Republican candidate for governor

continued to use his Portland home during the years he claimed Camas, Wash., as his residence to avoid paying thousands of dollars in Oregon taxes.

Interviews with people in Dudley's former neighborhood and public records show that Dudley may not have stopped using his Portland home to the extent needed to claim he was no longer an Oregon resident for tax purposes.

Dudley did live in Camas, but the couple who bought Dudley's Portland home in 1997 -- more than two years after he said he moved to Camas -- said he was still using the house at the time, and that Dudley had clothes in the closet, food in the refrigerator and sports equipment in the garage.

Dudley has said that, while playing center for the Portland Trail Blazers in the 1990s, he moved from Portland's Forest Heights neighborhood to Camas to avoid paying Oregon taxes on all of his income. Washington doesn't have an income tax.

He did have to pay Oregon income tax on his basketball salary. His campaign estimates Dudley's Oregon income tax bill came to about $463,000 between 1993 and 1997, when he played for the Blazers.

By claiming Washington residency, Dudley -- who was already earning a National Basketball Association salary before coming to Portland -- could shield any other income from Oregon income taxes, such as capital gains, investments and endorsement deals.

Oregon Department of Revenue officials say they can't comment on Dudley's situation specifically, and that every case involving someone claiming to be an Oregon nonresident for tax purposes is different. They say the test is often subjective -- a taxpayer has to show an intent to leave Oregon permanently, and then demonstrate that intent through his actions.

"It hinges a lot on what the taxpayer says their intent was and what the taxpayer did to establish that intent," says Theresa Schuh, personal income tax policy manager for the Oregon Department of Revenue. "It's not black and white. It's not like if you do 1, 2, 3 and 4, you've automatically changed your situation."

In an interview Friday, Dudley said he considered Camas his home after he moved. "I lived in Camas," Dudley said. "But I would stay there (in the Portland house) probably on occasion."

Dudley added that he didn't spend a lot of time in his Portland home after his move, even though it was much closer to the Blazers' arena and practice facilities.

Questions about how and why Dudley avoided paying some Oregon income taxes while playing center for the Blazers have become an issue in the race for Oregon governor. A television ad aired by his Democratic opponent, former

, hit Dudley for living "in Washington to avoid paying taxes that support our schools and health care."

"I think it's ridiculous," Dudley said. "Our state is in disrepair. For the other side to focus on where I lived 17 years ago is ridiculous."

Michelle Cory bought Dudley's Portland home in May 1997 with her husband, Lee. When they first toured the home, she said it still contained Dudley's furnishings. There was food in the refrigerator, his clothes hung in the closets and, in the garage, they found a basketball equipment that the real estate agent said Dudley used to practice shooting free throws.

"It was clear he had stayed there," Lee Cory said. "We spoke to neighbors who said he was around a lot, and that he was a great neighbor."

According to Oregon law, you can claim another state as your home but still keep a residence in Oregon without paying state taxes on all of your income. However, simply setting up a residence in another state is not enough. Oregon wants to know where you consider your "domicile." While you may have more than one residence, under tax law you can have only one domicile at a time.

Under state tax rules, you must do three things to give up your domicile status in Oregon. First, you must get a new residence outside of Oregon. Second, you must live in that residence. And finally, you must abandon your old Oregon domicile.

As the revenue department's website puts it, "You are also a full-year Oregon resident, even if you live outside Oregon, if all of the following are true: You think of Oregon as your permanent home. Oregon is the center of your financial, social, and family life. Oregon is the place you intend to come back to when you are away."

Dudley's situation would not be audited because Oregon law allows the revenue department to look back only three years from the time a tax return is filed.

Dudley came to Portland in 1993 after signing a seven-year, $11-million contract with the Blazers.

In July 1994, after his first season, he bought a 3,970-square foot house on Northwest Mendenhall Street in Portland's Forest Heights development for $437,000. By then he had an Oregon driver's license, registered his car in the state and registered to vote (he listed himself as unaffiliated) in Multnomah County.

Dudley says today that his accountant advised him that, for tax purposes, he should move out of Oregon.

"I was 26, 27 years old. My accountant said, you would save some dollars if you lived over here and, by the way, you're 20 minutes from the arena and you're living on a lake, so I did it," Dudley said during a KGW/Oregonian televised debate in the May primary.

Six months after buying the Portland house, Dudley in December 1994 bought a 3,300-square-foot house for $495,000 in Camas that backed up to Lacamas Lake. Records show he sold the Camas house for $500,000 in June 1998, after he was traded to the New York Knicks.

Dudley kept his Portland home for most of the time he owned his Camas home. Clearly, Dudley lived in Camas. A lengthy 1996 profile of him in The Columbian shows him living there. In that story, he told of proposing to his wife, Chris Love, in a canoe on Lacamas Lake.

"He was reserved and very quiet, and never said much," said Joan Collins, a Dudley neighbor in Camas.

Records show that Dudley retained his Oregon voter's registration, although there's no record he voted before the November 2004 election. He kept his car, a 1990 Mercedes, registered in Oregon until May 1996, about 18 months after he bought the Camas home.

Dudley also had his Multnomah County property tax bills sent to his Portland mailing address, rather than to the Camas house. And in 1997, he registered two jet skis with the Oregon Marine Board, listing a La Jolla, Calif., address.

Dudley's former Portland house, on Northwest Mendenhall , actually faces a private drive off of Northwest Hazeltine Street and has sweeping views of the Tualatin Valley.

One Portland neighbor, Steve Kaer, who lived across the private drive, called Dudley "a great neighbor. Friendly. Quiet. Always waved." After Dudley bought his Camas house, Kaer said, "I don't recall seeing him much after that, if at all."

To get to his house, Dudley drove past the home of next-door neighbor, George Drury, who shared the private drive. Drury also said Dudley was an ideal neighbor. "When he was not playing basketball, he was here," Drury said.

Drury said that he learned from other neighbors that Dudley had purchased a home in Camas for tax purposes. Even after that, he said, "he kept his home here." Drury said he never talked to Dudley about the Camas home.

Patrick O'Hollaren bought the other house next door to Dudley in May 1997, just as Dudley was moving out. O'Hollaren said Dudley left behind a closet full of basketball shoes -- as he remembers it, white Nikes with black stripes, size 17.

The new owners, the Corys, gave two pairs to O'Hollaren's sons, then ages 4 and 2. "They'd strap them on their feet and play with them," O'Hollaren said.

O'Hollaren, a pediatric urologist, said that in 2003 or 2004 he ran into Dudley at a benefit banquet for children and he told him the story about the shoes.

O'Hollaren said Dudley waxed about how much he loved living in his Portland home.

"He told me he loved living in that neighborhood because it was so quiet and private," O'Hollaren said. "He said it was his hideaway from everything, that he loved sitting on his deck in the evening watching the lights of the Tualatin Valley."

--Staff writer Harry Esteve and news researcher Lynne Palombo contributed to this story.