SALEM — After a lengthy debate, the House approved a measure Thursday that would rewrite the title of a referendum on whether to grant driver’s licenses to people who can’t prove they are in the country legally.

Last year, lawmakers approved Senate Bill 833, which gave people in the country illegally the ability to obtain short-term driver’s licenses. Opponents quickly gathered signatures to suspend the law with the hopes voters would overturn it in November 2014.

Lawmakers are once again weighing in on the debate, this time over the ballot title. The current title, written by the attorney general, describes the measure as giving Oregon residents without proof of “legal presence” the ability to obtain a driver’s card.

The title approved in House Bill 4054 on Thursday, on a 36 to 24 vote, removes “legal presence” and states: “Establishes limited purpose, duration driver card for individuals who prove Oregon residency, meet driving requirements.”

The effort to rewrite the ballot title by lawmakers sparked a heated debate with proponents of the ballot title change noting it’s important the measure’s title communicates to voters what the Legislature intended when it passed the bill. Opponents of HB 4054 said lawmakers are “meddling” in the process and taking away voters’ rights.

“Thousands of voters felt we did something wrong with that bill and we passed a bad law. They saw fit to participate in the best way they could and the only way they could to redress a grievance and how do we respond? Are we gaming the system by manipulating the circumstances for the sake of arriving to a predetermined outcome?” said Rep. Sal Esquivel, R-Medford, who opposed the measure and sponsored the referendum.

Rep. Kim Thatcher, R-Keizer, said it was like playing a “rigged game of blackjack, where the House changes the rules of the game in the middle of the game.”

But Rep. Jessica Vega Pederson, D-Portland, said it’s important voters don’t spend the next year debating something that mischaracterizes what the law would do. Removing the drivers’ legal status in the title would help ensure the debate was about the issue being addressed in the ballot measure.

Last year, Vega Pederson said, lawmakers met a need to improve the safety of the state’s roads and to help Oregonians get to their jobs and school. The Legislature, she said, passed a limited purpose, limited duration driver’s card, available to those who could prove they lived in Oregon and who passed a driver’s test.

The conversation in 2013, Vega Pederson said, was about the establishment of driver’s cards and making roads safer, she said. Without action by lawmakers, “Voters will spend the next year debating something that the measure isn’t really about.”

The measure now heads to the Senate.

— Reporter, 541-554-1162; ldake@bendbulletin.com