Editor's note: This is the fourth of a multipart series on Tina Kotek – her past and her future – as well as where her political ambitions might take her.

From a thinly veiled attempt to covering illegals with health care in the failed HB 2164 to requiring school-based health services , Speaker Kotek has placed a heavy thumb on the scales of health care. Kotek has driven the health care agenda towards universal health care with designed benefits for minority groups. She’s on record as pro-choice while defending access to reproductive health care for all Oregonians.

How could we forget Cover Oregon. As Speaker, Kotek lead her caucus to pass SB 99 in 2011. This was the bill that enabled the failed Cover Oregon website and in 2015 she was forced to help sponsor its repeal. The extreme failure made national news and cost the state more than $300 million. Kotek and leadership tried to blame the companies hired to build the website, but the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform investigation concluded that it was the politicians playing politics who were to blame.

Before New York tried to limit the size of soft drinks, Kotek tried limiting the size of drinks with high-calories. If you were disabled or needed liquid nutrients, containers would be limited to 12 ounces. That may not have been her intent. Perhaps it was aimed at sports drinks or teenage diets, but it didn’t go over well in 2011 when Kotek sponsored HB 3222 prohibiting sale of single servings of high-calorie beverages in prepackaged containers to not more than 12 ounces.

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

Speaker Kotek made sure HB 3057 passed using her majority to further Governor Brown’s mandates. The bill authorizes Oregon Health Authority to disclose individually identifiable information related to COVID-19 for medical reasons, but also may contract for purposes of responding to COVID-19 recovery efforts, provide what treatment and individual has had, and report services that were necessary for response and recovery efforts.

On August 19, Kotek tweeted support requiring health workers and school staff get vaccinated. “I support this decision. We need to keep our kids in school and support hospital systems throughout the state that are on the verge of collapse due to the Delta variant.” Hospitalization only exceeded last November by 20 or fewer for five days for the entire state and is now declining.


--Donna Bleiler

Post Date: 2021-09-07 10:53:18

Last Update: 2021-09-08 14:59:29