Measure 107 to amend the state constitution to allow such limits, paving the way for the 2024 law.
“Our top priority is to make sure we don’t have any delays in implementing what Oregonians want and deserve, which is stopping millionaires and billionaires from giving unlimited political contributions,” Jason Kafoury, a longtime campaign finance reform advocate, told The Oregonian/OregonLive. “We urge the Legislature to give the secretary of state the resources they need to put a functional campaign finance system in place.”