Oregon Rainmakers:
Restarting Oregon’s Economy
Joseph Richards for Oregon House District 51
Why I’m Running
Things are too expensive.
Housing, groceries, energy, it all adds up. District 51 is a great place to live, but it’s getting harder to afford.
My background is in workforce and economic policy. I’ve spent years analyzing how jobs, wages, and costs interact. But understanding the problem isn’t enough, we need to act on it.
At a high level, my approach is simple: we need to lower costs in the short term and grow the economy in the long term.
That long-term strategy is what I call the Talent Flywheel: investing in people so Oregon becomes a place where workers, businesses, and opportunity compound over time.
Lower Costs
What can the state actually do about rising prices?
Not everything is within state control. A lot of what’s driving prices is happening at the national or global level. But some areas are within reach.
Utilities and state taxes are direct levers. Housing, transportation, and childcare are systems the state can improve over time.
My approach is to focus on where we can make a real difference.
Grow the Economy (District 51 + Oregon)
Lowering costs matters, but we also need to grow opportunity.
In the short term, that means focusing on practical, local growth.
District 51 — Canby, rural Oregon City, Sandy, Estacada, Beavercreek, Eagle Creek, and Mulino — is where cities give way to farmland, forests, and rivers. Many of us choose to live here because we value community, space, and access to the outdoors.
But we’re not fully capturing the economic potential of this region. We can turn what we already have into opportunity.
That means supporting job growth in agriculture and manufacturing, capturing more visitor spending along the Clackamas River, helping Sandy grow into a true Mount Hood basecamp, and developing regional destinations that bring people, and dollars, into our communities.
This is about building a stronger local economy over the next decade, so people can find good jobs, local businesses can grow, and communities can thrive.
See the District 51 plan here —>
At the state level, we need a long-term strategy.
The Talent Flywheel is about making Oregon a place where:
People come for opportunity
Businesses come for talent
Growth compounds over time
It starts with education and workforce development—but it only works if jobs, housing, and infrastructure grow alongside it.
Workforce economist • Beavercreek resident • Father of four daughters
What you get with Me
If you elect me, you will get a representative who is:
Highly organized and execution-focused
A systems thinker who understands how complex organizations work
Experienced in navigating large bureaucracies (Kaiser Permanente, 250,000+ employees)
Responsive and provides a high level of transparency.
I will send you regular updates on:
Who I’m meeting with
What I’m working on
What legislation is coming up
How I’m thinking about key votes
You should know what your representative is doing, and why.
Want to see what type of representative I will be?
Sign up to my mailing list and I’ll show you — with a weekly update of what I did and why, until election day:
Note: I’m running in the Democratic primary on May 19, 2026. Only registered Democrats are allowed to vote in this race. The last day to register as a Democrat so you can vote for me is April 28, 2026. (you can switch back afterwards, if you want).
You can register to vote here: https://secure.sos.state.or.us/orestar/vr/register.do