Oregon welcome sign (oregondot/flickr)

In a short item over at The Oregonian, Christian Gaston highlights a strange legislative trend in that state: “an exodus of Republican lawmakers leaving at the end of next year.”

The piece is nominally about Rep. Wally Hicks (R-Grants Pass), announcing he won’t be seeking another term, but right at the end Gaston lays out a surprising statistic:

More than a third of the House Republicans have announced they will retire from public office or are seeking another office. Democratic turnover has been much lower, with 14 percent of members moving on.

Only 26 representatives in Oregon’s House are Republicans — compared with 34 Democrats — so the exodus isn’t exactly going to affect control of the chamber, but it’s still quite a lot of turnover for the small caucus.