Oregonians know Ron as a senator who listens and innovates. For example, Ron has secured landmark health care and economic wins for our workers and retirees. Always citing the need to "throw open the doors of government for Oregonians," he holds an open-to-all town hall meeting in each of Oregon's 36 counties each year. Thus far he has held more than 970 meetings, as well as several virtual town hall meetings sponsored by the nonpartisan Town Hall Project. Wyden's dedication to hearing all sides of an issue and looking for common sense, nonpartisan solutions has won him trust on both sides of the aisle and put him at the heart of so many of the Senate's most important debates. In 2011, the Almanac of American Politics described Wyden as having "displayed a genius for coming up with sensible-sounding ideas no one else had thought of and making the counter-intuitive political alliances that prove helpful in passing bills." The Washington Post's Ezra Klein wrote: "The country has problems. And Ron Wyden has comprehensive, bipartisan proposals for fixing them."
In 1999, Senator Wyden teamed with Republican Senator Larry Craig to author the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act, commonly known as the “county payments” law. The law honors the federal government’s historic commitment to rural communities where the federal government holds land, establishing a payment formula for counties that had previously received revenue-sharing payments from United States Forest Service (USFS) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lands. Since October 2000, the program has secured more than $2.8 billion dollars for Oregon counties -- keeping teachers in classrooms, Sheriffs on the job and roads in good repair. Wyden secured a one year extension of the program in 2007 and then fought for and won a four-year reauthorization of the program in 2008. He again secured one-year extensions of the program in 2012, 2013 and 2015.
The current reauthorization expires at the end of 2015 and Wyden is currently working to extend the program for at least another year, while crafting a long-term solution for rural communities.
In 2013, the Forest Service, citing sequestration, requested that counties return $18 million in timber payments paid out at the beginning of that year. Senators Wyden, Merkley & Murkowski successfully pressed the Forest Service to halt any penalties or fines and work to minimize the impact of mandatory budget cuts on states and counties.