Decision 2014: Kitzhaber, Richardson talk issues

Perhaps the most high-profile race Oregon voters will decide Nov. 4 is the one for governor. The two major-party candidate, Democrat incumbent John Kitzhaber and Republican challenger Dennis Richardson. met for a debate last week in Sunriver, giving their view on a number of critical issues to Oregon’s future.

Here’s a sampling:

Recreational marijuana (Measure 91)

Kitzhaber: “I don’t support the ballot measure. Not because I have anything against marijuana. I’m very concerned that we don’t know enough and don’t have in place the kind of public safety, law enforcement and educational framework for it to work.”

Richardson: “I agree with the governor that we should delay, if we could, implementing the law in Oregon until we see what has really taken place in Washington and Colorado.”

Cover Oregon

Richardson: “We’ve wasted $300 million on a website project. The Governor is going to say that we’ve signed up all these people under Cover Oregon for healthcare, but the truth is most of them would have been signed up under Medicaid anyway.”

Kitzhaber: “With regards to Cover Oregon specifically, it will deliver a functional website in November. We only have 5% or Oregonians that don’t have health insurance coverage today because we kept our eye on the ball which was enrollment.”

Driver cards (Measure 88)

Kitzhaber: “Absolutely yes. These people are working in Oregon, they’re paying taxes in Oregon, they are the backbone of our nursery industry , they’re the backbone of a huge part of our agricultural industry, they’re contributing to the state. They’re hard workers. They deserve the right to drive to and from work, to and from church, take their kids to school.”

Richardson: “I think it’s a mistake, though, for us to grant those driving privileges because we can learn from the experiences of other jurisdictions. Tennessee had this kind of a program and they repealed it because they had bus loads of illegal residents, immigrants that were coming to Tennessee so that they could get that government card.

Minimum wage (going to $9.25 per hour in January)

Richardson: “The minimum wage should probably stay with the same program we have now because it is indexed. But what we need to do now is not focus on (that) but focus on wages, so that people can get beyond minimum wage.”

Kitzhaber: “I do believe the minimum wage should be higher. I’m not sure what. I don’t think it should be $15, but I could see it at $11 or so. I think the real point though is raising the minimum wage by itself doesn’t solve the problem.”