Two state senators compete to be Oregon’s next treasurer

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The state of Oregon collects a lot of money from income, property and business taxes – and while the state Legislature directs how that money is spent, it’s the treasurer who acts as steward of the state coffers.

The current treasurer, Tobias Read, has served for two terms and cannot run for office again this cycle. Instead, Read is vying to become the next Oregon Secretary of State. That has opened the door for two established Oregon state senators to run to replace him as treasurer: Democratic nominee Elizabeth Steiner and Republican Brian Boquist.

The state treasury is like Oregon’s bank accounts. Income from taxes, fees and investments goes in; money to pay for roads, the state police and pensions for public employees comes out.

The state’s constitution directs the treasurer to manage Oregon’s books and serve on the State Land Board alongside the secretary of state and governor. The office is also third in line to the governorship after the secretary of state.

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Protecting and growing Oregon’s bank account

In terms of the practical decisions a treasurer makes affecting the state and its taxpayers, there are key investments and other spending moves that could help grow the state’s pool of money and can influence who gets contracts to spend the money. The treasurer also issues bonds.

“They’re the bookkeeper, they’re the banker, they’re the investor, they’re the debt manager, and they’re one of three land stewards in Oregon,” Boquist told OPB. “That’s basically what they do.”

And while the treasurer might not make the laws related to the state’s Public Employee Retirement System – responsible for the pensions of more than 400,000 Oregonians – Boquist and Steiner agree it’s the treasurer’s role to protect and grow PERS money.

Right now, the around $100 billion pension system has an unfunded liability – meaning the difference between benefits promised and the money set aside for them – of more than $25 billion.

“The treasurer’s role in ensuring that the pension system is well funded is critical to the wellbeing of the state for a whole host of reasons,” Steiner told OPB, “not least of which is that, when the unfunded liability goes up, then the amount that public employers have to pay in on an ongoing basis goes up. And that’s less money for teachers in the schools, troopers on the roads, firefighters, all the things that Oregonians depend on to stay healthy and safe and be well-educated.”

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The Democratic candidate

Before running for the state Legislature, Steiner had an established career as a family physician. In 2011, she was appointed to the Oregon state senate to represent parts of Multnomah and Washington Counties after her predecessor, Suzanne Bonamici, was elected to Congress.

In 2018, Steiner took over as co-chair of the Joint Committee on Ways and Means, making her one of Oregon Legislature’s top budget writers.

“What we have seen from a long history,” Steiner said, “is that treasurers who have been legislators are more effective at partnering with the Legislature and other parts of the executive branch to get stuff done.”

Steiner said her interest in the role aligns with her goal as a physician: improving public health.

“The treasurer plays a significant role in helping Oregonians overcome financial insecurity,” Steiner said. “And insecurity, not surprisingly, is one of the leading causes of poor health, which I think is intuitively obvious. If you have financial insecurity, you may struggle to afford housing that’s safe and close enough to where you work or go to school, where your kids can go outside and play safely, where it’s easy to get to work, all those kinds of things.”

Steiner wants to build on some of the savings and financial literacy programs already established in Oregon and is interested in starting new ones.

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The GOP contender

Boquist grew up on a dairy farm in Tillamook before joining the U.S. Army, where he served as a special forces lieutenant colonel. He was elected to the Oregon House of Representatives in 2004. After two terms in the state house, Boquist was elected to the state senate in 2008 to represent parts of Yamhill and Polk counties.

In 2019, Boquist joined nearly a dozen other state senate Republicans in walking out of the Legislature to halt a vote on a climate change bill. At the time, then-governor Kate Brown floated the idea of having state police gather up the GOP lawmakers who walked off the job. Boquist made national headlines when he responded that, if they come after him, the state troopers should only “send bachelors” and “come heavily armed.”

In 2022, Oregon voters passed a measure barring lawmakers with excessive unexcused absences from running for reelection – as a way to discourage walkout tactics like the Republican senators had used. The following year, Boquist helped stage multiple walkouts and is now disqualified from running for reelection to the senate this year.

Boquist said he wants to become treasurer because Oregon needs “to get some transparency back” back in the role.

“I think whoever comes in is going to, for better or worse, open the books up and the audit’s going to happen,” Boquist said. “We’ll just put it that way.”

He said he would work to make slow changes to reduce the state’s debt and fix the unfunded liability in the pension system.

The differences between the candidates

In addition to Boquist and Steiner, Mary King with the Working Families Party will also appear on ballots.

However, Steiner is the only candidate to garner major financial campaign donations with around $350,000 on hand. Boquist is a distant second in fundraising with less than $15,000 on hand.

Boquist has said he’s running to give Oregonians a choice other than the status quo, as Democrats have held the office since the early 1990s. While he says Steiner has been a prudent co-chair of the Ways and Means committee, Boquist maintains he’d be more focused on saving money and reducing debt if elected.

But Steiner says there’s a major difference between her and every treasurer in Oregon’s history.

“It’s the only statewide office where we’ve never had a woman,” she said. “And I think a woman who has earned her way through college, and has chosen a career as a family physician and saw firsthand the impact of financial insecurity on people’s day-to-day lives and on their wellbeing – that’s a very different conversation than many other people who’ve served as treasurer.” Correction: This story has been updated to reflect the correct cash on hand amount for Steiner’s campaign.