ALBANY - Peter DeFazio has been Oregon's congressman from the 4th District since 1987, and lately he often gets asked whether he intends to stay much longer or try something else, such as running for governor.

On Thursday he visited the mid-valley, stopped at the Democrat-Herald for an hour-long conversation and was quizzed about that again.

His answer: He's thinking about it, but for the next few months he has another huge challenge he wants to solve first.

As chairman of the House Subcommittee on Highways and Transit - the biggest subcommittee in the House - he'll be in charge of writing the next national transportation bill to replace the one that expires at the end of September.

After 22 years in Congress, DeFazio says the next transportation bill may become his legacy.

It will have to deal with repairing and upgrading the transportation system in the face of declining revenue in the Highway Fund, which is fed by fuel taxes.

The Obama administration has proposed no increased highway funding.

DeFazio says he'll try to work out some new way of paying for the transportation system the country needs.

In Oregon, Gov. Ted Kulongoski is in the second half of his last term. Voters will start choosing his successor in the May 2010 primary.

DeFazio, though, says his "total focus" the next few months is not on Oregon politics but on working on the transportation bill.

On Thursday, the Democratic congressman held town hall meetings in Sweet Home, Lebanon and Albany and met with Albany Mayor Sharon Konopa.

At one of the town hall meetings, he said he was asked about a persistent Internet myth that Congress was preparing some giant food inspection program that would subject home gardeners to government regulation.

It isn't so, DeFazio said.

There is a pending bill, HR 875, that calls for creating a food safety agency by splitting the Food and Drug Administration - one agency for drugs, the other for food safety.

More than half the country's food supply is imported and safety inspections are sporadic, according to DeFazio. The bill would help with that, he said, but it does not call for federal garden inspectors.