House committee adopts amendment and sends bill on maritime pilot residency to the floor

The House Committee on Emergency Management, General Government and Veterans on May 20 adopted the dash-1 amendment to Senate Bill 459 and voted to send the bill to the House floor with a due-pass recommendation.

The bill, as summarized by LPRO staff during the work session, removes a previous requirement that three specific licensed members of the Oregon Board of Maritime Pilots be Oregon residents and replaces that requirement with residency rules applying to public members and to at least one licensed member. LPRO staff said the amendment requires public members of the board to be Oregon residents, requires at least one licensed member of the board to be an Oregon resident, applies those residency requirements only to board members appointed or reappointed after the bill's effective date, and does not apply to current board members. LPRO staff also stated that the measure has no fiscal impact and no revenue impact.

Vice Chair Graber moved to adopt the dash-1 amendment dated 05/01/2025; the amendment was adopted. Graber then moved to report Senate Bill 459 as amended to the floor with a due-pass recommendation. The clerk called the roll; the motion passed with the following recorded ayes: Representative Boyce; Representative Evans; Representative Scott Landau; Representative Watson Ave.; Vice Chair Draper; Vice Chair Lewis; and Chair Tran. No nays or abstentions were recorded on the floor recommendation during the roll call called on the record.

During the committee discussion, Representative Evans thanked staff for the work on the bill and said, "I just wanna say thank you for working on this. I understand what the purpose of the original bill was to make sure that we had membership, but I do think it's important that people that are making decisions are the folks also paying the taxes." That comment was made during the committee's deliberations on the amendment.

Committee members noted the bill had previously been heard by the committee on April 22. Representative Lewis was announced as the member who will carry the bill to the floor. The chair closed the work session and said Senate Bill 150A and Senate Bill 838A would be carried over to the committee's next meeting on Thursday at 2 p.m. in Hearing Room C; the chair also mentioned an informational hearing in the Senate counterpart committee on emergency management post-Cascadia that members could attend.

The committee record shows the formal actions taken: adoption of the dash-1 amendment and a successful motion to send Senate Bill 459, as amended, to the House floor with a due-pass recommendation. The summary and committee statements on applicability to current members, effective-date limitations, and fiscal impact were provided on the record by LPRO staff.