Since winning the Dist. 52 race, newly elected Rep. Anna Williams has been working to build relationships with advocacy groups and other officials.
“It’s like basically going on a bunch of field trips, but I don’t have my school-age kids along,” she said.
These “field trips” have involved a significant amount of driving, she said, “but it’s through the most beautiful districts of Oregon, so I can’t complain.”
Williams won the Dist. 52 race over incumbent Rep. Jeff Helfrich in the 2018 Midterm Elections, 16,135 votes district-wide to Helfrich’s 15,238 — a 2.85 percent margin. In Hood River County, she won by a margin of 30.921 percent, 6,989 votes to Helfrich’s 3,687.
When asked about the election process, Williams said, “I have worked on other campaigns in the past, so I know for the most part what events looked like … and I also knew it was going to be harder than I expected.”
She said having that phrase in mind significantly reduced her stress, since “nothing can be harder than that,” she said.
Having the support of her family and “village” of friends and supporters throughout the campaign was helpful as well — especially at the end, where they organized a “meal train” for her family, she said.
“I’m not super good at asking for help,” she said, adding that her background as a social worker is likely a contributor, “but letting people do what they wanted to do to help me … was really meaningful.”
She’s since been spotted at meetings around Hood River, such as the Aging in the Gorge Alliance’s Alzheimer’s forum and the port’s Bridge Replacement Project Community Forum. She mentioned touring the Clackamas County Courthouse and meeting with the mayor-elect of Sandy, remarking that, since Clackamas County is represented by so many different legislative officials, “it’s hard to collectively get a sense of their needs and to represent them appropriately without stepping on anyone’s toes,” she said.
Williams has also been meeting with Dist. 59’s Rep. Daniel Bohnam, who represents neighboring Wasco County, to “get some traction on our shared needs,” she said. “We have a lot of overlapping priorities,” she added, citing serving the needs of the agricultural community as an example.
“There are a lot of bipartisan partnerships that look promising,” she said.
In addition to relationship-building, she has focused on figuring out what her role should be as a representative, “what strings I need to pull and where it’s more meaningful for me to listen and learn,” she said.
When asked about her priorities going into office, she said, “I’m still learning how to take my conceptual (priorities) and turning them into legislation.”
Little has changed since the campaign, she said, citing her focus on education funding, creating a climate bill that builds jobs and supports climate recovery, access to health and mental healthcare — “especially in rural communities” and “getting people the basic resources that they need to thrive.”
Williams will be sworn into office on Jan. 14 and the legislative session is scheduled to start Jan. 22.
She said that she is looking forward to working with fellow representatives on both sides of the aisle and wants to make sure that everyone is welcome at the table to have their voices heard.
“I’m just really nerdy for collaboration,” she said. “I love meetings … I’m in my happy place.”
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