Oregon Legislature Roundup: Bills for Water Quality and Wildlife
The 2025 legislative season is chock full of bills that will result in water quality protection. Bills move through the Oregon legislature quickly and if testimony is requested, there is a short window to do so. As we have opportunities to tell legislators you value clean water, Rogue Riverkeeper will send out action alerts to our email list. Sign up here if you aren’t already receiving notifications from Rogue Riverkeeper.
Here are some bills Rogue Riverkeeper has been working on this legislative session:
Living with Beaver Bill - HB 3143:
This bill is sponsored by Representative Pam Marsh, who has been a loyal supporter of beavers and their work to protect watersheds. While a prior version of this bill did not pass in 2024, Rep. Marsh reintroduced the bill in 2025—now with strong bipartisan support and backing from diverse organizations ranging from Farm Bureau to the Defenders of Wildlife. The "Landowners Living with Beaver Grant Program Fund" bill is now gaining traction in the legislature and is heading to the Joint Ways & Means Committee.
This bill would allocate $1.5 million from the General Fund to the Oregon Conservation and Recreation Fund, authorizing the Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife to distribute grants for beaver coexistence efforts (instead of lethal removal). The funding provided to landowners would support cost-effective habitat improvement and restoration work, recognizing that beavers are natural engineers that can enhance riparian habitats, wetlands, and floodplains more efficiently and economically than human intervention.
For more, read our blog on the current “Living with Beaver” bill and our testimony in support of this bill.
A separate bill related to this keystone species and our state mascot is the Beavers and Water Quality Bill (HB 3932) which would close beaver hunting and trapping in public waterways so beavers can help improve water quality and restore habitat.
We now know that beavers are ecosystem engineers and excellent at providing benefits to water quality and watersheds. This is not an “anti-hunting” bill as much as it is a “pro-clean water” and watershed health bill. Data from the Oregon Dept. of Fish & Wildlife for 2024 shows that only 4% of beaver hunting takes place on public land. Many tributaries in the Rogue basin could benefit from the work of beavers. This bill would enable beavers to access waterways where they are most needed and remain long enough to perform their ecosystem functions without getting trapped out.
The activities of beavers help slow water flow, restore impacted water tables and underground aquifers, enhance streamside shade, riparian areas, and wetlands that buffer and filter toxins, and create wildlife and fish habitat at the same time.
Why should Oregon invest in humans trying to do more of the good work that beavers are already doing for free, let’s just allow them to do it! If we can allow beavers to work on these streams, that will be an overall benefit waterways and water quality for all of us.
See Rogue Riverkeeper’s testimony to the House Committee On Climate, Energy, and Environment in support of this bill here.
Credit: Department of Ecology, State of Washington
Despite HB 3362's work to protect fish, wildlife, and waterways as well as improve public transit, it faces heavy opposition. The bill would create a 4% excise tax on the sale of tires to fund rail projects, wildlife crossings, and address salmon killing pollution from tires.
Rogue Riverkeeper’s specific interest is in the support of addressing and limiting a fish-killing chemical called 6PPD-quinone (6PPD-q) that comes from the wear of car tires and is washed down into waterways after rain events. Even at extremely small amounts, 6PPD-q is lethal to coho salmon. Fortunately, 6PPD-q can be effectively removed from stormwater runoff by simple and proven techniques such as bioretention, porous pavement, proprietary filters, and green infrastructure facilities, some of which have been shown to reduce 6PPD-q up to 90%. As the impacts of this pollutant have only recently been understood, current infrastructure along roads do not sufficiently protect waterways from the deadly chemical.
Funds from the tax proposed in HB 3362 could be used to retrofit and otherwise implement these proven methods to remove 6PPD-q and other pollutants from waterways while industry seeks to find safer replacement ingredients for tires.
We appreciate the work of legislators to solve problems that impact water quality, fish, and wildlife, and we stand in strong support of this bill. The quick scheduling of the first public hearing did not provide us sufficient time to send out an action alert, but if this bill is able to move forward, we will send you notice. You can read our testimony in support of HB 3362 that we provided to the Joint Committee on Transportation.
Clearcut timber harvest on private land in the Rogue basin.
Rogue Riverkeeper and KS Wild have long been involved in the development and negotiation of the Private Forest Accord (PFA), which was a historic agreement between conservation groups and the timber companies to strengthen Oregon's notoriously-weak logging laws and made significant changes to how private forestlands in Oregon are managed to protect fish, wildlife and, water quality.
PFA success hinges on funding for ODF to complete its work, so we submitted testimony in support of budget bill SB 5521 that will fund important ODF projects. With this bill, Oregon has the chance to secure improved protections for clean water, forests, and fish. A recent hearing showed broad support for this bill with nearly 200 written submissions calling for fully funding the accord’s programs, but lawmakers are still early in negotiations during this year’s long legislative session and the funding proposals are likely to change over the coming months.
Irrigation supports numerous crops in the Rogue basin including hay production, seen here in the Bear Creek watershed, Jackson County. Photo credit: OSU, Southern Oregon Research & Extension Center | College of Ag Sciences
Another bill to improve water quality is Senate Bill 1153, a bill that will ensure fish and water quality are not harmed in water right transfers. We know that water diversion in the Rogue and other parts of Oregon can have an impact on water quality by removing or altering flows or adding pollutants. Under current law, the state can approve water rights transfers and similar changes to existing water rights without considering impacts to streamflows and the fish and water quality they support.
SB 1153 will close this harmful regulatory loophole in Oregon's water transfer laws that allows changes to an existing water right without any environmental review. As users of legal water rights often make changes that can have negative water quality impacts, this loophole nullifies Oregon's ability to protect instream values on hundreds of streams across the state. The Rogue basin has an extensive system of water rights and use. This bill would have a direct impact on how water rights impact water quality and fish habitat in the Rogue by ensuring that changes to water rights are reviewed for environmental impacts. Gov. Kotek has come out in support of this bill.
Read Rogue Riverkeeper’s testimony in support of this bill to the Senate Committee On Natural Resources and Wildfire.
Did you know?
The first known water right in Oregon was at the junction of Bear Creek and Wagner Creek filed by Jacob Wagner in 1851. He built the first irrigation ditch in the state the following year, in what is now Talent, Oregon. At the intersection of Rapp Road and Wagner Creek Road, there is a monument to this piece of Oregon history. Southwest Oregon’s settlement and agricultural development depended heavily on the use of surface water. The irrigation systems and districts that exist today still serve water to thousands of users. Many aspects of Oregon water law have not changed since its origination in the 1850s.