Earlier this month North Star hosted a briefing about a policy framework to address volatility in Oregon’s general fund revenue. (Here is a link to the slides we shared and a recap is below.)

We appreciated the lively discussion and are hosting a virtual working meeting on Monday, March 6th, 1:30-3:00pm to dig in on advancing the concept.

All are welcome – even if that kind work is new to you or unusual in your current role. We’ll send around an agenda to registrants next week, but expect a more discussion-focused work session.

A Recap of North Star’s Briefing on February 6th:

What is the problem … and solution?

Instability in Oregon’s revenue system creates problems for planning and delivering excellent public services, and for meeting Oregonians' values for creating equal opportunity across race, geography, and generations. We believe that Oregon could stabilize the revenue system and invest in much-needed infrastructure projects by diverting one part of the existing personal income tax out of the general fund and into a separate fund with a dedicated purpose.

The revenue that we’re looking at, capital gains, is the specific tax paid by individuals on the profit that they make when an investment is sold, on items like stocks, bonds, cryptocurrencies, jewelry, and real estate. This tax already exists; we’re not talking about any changes to the tax. But capital gains is wildly volatile — and that’s the problem we’re interested in solving. We think that taking that volatility out of the general fund, and dedicating it to purposes like one-time infrastructure investments, like housing or seismic readiness, is excellent public policy for today, and for generations to come.

What is North Star’s role?

North Star is a private foundation focused on economic issues and democracy reform. We’re not an advocacy group, and aren’t structured to do that kind of work. Instead, we focus on convening stakeholders to learn together and collaborate on finding solutions to vexing problems.