EDITOR’S NOTE: UPDATE – We have removed our note about the information regarding the age restricions regarding parental notification for children. See below for Jim Heffernan’s review of the legislation. We want to acknowledge that when we get it wrong – we will clean it up. I have reached out to Dixie to let her know that we really appreciate having this issue brought to our attention, and to clarify what the legislation does say. While as Jim states below, the scope of HB2002 (now HB2002B) is overwhelming and the language concerning, it really comes to body autonomy and a person having the right and access to reproductive health care.
From Jim Heffernan:
I really have to wonder about HB2002B, why it needs to be 46pages, 26000+ words. It’s troubling to me it contains the following text
First in Section 2:
1 (4) “Reproductive health care” includes family planning and contraception, pregnancy
2 termination services, prenatal, postnatal and delivery care, miscarriage management,
3 fertility care, sterilization services, treatments for sexually transmitted infections and re-
4 productive cancers and any other health care and medical services related to reproductive
5 health.
Then in Section 8 there are these lines
1 [(1)] (2) Notwithstanding subsection (3) of this section, a minor of any age may give con-
2 sent, without the consent of a parent or guardian of the minor, to receive reproductive
3 health care information and services from a physician, physician assistant licensed under ORS
4 677.505 to 677.525, nurse practitioner licensed under ORS 678.375 to 678.390, pharmacist licensed
5 under ORS chapter 689 or naturopathic physician licensed under ORS chapter 685 [may provide
6 birth control information and services to any person without regard to the age of the person], who is
7 acting within the provider’s scope of practice.
I believe the whole intent of act was to ensure the rights of women and why the “minor of any age” gets in the act is something of a mystery to me, unless it’s just to start fights. But, I do think that if an 11 year old (it could happen) wants to terminate her pregnancy, her parents should not be able to say no.
The way I get it, HB 2002B (engrossed) is latest version with all changes. I converted PDF on the Oregon House website to a Word document to be able to copy/paste lines and get the word count. The way I count, there are 38 sponsors to the bill.
We absolutely agree with Dixie that in a situation when a child (of any age) has an unplanned pregnancy that they should have access to services, resources and support. As Jim says above, no child should be forced to have a child.
(Dixie’s original letter 5/6/23)
First of all, lets look at the bill that made the Republicans “walk out”. I should first say that I was a Democrat most of my life until about 10 years ago, when the corruption in our Federal government made me realize that belonging to a political party blinded a person from seeing the bigger picture. I am now a member of the “independent party” of Oregon and will remain so forever in the interest of a better and more honest government. I have been watching the Oregon Legislature for about 5 years now, and I find it is as corrupt as our federal government. I was terribly disappointed to find that out, and I considered myself terribly naive to think it could be otherwise.
So on to this bill HB 2002. Amongst other things, this bill allows a child of ten years* and up to get an abortion or gender change “care” without the parents notification. Isn’t that bad enough to make a person say – OK STOP RIGHT THERE!
The interesting thing about this bill is that the sponsor did not know what was in the bill. STOP RIGHT THERE! And hence the Republicans pointing out that several procedural rules have been violated – which they have been. I discovered this for myself while watching the Oregon legislature in action for the last five years. Who cares about rules? Well like most rules they are there for a purpose and these rules were put in place to guarantee a democratic procedure. Why are they violated? To insure that corporate and human greed can prevail over state governance. If you watch the “news” on TV – it doesn’t tell the truth at all.
I believe that parental rights are being violated – that is where this whole country is going, and I strongly believe in parental rights. It is well known that the Communist party separates children from parents with the intent to indoctrinate them with CCP values. This is true, Why is it happening here?
My youngest granddaughter, who lives in another state was treated with “gender care”. Isn’t that a nice word? Gender care – sounds so soft and loving. She was very unhappy in school and depressed. She was made to believe that the reason she was unhappy was that she was a man in a girls’s body and therefore if she were “treated” she would be happy. Her parents were convinced, helped along by her older sisters who were also convinced that they were not the gender they were born with -all this was done in their school. Now other family members pretty much thought that this was not true and watched all this unfold with great misgivings. My youngest granddaughter is a very attractive slender person with a beautiful oval shaped face, great skin and perfect teeth and naturally curley hair. She loves animals and reading, a very quiet person. She was given testosterone in school. Her voice is much lower now, but now that she is out of school, she says she doesn’t believe in that anymore and just wants to be who she/he is -what ever that is – and doesn’t take testosterone anymore. In fact, once out of school her sisters just dropped the lesbian/gay thing and went on to pursue their future. Thank God that is where it stopped. You cannot tell really if she is male or female now. Her family refers to her as he or him. I don’t – I refer to her by her name. However she probably will never be able to have children and I don’t know what else will happen to her – But I write this so that you will know this is real and not let it happen to your family.THAT IS WHY THE REPUBLICANS WALKED OUT – SO THIS BILL COULD NOT BE PASSED. Please call some Democratic legislators and ask them WHY they would be voting for this bill? They probably don’t know what is in this bill either. They are just told by the ones who hold power in our legislature to VOTE YEA!
Dixie Gainer
Tillamook
This is the op/ed Dixie is responding to: <a href=”https://www.tillamookcountypioneer.net/op-ed-lawsuits-walkouts-true-transparency/”>https://www.tillamookcountypioneer.net/op-ed-lawsuits-walkouts-true-transparency/</a>)</em>