Healthy Democracy Oregon is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization committed to strengthening citizen ownership of, and integrity to, the ballot initiative process. The organization is promoting the Citizens’ Initiative Review (CIR), an innovative reform to provide voters with clear, useful, and trustworthy evaluations of statewide ballot measures.

Healthy Democracy Oregon was formed in early 2007 by Tyrone Reitman and Elliot Shuford - colleagues from the University of Oregon's Public Policy Master's Program.  While in graduate school in 2003, Reitman and Shuford's studies focused on methods of citizen deliberation and democratic reform policies.  Reitman and Shuford debated the merits of different reform ideas, including the Citizens' Initiative Review—an idea Shuford had recently learned about.

The formation of Healthy Democracy Oregon followed both good timing and a bit of luck a few years later. Concerned about the quality of information in the initiative process, and the design of many proposed reforms, the debate between Reitman and Shuford was settled in early 2006 when Reitman contacted Shuford to explore the idea of promoting the Citizens' Initiative Review.  Shortly thereafter, Reitman and Shuford approached Ned Crosby, the founder of the Jefferson Center (the organization that developed the underlying model of citizen deliberation for the CIR) and his wife, Patricia Benn about the possibility of collaborating on such a project.  Crosby and Benn had been working in Washington state on the CIR proposal and upon multiple meetings with Reitman and Shuford agreed to provide funding to start Healthy Democracy Oregon.

Setting out to improve Oregon's initiative process by developing the CIR with Crosby and Benn's help, the team enlisted the support of good government advocates, former Secretaries of State, legislators from both parties and the citizens of Oregon. To date, HDO has also signed on over 30,000 Oregonians in support of the Citizens' Initiative Review.  The organization receives its funding from the generous contributions of its board members, and from over 600 Oregonians statewide.