OHSU Government Relations hosted OHSU Day at the Capitol April 18. The School of Medicine had several departments represented, including Graduate Studies, the Child Development and Rehabilitation Center, the Center for Evidence-based Policy and the OHSU Knight Cancer Institute.

OHSU leaders and students met with legislators to discuss the significance of OHSU to Oregonians and the importance of state funding to the health care, education and research missions. Dean Mark Richardson, MD, MBA, and MD students Jessica Carlson, Rachel Pilliod and Rachel Seltzer took part. OHSU President Joe Robertson, MD, MBA; Chief Financial Officer Lawrence Furnstahl; and Interim Vice Provost David Robinson, PhD, also participated.

Governor John Kitzhaber released his Recommended Budget on Feb. 1, which included an overall 20 percent reduction to OHSU relative to the appropriations from the General Fund provided to OHSU in the 2009 legislatively adopted budget. State funding to OHSU has been declining for some time, and is now among the lowest in the country to public institutions.

Other OHSU representatives in Salem included the Center for Research on Occupational and Environmental Toxicology, School of Nursing, Poison Center, Oregon National Primate Research Center, School of Dentistry, Office of Rural Health, Research Integrity, Technology Transfer & Business Development and OHSU Library.

Pictured Top: (Left to right) Rae Seltzer, Rachel Pilliod, Jessica Carlson, Mark Richardson, MD

Pictured bottom: OHSU information tables