State lawmakers will return to the Capitol in Salem on Monday with an agenda fully reloaded by legislative leaders.
Most House and Senate members were pleasantly surprised to be told Thursday they could go home and not be back for work until Monday. Both chambers continued committee meetings, but those could be done virtually, as they have been since the Capitol closed in March 2020 because of the pandemic.
Lawmakers still have some heavy legislative lifting left before they can go home. The end of every session focuses on pieces of the state budget, which move through in multibillion -dollar chunks at a time.
School building: One allocation that has caused higher education officials around the state to hold their breath in the past is the capital construction bond authorizations for universities. This year’s projected $442.8 million bond package for seven state four-year college campuses is in Senate Bill 5505. It includes $13.8 million to build a new Student Success Center at Oregon State University-Cascades in Bend.
