Recent ruling by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor may impact the direction of many bills being considered by the Oregon Legislature. Judge O’Connor approved a temporary restraining order forbidding President Biden’s administration from giving out grants in a program aimed at prioritizing applicants due to their race and/or gender after he told plaintiff Philip Greer he is likely to succeed.

Greer prepared an application on behalf of his restaurant and is otherwise eligible to receive an RRF grant, but for the allegedly unconstitutional prioritization scheme.

At issue is the fact that the Biden administration directs prioritization of restaurants that are owned and controlled by women, veterans, and people deemed “socially and economically disadvantaged,” which includes those owned at least 51 percent by some Indian tribes or Native Hawaiian organizations. The lawsuit goes forward claiming “this is illegal, it is unconstitutional, it is wrong, and it must stop.”

Oregon’s leadership has been following the Biden administration in bills covering education, land use, energy, and business. These are a few examples of bills that could result in an unconstitutional law suit:

• HB 2001 Requires school district that is making reductions in educator staff positions to retain teacher with less seniority if teacher has more merit and if retention of teacher is necessary to maintain school district's diversity ratio.
• HB 2060 Identifies economically disadvantaged students based racial or ethnic groups… for purposes of Student Investment Account distributions.
• HB 2518HB 2518 establishes and allocates funding to the Oregon Brownfield Properties Revitalization Fund to support a forgivable loan program for minority-owned and woman-owned businesses and emerging small businesses.
• HB 2567 Directs Secretary of State to study and make recommendations regarding best practices for conducting audits related to equity issues pertaining to historically disadvantaged groups.
• SB 247 Directs Department of Energy to study opportunities and challenges in Oregon for renewable energy, energy equity and development of clean energy workforce.
• HB 3110 Requires board of directors of publicly traded corporation to have specified proportion of female directors and directors who are members of underrepresented communities.
• HB 3112 Establishes Equity Investment and Accountability Board and Office within office of Governor to provide equity oversight of cannabis industry to issue license being racially inclusive.

Could it be that “socially and economically disadvantaged” is being used to pull on the heart-strings to hide the social justice agenda?


--Donna Bleiler

Post Date: 2021-06-01 11:08:11

Last Update: 2021-06-01 12:30:17