BC-OR--Teacher Endorsements, 4th Ld-Writethru,0928 Novick handily wins endorsement of Oregon teachers union Eds: ADDs graf 8, grafs 25-27 to UPDATE with new endorsements, vote totals. Stands. By JULIA SILVERMAN Associated Press Writer

SALEM, Ore. (AP) - Democratic Senate candidate Steve Novick landed a big win Saturday, easily gaining the coveted endorsement of the Oregon Education Association over his better-funded rival, Oregon House Speaker Jeff Merkley.

Under a formula that weights the contributions each union local makes to the OEA political fund, the 337 delegates who decided the endorsement gave Novick 58,322 votes - more than three times Merkley's 19,013. Independent candidate John Frohnmayer came in third, with 12,541 votes. Another candidate, David Loera of Salem, received 342.

The decision gives Novick a needed dose of plausibility and momentum, and deprives Merkley of a key bragging right.

"I am deeply, personally touched by this," said Novick, a Portland lawyer and activist. "In-state people beat out-of-state money."

Novick and Merkley are vying to take on Republican Sen. Gordon Smith, a two-term incumbent, in a race that's expected to be one of the most expensive in Oregon history. The OEA's endorsement caps a week of shifts in a race that turned snippy, with the candidates taking as many shots at each other as at Smith.

After the vote, Merkley ducked out. He'd previously called the teachers' endorsement, "highly valued. I would love to have it. If not, life goes on."

Merkley has been endorsed by most of the state's Democratic power structure, including Gov. Ted Kulongoski and former Gov. Barbara Roberts, along with the AFL-CIO and the American Federation of Teachers' Oregon chapter. He's also the choice of the deep-pocketed Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

And late on Saturday came word that Merkley had picked up the endorsement of the 50,000 member Service Employees International Union, which represents health care workers and other government employees. Like the OEA, SEIU is known as an influential get-out-the-vote operations, whose members will phone bank and door knock for their chosen candidate.

Meanwhile, this week Novick picked up an endorsement from former Gov. John Kitzhaber, a popular figure among nonaffiliated voters, and the Teamsters Union.

Federal law limits the OEA's direct financial help in the Novick-Merkley primary contest to $5,000 from the political action committee run by its national affiliate.

But the union will make sure its 48,000 member households get information about Novick, and teachers across the state will be encouraged to volunteer and make individual contributions.

"It's all about word of mouth, and boots on the ground," Novick said. "Teachers talk."

And the organization might also pay for commercials or mailers, as long as they don't coordinate directly with the Novick campaign.

Around the convention center on Saturday, many of the teachers were buzzing about Novick's quippy, brash style.

"Novick fills a room the minute he walks into it," said Webb Thomas, a teacher from Beaverton. "That's what you need. Merkley is so out of central casting. If you took all the white, male, Democratic candidates and blended them together, then you'd have Jeff Merkley."

Kathy Mayeda, who teaches in Salem, said she found Novick the more dynamic of the two.

"I was more convinced that he would fight for education," she said.

Others, though, were not so eager to hop onto the Novick bandwagon.

"I felt that Jeff had experience, and has been 100 percent supportive of OEA," said Carla Duffy, from the South Umpqua school district, near where Merkley was born. "I shouldn't change and take a chance, because he has been loyal to us."

And Jerry Sebestyen, a teacher from La Grande, told his fellow educators that it was Merkley who stood a better chance of, "beating Gordon Smith in the hinterlands, or at least running even with him."

On education issues, the two largely agree that No Child Left Behind, the federal education law backed by the Bush administration, is in need of near total overhaul.

And both tried to emphasize their education bona fides, with Merkley reminding the teachers that it was under his leadership that the state increased education funding by 20 percent, poured money into Head Start and socked away millions in a rainy day savings account. Novick drew on his past campaigns against initiatives sponsored by anti-tax activist Bill Sizemore, a pariah among many educators, as well as his work to direct more lottery revenue to education.

The teachers also endorsed Democrat Kurt Schrader, a state Senator from Canby, over Steve Marks, a former chief of staff to Kitzhaber.

The two will face off in the May 20 primary for the Democratic nomination for the congressional seat that's been held by retiring Democratic Rep. Darlene Hooley of West Linn.

In the Secretary of State's Democratic primary, which features a match-up of four state Senators, Kate Brown of Portland narrowly beat Brad Avakian of Beaverton in a run-off vote, garnering 42,738 votes to his 41,846. The Attorney General's race, between Democratic Rep. Greg Macpherson of Lake Oswego and Lewis & Clark law professor John Kroger was far less suspenseful, with Kroger winning in a rout, 74,007 to 16,283, evidence that many public employees remain angry with Macpherson for his role in reforming their retirement plan.

And in the presidential race, in which U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer stood in for Barack Obama and U.S. Rep. Darlene Hooley spoke out for Hillary Clinton, Obama won with 46,047 to Clinton's 33,095, though nearly 12,000 weighted votes went to "no recommendation."

No Republican candidates attended this year's OEA gathering.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)