Children First for Oregon

State working its way out of recession one job at a time

Clackamas Review
Guest Column
By Dave Hunt
Mar 10, 2010

Inch by inch… job by job… Oregon is working its way out of this global recession. The work accomplished in the 25-day legislative session we just concluded will help our state’s recovery and continue our efforts to prepare Oregon for a robust economic resurgence in the coming years.

Our focus: create jobs and help struggling families. Here are some of the highlights of our work this February session:

• For small businesses looking to expand, we eased restrictions, streamlined the application process and allocated new resources to give them access to capital. Small business owners across Oregon have told me that the lack of access to credit is the single biggest factor preventing job creation.

• For 19,000 unemployed Oregonians, we extended unemployment benefits to help them pay the mortgage and feed their families.

• For 5,500 children, we extended Employment-Related Day Care, ensuring that 2,900 families will have assistance they need to keep working and over 1,500 day care workers will have jobs caring for those children.