Pendleton lobbying efforts paid off in Salem
By Terry Murry on Thursday, July 15th, 2021 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
PENDLETON – State Sen. Bill Hansell (R-Athena) said that city of Pendleton officials provided a unified front in Salem and worked hard to get approval for two top-priority bills. He said their accessibility made it easy for him to do his job in making sure the measures were passed.
One bill protects the companies testing innovative products at the Pendleton UAS Test Range from having to reveal proprietary information to the state. It was feared that competing businesses could then access and use that information.
“It’s incredible, the work that’s being done at the test range,” Hansell said. “A lot of it is proprietary. There are only three locations in Oregon where they can do the type of experimentation that’s being done here.”
The other successful measure will help ease the city’s housing crisis.
“The second thing we did here was open up some additional land for housing development,” Hansell said. The land is opened up because the legislature approved allowing Pendleton to expand its urban growth boundary.
