Oregon Public Broadcasting

As Oregonians joined the big Democratic wave Tuesday night, they actually celebrated with a bit of a spending spree.

Oregon voters approved more than a half billion dollars in bond money to fund  public school buildings and kids' programs.  And that amount  could rise, because some ballot measures are still too close to call.

Rob Manning reports on what was behind the surprising success of these money measures.

Euphoric Portlanders celebrating Barack Obama’s win, up and down Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, tended to drown out other results Tuesday night.

Fifty miles south, in Salem, Patrick Sieng was nervously watching the returns. He’s a lead advocate for a 240 million dollar Salem-Keizer school bond.

It’s the largest such bond in state history.

Patrick Sieng: “Polk County came in, and at that point, was showing 60 percent support, so we were really excited at that point. We knew if we were coming out in the early numbers ahead, we’d be looking good. So, I think it was a pleasant surprise to everyone.”

Unlike the presidential race, polls are rare in bond campaigns, so results can be surprising. For instance, few people expected Portland’s Children’s Levy to pass with 70 percent approval.

Dan Saltzman: “I’m feeling humbled, but I’m also ecstatic over the resounding endorsement by Portland voters, for the Portland Children’s Investment Fund.”

That’s lead backer, city commissioner Dan Saltzman. He credits the same underlying excitement in the presidential race for helping his levy pass.

Dan Saltzman: “I have to attribute something, I think, to the sense of optimism that people took to the polls with them. Whether they’re voting for McCain, or Obama, I think we benefited. Despite the gloomy times, people have a sense of optimism about the future, and that’s reflected in those votes.”

Children’s Investment Fund leaders say they didn’t just grab the coattails of the big race. They adjusted their strategy. Campaign manager, Emerald Bogue, says she targeted young voters, once their registration numbers started growing.

Emerald Bogue: “We had blog ads. We took out ads in college newspapers. We had bus benches. We had billboards. We tried to create as much visibility around Portland as possible, but we wanted to make sure that it was visibility that was getting to young people, too.”

But Bogue isn’t sure how big of a connection to draw between wins for Obama and those for tax measures.

David Williams is a legislative specialist with the Oregon School Board Association. He says economics are often more important than the party dynamic of other races.

David Williams: “I think clearly, the Red-Blue is not relevant. But clearly the economy was a huge factor in a lot of communities. You can go through that list, and look at any of them in much smaller communities around the state that had trouble convincing their voters to pay the extra dollars to invest in their K-12 infrastructure, because these are hard economic times.”

For instance, economically hurting Deschutes County rejected a school levy and a community college bond. But Umatilla County voters approved three out of four school bonds on this fall’s ballot.

Williams notes that there was one major development on the state level that could help a handful of districts whose measures narrowly failed.

Oregon voters approved Ballot measure 56.  That repealed the so called double majority rule, requiring at least half of registered voters cast ballots in most elections, for money measures to be approved. The change means that Oregon school districts can pass money measures as soon as next May,  with a simple majority.