OSTA: Empowering Park & Marina Residents
If you are an Oregon Manufactured Home Park or Marina resident who owns their home, but rents the space or slip in which your home is located, then we are here for you.
OSTA is your support network, a trusted source of information about your rights, and your advocate for more secure housing through improved legislation.
Through these efforts and initiatives, we enhance your quality of life.
OSTA is a nonprofit, grassroots organization that seeks direction from members, avoiding a top-down approach, regarding decision-making on critical issues affecting members’ lifestyle choices, quality of life, and rights as residents in manufactured housing and floating home communities.
OSTA works to provide an expanding array of programs, information, and services to its members. It is an organization focused, not only on protecting the rights of homeowners as residents in parks and marinas but an organization that supports all aspects of manufactured and floating home living.
To enable this to happen we rely on members, teams, and colleagues, across the state who support this common vision. This work requires time, investment, and dedication to serve our 80,000+ residents and we rely solely on memberships and donations to achieve our goals.
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OSTA: Empowering Park & Marina Residents
OSTA Update: Conference-Packed Room, Clear Wins
The room was standing-room only, and the energy was unmistakable: tenants came ready to learn, share, and act. We walked through the biggest wins from our first OSTA conference in five years, from HB 3054 momentum to the practical tools that help residents challenge misinformation with confidence. You’ll hear how a simple workshop turned into Monday-morning action, with neighbors launching a park newsletter backed by the right ORS 900 citations—and why that kind of clear, lawful organizing changes the conversation with managers and owners.
We open with thanks to the people who made it happen—Representative Pam Marsh for setting the tone, Senator Jeff Golden for his video support, and experts like Samantha Sheehan from the Oregon Law Center for bringing sharp legal guidance. Even when the tech got fussy, we adapted and kept the knowledge flowing—because hearing the message mattered more than perfect slides. Along the way, we spotlight the tools that make a difference: ORS 90 guidebooks, templates for tenant communications, and simple steps for forming and sustaining park associations that actually get results.
Looking ahead, we’re already planning a longer, smarter event with deeper tracks on organizing, rent rules, habitability, mediation, and advocacy. Membership is growing, resources are available online through December, and the focus is clear: equip every resident with the language of the law and a supportive community. If you want practical takeaways, real stories, and a roadmap for action, this recap brings it together in one place.
If this conversation helps you or your neighbors, subscribe, share it with your community, and leave a review. Then tell us what you want on next year’s agenda—we’re building it with you.
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Email: bbateman@oregontenants.com
Copyright OSTA2045,2025 Not for rebroadcast w/o express written permission. Please share and download for educational purposes with attribution.
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Title: Make An Impact (Stinger Intro) - Upbeat Corporate Inspirational Uplifting
License: Individual License, Commercial
Composer: juqboxmusic
Stock Music provided by inspiringaudio, from Pond5
Produced by Retired Guy Productions
Info Logo 6 (Breaking News) 196306063 Sound effect TTSynth 2025-01-25 Individual Info Logo 13 (Breaking News) 210545139 Sound effect TTSynth 2025-01-25
In case you were somebody who did not get an opportunity to attend our conference on October the 4th, here's how it broke down. Come on in, we'll fill you in on all the details. Welcome in everyone. I'm Bill Bateman, part of the team here at Osta, Oregon State Tenants Organization. And as I said, our first conference in five years was a success in all kinds of good ways. If you didn't get to comment, I'd be surprised because the room was packed. We had a complete uh I didn't see room for more than maybe one more person, and you would have had to know somebody really well to get anybody extra into that room. We filled it and I thank you for coming out. Uh it is something that we have not done for five years. We did it and we're happy we did. We're happy you were there. Everybody who was in attendance seemed to go away with a lot of good things, both uh lovely parting gifts and some good information and new purpose. More on that in a second. I'd like to begin as I did in my opening remarks by thanking Rochelle Love Elder for her tremendous hard work. She worked up until midnight the night before, and her hard work showed. Also thank you to everyone on the board whether you drove in and made a personal appearance or took time to take part in a Zoom session. It contributed to an overall excellent day. And that included things like checking in the guests, passing out the gift bags, and being there to answer questions and point people in the right directions. Thanks too to Representative Pam Marsh, who is our opening speaker, and Senator Jeff Golden, who was kind enough to take time out of his schedule and provide us some opening remarks on video. And a welcome message to the group is always appreciated. I appreciate their continued support and participation, and we look forward to working closely with them in the months to come. Well, we're passing out thank yous. I want to include the Hilton Garden Inn up there in Springfield. Had an opportunity to stay there as well as experience their support and help during the conference. A high five to everyone there. Nice facility, nice rooms, nice people. Everything worked out just great. Thank you guys. I had time, and this is a luxury for me, I had time to sit and listen and observe with a lot of the members, people who you see the name on the list, but here they are right there in front of you. People came up with good suggestions, and I saw some positive outcomes of our meeting. One of the persons took my workshop on how to build a newsletter, and that generated a conversation about the fact their manager has said, no, you can't do a newsletter without my permission, and I need to check it out. Well, no, that's complete garbage. And we've found the appropriate section of the Oregon ORS 900, and we sent that resident back to their park armed with information, and they have decided, nuts to this noise, we're going to start a newsletter in our park on Monday morning. So this is one of the many positive discussions we had. Myths or downright fabrications, fake lies, and bogus balihoo were being debunked left and right. There's a lot of shenanigans happening out there, and you having good information, knowing where to get good information and how to present it appropriately to get your point across was a good part of that day. We also have some good information on what we're going to do different the next time. Technology was a big bugaboo for us. We had some uh good connections, things worked out, but uh there were some situations of having to well, I think in one point we had to call someone on the phone because the audio didn't work on the computer, and then hold the phone up to the microphone. But the problem the point is, the point is they were able to be heard and the presentation got made. I also want to thank uh everybody who took that extra step. Uh Samantha Sheehan from the Oregon Law Center. Uh she came, she was masked, she had just gotten over an illness and was trying to avoid getting sick again, and she took time and had quite the uh quite the nice presentation. It worked out very, very well. And we had one of our board members, and she was not feeling too well, she had just returned from Germany, so that would be Angela Garvin, who came in and took time to zoom in. She didn't want to risk making anybody sick by coming in physically, and so she took part uh in a uh Zoom presentation along with uh Ken Pryor, who zoomed in from the north end of the state. And so a lot of people went that extra mile to do things and it really showed. I'm glad we were able to build on the success of HB 3054 and turn that into a highly successful conference. People walked away with a new and positive impression of Osta and a box full of good ideas and information. Well done, everyone. Give yourself a pat on the back. Now we have all decided, whew, because it took us all week to uh kind of come back together and put things away. That's why this is coming out on a Friday. Uh, we're gonna take a few deep breaths, so we're cleaning up our uh information, packing away our toys, and we're going to already be working at the next board meeting on what to do different, what to do better, and how to have a more even more successful and perhaps even a longer conference, maybe a full-day presentation. Your ideas, of course, are always welcome. We did get a lot of good input. I one of the things I put on this program previously, I would like to find out what you, our members, are interested in in us doing things we should be working on in the next five years, the next year, how to continue this positive growth. And uh we got a lot of that information, more on that as we unpack it and have an opportunity to put it in a uh a positive form that we can share with you. And finally, I'd like to report that just at the meeting we had, I believe, 19 uh people sign up to be members, and uh some folks were lucky enough to pick up some t-shirts and some uh ORS 90 guidebooks, which I think are great. Those things are still going to be on sale. Go to the website if you did not get a chance to purchase one, if we ran out, which we didn't expect that kind of a response, so that's kind of exciting. So if you'd like more information on things to purchase, be it an Osta t-shirt or the very popular ORS guidelines, it's a discussion and a line-by-line breakdown of the Oregon's rental code, and that's what we're always referring to: the things that you need to show your landlord and your owners that give you the legal strength and the legal standing to have very positive discussions. So those things are still going to be on sale. We're gonna keep that part of the web page open until the end of December. So you are available, they are available to you. They can uh they make lovely Christmas gifts and stocking stuffers. Who wouldn't want a copy of the ORS 900 uh in their Christmas stocking? I mean, seriously, folks. Okay, so once again, you made it happen, you made the passage of the bill happen with your support, you made the conference happen with your phone calls, your emails, your ideas, and your suggestions, and our board and our volunteers went the extra mile to make that happen, even if they uh weren't feeling 100%. So we had a lot of a lot of going that extra mile, a lot of support from the community. Thank you, Pam. Thank you, Jeff, once again, thank you, board members. We look forward to uh keeping up to date with you in our next uh our next chapter. There's more ahead, and we hope you'll have a good holiday season, happy trick-or-treating, be careful out there, make sure you wear a uh a bright costume and have a flashlight, or be ready for the little ones when they show up at your door with uh the mini Snickers or the mini uh Milky Ways, those are my own personal favorites. So with that in mind, be safe out there. Thank you again. I'm glad you had a good time at the conference. I loved being there and meeting all of you. Aren't we a good group? A good looking bunch of people. Take care. Talk to you next week. The preceding program was a presentation of a retired guy productions.
