Senate votes in favor of permanent Daylight Saving Time as Portlanders enjoy the extra sunshine

PORTLAND, Ore. (KPTV) - If half of the clocks in your house are wrong and you’re still tired from the weekend, Congress might soon have the answer for that.

Tuesday the Senate voted to make Daylight Saving Time permanent, which would mean no more changing the clocks every spring and fall.

“Americans want more sunshine and less depression,” Washington Senator Patty Murray said to her Senate colleagues just after they unanimously voted in favor of the bipartisan Sunshine Protection Act.

Oregon and Washington have both passed laws to adopt this as soon as Congress does.

“This past weekend Americans from Washington state to Florida had to lose an hour of sleep for absolutely no reason. This is a burden and a headache we don’t need,” Sen. Murray said.

What was historically an energy-saving strategy just doesn’t seem necessary anymore to the Portlanders we spoke with.

“Kind of annoying, kind of weird,” Nahumo Niringiyimana said.

“I feel like it’s kind of a pain. It’s not really that useful,” Mark McCoy said.

The bonus though is extra sunshine in the evening. That means no need to rush home from the park.

“You typically get off work at five o’clock and it’s already dark and can’t bring my dog out to the park or anything like that, kind of a bummer when it’s dark at 5 o’clock, 4:30 so this is pretty nice,” Niringiyimana said, adding that he’s glad that soon a permanent Daylight Saving Time could optimize the day without the hassle.

The Sunshine Protection Act will now go to the house and then would have to be signed by the president to become a law.

It would go into effect November of next year.

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