Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski wants to fix Measure 37.

His critics say Measure 37 isn't broken.

And so begins a new battle over Oregon property rights, as the proponents of a new Measure 49 promise it will fix the controversies created by Measure 37.

“We are here for a critically important reason,” Kulongoski told a morning crowd at Portland’s Eastbank Esplanade.

He says Measure 37 is doing much more than what voters intended.

“They wanted fairness for small landowners who wanted to put a house on their property if the law allowed them to do so when they purchased that property. Well, that may be what Oregonians wanted when they voted for measure 37. It is not what they got!”

Voters passed the measure in 2004, grandfathering land use rights for longtime property owners or guaranteeing them compensation for their claims.

Since then, claims have added up to 7,500, totaling $15 billion in combined value.

This, possibly impacting 750,000 acres of Oregon land.

Some of that lies in the forest.

Some on agricultural land.

“As we stand here today, over 7,500 Measure-37 claims have been filed covering more than 750,000,” said Kulongoski. “These claims, most of them which are on prime farm and forest lands, include huge subdivisions, commercial and industrial development, and projects that threaten areas with limited water supplies.”

The governor's says Measure 49 is designed to protect small land owners not acre-gobbling developers.

“I think that's reprehensible,” said Ross Day, co-author of Measure 37, describing the logic of Measure 49's argument.

He says the governor is pushing an idea that would handcuff property owners who've already filed measure 37 claims or were somehow counting on them.

“It's like making somebody pay the schoolyard bully to get your lunch back. That's exactly what measure 49 does,” said Day, adding Measure 49 is simply a repeal of measure 37, parading as a fix.

But a few landowners disagree.

They stand alongside Kulongoski at Thursday's press conference, saying they were tricked into voting for Measure 37 in the first place.

“I’m a native Oregonian and registered Republican,” explained Dick Day who filed a claim to build a house on his land in Yamhill County wine country, only to learn his neighbor wanted to build 112 homes next door.

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“(Measure 37) turned out to be a wolf in sheep's clothing,” said Dick Day.

With those messages, the Measure 49 campaign gets a head start on Ross Day and his pro-37 group.

But he says his group defended Measure 37 before and it will succeed again in November.