Bill Sizemore

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Bill Sizemore
Born	June 2, 1951 Aberdeen, Washington
Occupation	political activist

Bill Sizemore (born June 2, 1951 in Aberdeen, Washington) is a political activist in Clackamas, Oregon. He graduated from Montesano High School. Sizemore earned a Bachelor's degree in Theology from Portland Bible College in 1976. After graduating, Sizemore taught bible history and ran a series of unsuccessful businesses.^[1]

1 Ballot Initiatives
2 1998 Gubernatorial Election
3 Racketeering case
4 Measure 42 in 2006: not anti-tax
5 See also
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Ballot Initiatives

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In 1993, Sizemore founded Oregon Taxpayers United and became its Executive Director. He is noted as the author and driving force behind a number of ballot initiatives in Oregon. One of the first measures Sizemore was involved in was a referendum which stopped Portland's 3.4 billion light rail expansion.

Sizemore's most notable success was passing Ballot Measure 47 in 1996. The measure rolled back property taxes to the 1995. Measure 47 also mandated a double majority for ballot measures increasing taxes. With Sizemore's assistance, the Oregon Legislative Assembly amended some of the provisions of Measure 47 in 1997,^[2] and referred the amendments back to the voters as Ballot Measure 50, which also passed.^[3]

In 2000, Sizemore drafted and placed on the ballot Measure 7, which required govenments to pay just compensation to property owners when a government-imposed regulation reduced the fair market value of their property. Oregon voters approved Measure 7, but the Oregon Supreme Court later nulified it. The measure was placed back on the ballot as Measure 37 in 2004, and subsequently passed.

[edit] 1998 Gubernatorial Election

Sizemore ran for Governor of Oregon as a Republican in 1998. He won his party's primary easily, defeating three other candidates with little or no name recognition. During the general election, rumors circulated about Sizemore's alleged shady business practices, both in private business and in the operation of his political action committee and non-profit educational foundation. Sizemore lost the November general election to incumbent Governor John Kitzhaber, a Democrat. Sizemore won 30% of the vote, to Kitzhaber's 64%.^[4] Sizemore claims he never expected to win the election, but ran simply because no one else would. Sizemore raised very little campaign money and reportedly told contributors that the race was not winnable, so why waste a lot of money.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Racketeering case

In July 2000, the Oregon Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers filed a civil racketeering lawsuit against two of Sizemore's organizations: Oregon Taxpayer's United and the OTU Education Foundation. During the trial Becky Miller, Sizemore's top aide, under protection of state and federal immunity deals, testified in detail about the unethical and illegal practices of Oregon Taxpayers United. These included a money laundering scandal involving both Sizemore and Americans for Tax Reform founder Grover Norquist.^[5]^[6]

After three weeks of testimony and a million dollars in union legal fees, the jury found Sizemore's organizations guilty of racketeering, and the organizations were fined approximately $2.5 million. Sizemore refused to pay the fines and attempted to avoid the liability by changing the name of his organizations to Oregon Taxpayers Association and carrying on with business as usual.^[7] Without a trial, Sizemore was found personally liable for his organization's civil racketeering liability, and a judge shut down his 501(c)(3) education foundation. Nearly a million dollars were added to the fine as a result of Sizemore's resistance to earlier court orders/decisions. Sizemore appealed the verdict, and it was partially overruled.^[8]

[edit] Measure 42 in 2006: not anti-tax

In 2006, Sizemore broke with his pattern of anti-tax measures, by filing Measure 42, a consumer-oriented bill that would have denied insurance companies the ability to take credit scores into account when setting insurance premiums. In the most expensive Oregon ballot measure campaign of 2006, nearly $3.7 million were spent—nearly entirely from out-of-state sources—to defeat the measure.^[9] The campaign to defeat the measure, which focused heavily on Sizemore's credibility, was successful.