PORTLAND -- Former Portland Mayor Vera Katz is ready to go back to work. This time, in the private sector.

The two-time cancer survivor’s health has improved steadily since retiring from public office nearly four years ago.

Mayor Vera Katz said more budget cuts are needed as Portland waits to lift out of a deep recession. (KGW photo)

“I've always had the energy,” she said. “I stayed back and pulled back for a couple of years. And then I was very honest with myself and I said, ‘No, I have to go back to work.’”

Gallatin Public Affairs has hired 75-year-old Katz as a policy and public affairs consultant.

In the future, if she testifies at Portland City Hall, Katz will have to declare herself as a lobbyist, a title that makes her wince.

Nevertheless, she says she will call upon her decades of public service in Oregon as she advocates for her clients by “pushing and prodding and asking hard questions and helping them get through the problems that they're facing.”

Her first client is the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI).

“Mayor Katz will bring unequalled policy knowledge, political insight and good humor to our firm and our clients,” said Dan Lavey, Gallatin’s Portland Managing Partner.

Katz fought off the early stages of breast cancer in 2000. Four years later, she was diagnosed with a rare, aggressive cancer of the uterus.

Katz battled back that cancer with help from strong chemotherapy which damaged her kidneys.

She now receives dialysis three days a week but has managed to fit it into her schedule with no problem, she says.

Her battles with cancer came toward the end of a long career in Oregon politics.

Katz began her political career in Oregon working on the Presidential campaign of Robert Kennedy in 1968. In 1972, she was elected to the Oregon legislature where she served for 20 years, including serving as the first woman and first three ‐term Speaker of the House. In 1992 she was elected Portland Mayor, serving three terms until 2004.