A Better Future for Oregon's Children and Families
Oregon’s 861,000 children deserve to grow and thrive in supportive communities. But today, Oregon’s youth face urgent challenges: we rank last nationally in youth mental health, 44th in education, and one in six Oregon children face food insecurity. And the cost of housing continues to squeeze families, while child care remains both elusive and unaffordable for many.
The 2025 Children’s Agenda, representing over 135 organizations across Oregon, presents a comprehensive legislative vision to address these challenges. The proposed, groundbreaking, Momnibus package – a landmark set of bills addressing everything from maternal behavioral health to reducing child poverty, recognizes that supporting children means supporting whole families.
The proposed legislation spans our target domains including healthcare, education, housing, family & community, and climate while recognizing that these issues are deeply interconnected in children’s lives. A child’s ability to learn is impacted by their housing security; their mental health is connected to family stability; their future opportunities are shaped by early childhood experiences.
Below you’ll find our priority legislation for the 2025 long session, coded by focus area(s) Each proposal reflects dedicated collaboration between advocates, community organizations, and families across Oregon who know that we must act now to create lasting, positive change for our children and youth.
How We Measure Well-Being:
Our Children Oregon uses the following 5 intersecting domains to measure the well-being of Oregon’s children, youth and their families, and to determine which areas an agenda item will have the most impact.
Economic
Well-Being
Economic Well-Being
Mental &
Physical Health
Mental & Physical Health
Education
Education
Family & Community
Family & Community
Climate & Sustainability
Climate & Sustainability
2025 Children's Agenda Top Priorities
Click each block to see which of our partners submitted the agenda item, who’s supporting it, and links to learn more.
*These links are updated as information is made available, so please check back to see how each concept is progressing.
FILTER:
Child and Adult Care Food Program
SUBMITTED BY:
As many as 1 in 6 children in Oregon are food insecure and Early Care and Education providers are struggling to feed children during a time when access to quality, affordable care is already threatened. Our proposed solution is to create the ‘Child & Adult Care Food Program Supplemental Fund’ at the Oregon Department of Education. The purpose of the fund is to increase access to healthy and culturally relevant food for children in childcare by increasing meal and snack reimbursements for providers participating in the Child and Adult Care Food Program.
Child Care Package
SUBMITTED BY:
Oregon’s child care shortage is profound, and negatively impacts families across the state.
The Child Care Package aims to address three concerns: First, a quarter of families enrolled in Employment Related Daycare Programs are unable to find providers. Second, childcare businesses are struggling to recruit and retain employees. And finally, childcare is commonly left out of labor discussions.
By re-establishing enhanced child care referrals with local Child Care Resource and Referrals to reduce the number of unconnected families who cannot find care, continuing Child Care Recognition bonuses, providing increased healthcare coverage for workers, and ensuring that every economic development and workforce package includes a child care component and child care impact statement, we can begin to take real strides to address child care needs in Oregon.
Food for All Oregonians
SUBMITTED BY:
DETAILS:
SB 611
Today, one third more Oregonians experience hunger than before the pandemic. We are also seeing record-breaking numbers of visits to food assistance sites throughout the Oregon Food Bank Network. This bill establishes Food for All Oregonians (FFAO), a program that will provide, for the first time ever, vital food assistance to Oregonians aged 6 and under solely based on their immigration status. Currently, 6 other states have similar programs. FFAO would also include a Community Navigator program to ensure outreach to community members is based on trust, support, and safety.
Investing in Oregon Relief Nurseries
SUBMITTED BY:
Life circumstances like poverty, mental illness, generational trauma, and chemical dependency cancompound the stress associated with parenting young children. Relief Nurseries provide children, birth through age five, and their families with wraparound support to keep young children safe, strengthen families, prevent abuse and neglect, and reduce costly foster care. Relief Nurseries serve parents and young children by providing Therapeutic Early Childhood Program (TECP) Classrooms, In-home Parenting Support, Outreach Services, and Parenting Education. Relief Nurseries are connected at the local level with organizations working with young children and families and are able to adjust services to meet the needs of families as communities change. Investing in Oregon Relief Nurseries supports Relief Nurseries in meeting changing family and community needs.
Momnibus
SUBMITTED BY:
Our state has never been able to truly prioritize young children and their families. While the data clearly shows that investment in early childhood services has a tremendous return on investment both for children and families as well as the state, Oregon tends to continuously be reactive instead of proactive in our funding and our policies. Sen. Lisa Reynolds has been holding discussions with early childhood advocates all over the state to put together a landmark piece of legislation, fondly titled the “Momnibus” bill, that prioritizes housing for pregnancy and early childhood, ending child poverty, expanding behavioral health services for infants, children and parents, and expanding the perinatal workforce.
Nurse-Family Partnership Ask for State to Pay Medicaid Match
SUBMITTED BY:
The 9 counties with Nurse-Family Partnership programs in Oregon rely on billing Medicaid to fund their services to families. To get the federal Medicaid dollars, a non-federal match must be paid, which is paid by the state for almost all Medicaid services in Oregon. Arranging for the state to provide match funding to draw down Medicaid dollars for NFP home visiting services would allow for greater equity in access to beneficial home visiting services for families across Oregon. This would also align support for NFP with the state’s approach of using state funds for the Medicaid local match funding for Family Connects Oregon.
Rent Stabilization Policy Improvement Bill
SUBMITTED BY:
Oregon has some of the worst housing affordability in the nation. Rents are high, and wages have not kept up. Partially, this is due to the fact that we have extreme shortages of affordable units, and partially this is because the private market is still not regulated enough – all units less than 15 years old are entirely exempt from rent stabilization statutes. The tight market means that in newer units, prices have spiked exorbitantly, and even in units that are covered by rent stabilization, landlords are able to charge right up to the annual cap, which is not protective enough. The use of price-fixing algorithmic software exacerbates this situation, maximizing profit on any unit while destabilizing Oregon’s families. Consequently, the risk of eviction and homelessness is one of the biggest fears for low and moderate income households across the state, and the eviction rate is higher than ever. The solution is to ban the use of price-fixing algorithmic software and to strengthen and improve coverage of Oregon’s rent stabilization statutes.
School Meals for All
SUBMITTED BY:
Together, we’re building a movement for school meals in Oregon that reflects our values as Oregonians. No matter where they live in the state, a child shouldn’t experience hunger at school. We will eliminate unequal access to school meals for children in Oregon, improve school food practices and support thriving communities throughout the food system. We are bringing legislation to Oregon’s 2025 session to solidify a statewide commitment to universal school meals. With the passage of the Student Success Act in 2019, Oregon was a leader in addressing child hunger and nutrition through school meals. The pandemic proved that universal school meal policies were overwhelmingly popular, simple, and achievable. As of December 2023, nine other states have passed Universal School Meals for All policies. Oregon can once more be a leader with the success of a comprehensive Universal School Meals for All campaign.
School-Based Mental Health
SUBMITTED BY:
Oregon is ranked last in the nation for youth mental health and has the 4th highest school absenteeism rate. Our schools and families are being overwhelmed by the youth mental health crisis and we must provide innovative resources to create a continuum of care for youth and families, and address health issues and disrupted learning. This bill provides mental health and substance use grants to Oregon schools. Additionally, it provides 10 planning grants to develop new school-based health center and school nurse models to support thousands of students.
The bill also provides an inflationary increase of 10% to the school-based health center base rate, which has remained static for over a decade despite annual increases for CCOs and other health supports.
Strengthening the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC)
SUBMITTED BY:
The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is the largest anti-poverty program in the Oregon tax code, helping more than 250,000 working families struggling to make ends meet. The state credit is 9% of federal EITC, except for families with children under age 3, who receive 12% of the federal credit. The EITC is only available for families with earned income, and phases out at about $65,000 in income.
The EITC is on track to sunset without legislative action in 2025, and we are calling on lawmakers to both renew it and also strengthen it. The current 9%/12% breakdown of the federal EITC should be roughly doubled to 20% (baseline) and 25% (if you have a child under 3). Furthermore, an existing exclusion of childless adults under 25 and over 65 should be fixed so all adults, regardless of their age, are fully eligible.
WIC and Nurse Home Visiting
SUBMITTED BY:
BUDGET ASK:
- $10.2 M
Local Public Health Departments are struggling to maintain early childhood programs including the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program and nurse home visiting — specifically Babies First! and CaCoon. In the inflated cost environment we all are living in, counties are struggling to keep these programs funded. As such, we are asking for $6.2m to safeguard these two nurse home visiting programs and $4m to expand WIC. WIC is a federally mandated program that serves all pregnant people and their babies who meet the income requirements. Counties don’t have enough staff capacity to meet the need currently, and often clients have to wait for WIC services. We want to fix that and make sure everyone gets their full benefit. These programs are evidence based and have decades of positive outcomes, demonstrating better family stability, parent-child bonding, better mental and physical health, and better outcomes in school and beyond.
Additional legislative concepts
included in the 2025 Children’s Agenda
FILTER:
Bolstering Education Diversification
SUBMITTED BY:
This bill enhances financial support mechanisms through increased scholarships and funding allocations aiming to reduce economic barriers for prospective educators entering teacher preparation programs. Specifically, funding will be allocated to enhance The Oregon Teacher Scholars Program (OTSP) Grant, increasing it from $12,000 annually and allowing recipients to access funds during the summer term. This initiative prioritizes underrepresented groups and high-need subject areas, attracting talented individuals and ensuring a robust pipeline of well-prepared teachers for all students.
Expand Child Care Zoning
SUBMITTED BY:
DETAILS:
HB 3496
Child care providers can face significant barriers to opening and increasing the number of children they care for. Unpredictable and unclear local zoning restrictions are named as one frustrating and expensive barrier. This legislation would clarify where child care providers are allowed to operate as one piece to addressing Oregon’s child care crisis.
Five Needle Point Protocol
SUBMITTED BY:
DETAILS:
HB 2143
The legislation defines and establishes guidelines for the use of the “five-needle protocol,” which involves stimulating five points on the outer ear with sterile needles, ear seeds, or ear beads to provide temporary relief from symptoms related to substance use disorder, mental health conditions, or trauma. The Act allows individuals who complete specific training through recognized organizations to perform this protocol without needing an acupuncture license. However, these individuals cannot present themselves as licensed acupuncturists unless otherwise certified.
Flavors Hook Oregon Kids
SUBMITTED BY:
DETAILS:
SB 702
This proposed amendment will:
- Keep all products and all flavors in the bill, including menthol cigarettes, flavored shisha tobacco, and flavored Zyn.
- Establish regulatory authority over nicotine pouches. It will bring Zyn and like products under Oregon regulatory authority to ensure that inspectors can prevent these products from getting to kids – including the unflavored version.
- Reduce the number of retailers that can sell these products from the current 2,800+ tobacco retail license holders to 282 possible retailers – those currently holding OLCC liquor store licenses. Only 133 of current OLCC liquor licenses are dual licensed to sell both tobacco and alcohol. 68 of these are in Multnomah & Washington County, meaning once the Supreme Court upholds their county bans those liquor stores will not be able to sell flavored tobacco products.
- Clarify language regarding current local control over regulation of flavored tobacco sales. Multnomah and Washington counties – which have already decided to end the sale of flavored tobacco sales – would not see their ordinances affected by this amendment. Other local jurisdictions will maintain their current authority to pass flavor restrictions.
Freedom to Read
SUBMITTED BY:
DETAILS:
SB 1098
Book bans and classroom censorship efforts work to effectively erase the history and lived experiences of women, people of color and the LGBTQIA+ community by censoring discussions about race, gender and sexuality that impact people’s daily lives. While current laws require inclusive selection of instructional materials and generally prohibit discrimination in education, there is no law making it explicit that banning materials because of the identities involved in the material’s content or creation violates these laws. SB 1583 will strengthen our anti-discrimination values and laws by making it explicit that viewpoint-based decisions about who is represented in school materials qualify as discrimination that Oregon students are protected from.
The passage of the bill will protect students’ rights to read, learn and share ideas free from discriminatory censorship and enable them to see themselves reflected in their school’s library books, textbooks and instructional materials.
Fund Care Coordinators for In-School Oral Health Sealant and Screening Programs
SUBMITTED BY:
Approximately 25-40% of children in Title 1 schools (it varies by district) seen by OHA-certified oral health screening and tooth sealant programs have untreated tooth decay. And of those, about one-quarter have severe decay requiring urgent treatment. There are many invisible barriers to care for these children, and care coordinators help children and their families overcome them and get access to needed dental care. Unfortunately, programs are challenged to fully fund them. Our concept, which will be chief sponsored by Sen. Campos, would appropriate $900,000 to OHA to in turn provide grants in support of care coordinators in certified oral health screening and sealant programs. This would be a simple process – all certified local programs would receive funding. The amount was determined as sufficient to cover about half the cost of one coordinator for each program.
Protect Critical Funding for Victims of Crime
SUBMITTED BY:
Funding provides sexual and domestic violence service agencies to provide life-saving services to children and families experiencing violence and abuse, including safe shelter, safety planning, supportive advocacy, and critical operational funding for staff and programs.
Specifically, OSATF requests funds to Backfill and stabilize the Victims of Crime Act and to adopt one-time 2024 investments in Oregon Domestic and Sexual Violence Services Fund, the Survivor Housing Fund, and the SANE Certification Commission, as current service level funding.
State Support for Court Appointed Special Advocate Programs (DAS Budget Bill)
SUBMITTED BY:
When children enter foster care, they need a caring and consistent adult in their lives who looks only after their interests in the courtroom and beyond, throughout their path to permanency. Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASAs) are state mandated services where the court is required to appoint a CASA for every child who has experienced abuse or neglect and is in foster care. Due to limited resources and an underfunded state mandate, the 20 local CASA programs are only able to serve 56% of all children and youth in care in all 36 counties. An increase in state funding will stabilize local programs facing the impacts of inflation and support the expansion of services in their counties. This means that more foster children will have an advocate in court and a caring adult who will connect them with the services they need to be healthy, safe, and educated.
Strengthening School Nursing Act
SUBMITTED BY:
DETAILS:
TBD
This multi-pronged bill strives to solve immediate problems related to barriers to the delivery of school nursing services which impact the safety of students in Oregon schools. The concept includes the following: establishing requirements for policy (required by the Nurse Practice Act) supporting the practice of delegation; requiring the provision of nutritional information to support the care of students with health conditions including diabetes; and providing education for administrators about the requirements for school health services. The concept also proposes supports for the delivery of school nursing services in rural areas of Oregon.
Student Voice and Democracy Act
SUBMITTED BY:
DETAILS:
HB 3012
Youth are affected by local issues as much as anyone, especially when it comes to their schools. Students are the primary recipients of the services provided by the school and their experiences, needs, and concerns should inform district policy and the priorities of school board members. Yet, students cannot elect people who make decisions about their schools and, therefore, have no accountable representation and limited avenues to be civically engaged. We can do more to ensure that schools set students up for lifelong success and being civically engaged. Strong civics education and a lower voting age for school board elections mutually reinforce each other to increase civic engagement. Providing students with a way to directly apply what they’re learning in the classroom to their communities would add a crucial level of relevance to civics courses.
Students See Clearly At School Act
SUBMITTED BY:
An estimated 40,000 kids in Oregon lack needed glasses, a problem that leads to substantial learning challenges in school. These children suffer from access barriers to vision care, leading to a persistent and large gap in their ability to read, learn, and achieve. With Oregon lagging on academic achievement metrics, this must be addressed.
This bill creates a new, third-party administered program that will result in free school-based eye examinations and eyeglasses for underserved children across the state. Help cover the cost of providing this service by 1)providing ongoing state support and 2) enabling qualified, in-school service providers to access available federal funding via Medicaid, CHIP and a CMS-approved Health Services Initiative.
Toxic Free Schools
SUBMITTED BY:
DETAILS:
HB 2684
This legislative concept will modernize School Integrated Pest Management law which first passed in 2009. Children are at higher risk for health effects from exposure to pesticides than adults because their internal organs are still developing and maturing.
This concept will protect children by requiring school districts to:
– Review and update IPM plans every 5 years
– Review and update a district specific low-impact pesticide list every 5 years
– Require that IPM plans and low impact pesticide lists are easily accessible on School District websites
– Include school gardens in IPM plans
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2024 Legislative Wins
Last year through the collective efforts behind the Children’s Agenda, we successfully achieved ~$293.6M in investments for children and families in Oregon.
Thank you to all our Children's Agenda Partners
Our partners give us the support we need to fight for real legislative change.
