Governor vetoes bill that would have legalized Mayor Hoy’s ethics violation

Good news for everybody who values openness and transparency in public meetings. Bad news for Salem Mayor Julie Hoy, who was the ringleader of a scheme to circumvent Oregon’s public meetings law, a sleazy move that earned her an ethics violation from the Oregon Government Ethics Commission.

Julie Hoy

Recently Governor Tina Kotek vetoed HB 4177, a seriously flawed bill passed by the 2026 Oregon legislature that would have made legal the private “serial communications” with members of the Salem City Council that Hoy engaged in because she wanted to get rid of City Manager Keith Stahley without having to attempt this through a public process.

Here’s excerpts from an Oregonian story by Betsy Hammond, “Democratic Gov. Tina Kotek vetoes bill supported by her party.”

Gov. Tina Kotek has vetoed a public meetings bill that overwhelmingly cleared the Legislature this spring, citing fears local government officials could use it to “circumvent transparency.”

House Bill 4177, championed by Democratic Rep. Nathan Sosa of Hillsboro, would have created a broad exemption for some or all members of local governments to meet in secret to “gather information related to a decision that will be deliberated upon or made by the governing body.”

That would have allowed a quorum of a city council, county commission or school board or even the full body to meet privately to learn about a potential policy change, personnel action or spending choice without notifying the public of the meeting or the topic, journalism leaders and good government advocates said.

At least five legislators, including House Democratic Leader Ben Bowmanof Tigard, testified the bill would likely or certainly need changes in 2027 to ensure public transparency.

Still, only seven of Oregon’s 90 lawmakers, six of them Republicans, voted against it.

But on Thursday, one day before her deadline to do so, the governor killed it.

This was the only bill that Kotek vetoed. Good for her. She made the right decision to ignore legislators and other government officials like Mayor Hoy who enjoy wielding power secretly, outside of the public eye. Yeah, I know, democracy is messy. But it’s supposed to be.  Citizen input adds complexity to decisions by public bodies like a city council because a little messiness is preferable to less democracy.

I like to think that my message to Governor Kotek urging her to veto HB 4177 had some small effect on her decision. Thanks to the other people who also contacted Kotek after reading “If you don’t want elected officials doing public business behind closed doors, urge the governor to veto HB 4177.” In part I said:

I filed a successful complaint against Salem Mayor Julie Hoy with the Oregon Government Ethics Commission. A commission investigation found that Hoy communicated individually with a quorum of the city council about whether the City Manager, Keith Stahley should resign. Hoy then lied to the council president, Linda Nishioka, falsely claiming that a majority of the city council wanted Stahley to resign. Nishioka shared that falsity with Stahley, and he did resign, wrongly believing that most city councilors wanted him gone. Actually, only Mayor Hoy wanted Stahley to resign.

Under the current public meeting law, Hoy engaged in an illegal “serial communication,” which bars a quorum of a public body such as a city council from discussing issues in private that could be deliberated and voted upon by the public body. HB 4177 would allow the previously prohibited action by Hoy — which means that all the public would see is a motion to take action on some issue, as the discussion of that issue would have taken place outside of public view.