{photoSource}Daily Astorian{/photoSource}

How similar will Democratic Gov. Tina Kotek be to Oregon’s long-ago yet most-recent Republican governor, Vic Atiyeh?

My question might come as a surprise. After all, Kotek spent $30 million distinguishing herself from the Republican and independent candidates in last year’s gubernatorial race.

In her inaugural address a month ago, Kotek quoted Atiyeh’s 1979 inaugural speech and said she took inspiration from him: “He too was a former legislator with deep knowledge of our state budget. And we are both ‘firsts’ — he, the first elected governor of Arab descent in the United States — and me, the first openly lesbian governor in the United States, along with the new governor of Massachusetts. I will endeavor to listen and lead with the same authenticity, compassion and skill that Gov. Atiyeh brought to this job.

“And in that spirit, I launched my One Oregon Listening Tour in Yamhill County a couple of weeks ago. On this visit, and the ones to follow, I want to hear directly from people who are doing the hard work every day to serve their community — especially on issues of shared concern across our state.”

Kotek has promised to visit all 36 counties during her first year in office. She might be hard-pressed to eventually match Atiyeh’s travels around Oregon — 250,000 miles during his eight years as governor.

His 1985-1987 budget proposal had included $800,000 to buy a state airplane, so he and others could get around more quickly. Legislators promptly dismissed the idea of what wags dubbed Oregon One.

“They can kiss that one goodbye,” said state Rep. Wayne Fawbush, D-Hood River, the Ways and Means co-chair.

The state did acquire airplanes years later, then ditched them to save money. Gov. Kate Brown sometimes hitched a ride on military department aircraft, if her trip involved National Guard business, or on a Forestry Department plane, which was described to me as a bit rickety.

This month also is an appropriate time to talk about Atiyeh, who died in 2014, because Feb. 20 would be his 100th birthday. I turned to Pacific University professor Jim Moore, who is writing a biography of him, to augment my own recollections and stories as a young reporter covering the statehouse.

Moore noted that Kotek and Atiyeh had been longtime legislative leaders and understood the triangular relationship among the state House, Senate and governor’s office.

“When he became governor, I would argue, it took him about two years to figure out how to be governor rather than a superlegislator,” Moore said. “Some people who worked with him think that he never was able to be a true governor, that he was always a superlegislator.

“I think he overcame it, but Tina is in the same situation. She knows that relationship but from the legislative side.”

A key difference in roles, Moore said, is what former senator Joe Biden finally learned last summer as president in achieving success with Congress: You don’t need to take the lead in negotiations. Let legislative leaders do their work.

Second, recognize that a governor’s voice comes across as a bullhorn compared with a legislator’s: “So you’ve got to be careful how you phrase things.”

Further, the governor’s constituency is statewide, not inside the state Capitol. Atiyeh established “listening posts,” a sort of ombudsperson in each county to whom rank-and-file Oregonians could talk and who would quickly convey those conversations back to the governor, unfiltered and unpoliticized. Initially effective, the program was hard to keep going.

A businessman, Atiyeh was Oregon’s last full-on CEO-style governor. He met weekly or semiweekly with agency and department heads.

“Barbara Roberts described the meetings as the gift of a graduate-level course in how state government worked,” Moore said. “The practice fell apart pretty quickly after Vic left. Barbara and Ted (Kulongoski) both said they tried, but time constraints were very different by the time they became governor.”

As a first-timer regularly covering state government, I was naïve. I assumed every governor would be as accessible as Atiyeh and Secretary of State Norma Paulus. She often ended her workday by wandering through the Capitol press room.

Atiyeh held media availabilities almost every week that he was in town. His chief of staff, Gerry Thompson, readily returned my phone calls, patiently answering what probably seemed like endless questions.

Atiyeh was governor during 1979-1987. I know, a different era. He often ate lunch with the public in the Capitol café. His door was open to anyone.

Like Kotek, Atiyeh knew the heads of state agencies and, having judged their effectiveness, pushed out several as he entered the governor’s office.

He appointed people to his staff, agency leadership and the courts based on competence, not party affiliation. That included naming former Democratic legislator Betty Roberts as the first woman on the Oregon Supreme Court. Democratic Gov. Bob Straub had appointed Roberts, a former opponent, as the first woman on the Oregon Court of Appeals. Roberts would have turned 100 on Feb. 5.

Wrapping up my conversation with Moore, I asked how he thought Gov. Kotek was doing.

“I think she’s doing pretty well. You know, early days,” he said. “If I were her, I’d be bending over backwards a little bit more to make it really clear that she’s reaching out to Republicans.

“Let them be the ones who say, ‘No, we can’t work with her. She’s still the Portland liberal.’ Don’t give them the opportunity to say, ‘Oh, she’s been half-hearted in reaching out or she hasn’t reached out.’”

Atiyeh was big on saying that it’s amazing what you can accomplish when you don’t care who gets the credit.