Even as the economy recovers, it’s become increasingly apparent that there is no end in sight to Oklahoma’s budget woes. Oklahoma has seen three straight years of budget cuts, and according to one House leader, we may be in for a fourth. At best, this year’s budget will stay flat, which means we can accomplish less due to inflation, reductions in federal assistance, and continued deterioration of equipment and infrastructure that we can’t afford to fix. It also means the damage caused by previous cuts will continue unchecked.

We provided overviews on previous rounds of budget cuts here, here, and here. This is an update on a few more of the ways we’re falling behind in public safety, child welfare, education, health, and other areas:

Public Safety

• The number of state troopers on Oklahoma highways is at its lowest level in 22 years. Without funds to train new troopers, the problem is likely to get worse because more than 1/4th of existing troopers are already eligible for retirement.
• The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation has frozen hiring with 35 vacant jobs, and Director Stan Florence said further cuts would lead to furloughs. Inadequate staff has forced the agency to reduce investigations of the theft of equipment from oil and gas fields and curtail other investigative work. Read the rest of this entry »

For the second time in less than a month, the Governor and legislative leaders have announced an agreement on how to address the huge shortfalls in this year’s budget caused by declining revenue collections. This second agreement is not much different than the initial January agreement: monthly across-the-board cuts of ten percent of allocations from the General Revenue Fund will continue for the rest of the year, with the extent of cuts to some agencies mitigated by additional funds. This “addendum” to the January deal involves two main components: Read the rest of this entry »

The initial reports on the agreement for the Fy ’10 budget reached on Friday between legislative leaders and the Governor were positive - due to the availability of over $600 million in federal stimulus dollars, key education, health care, and public safety agencies received flat funding or increases to cover mandatory costs without recourse to the Rainy Day Fund or tax increases. While most agencies were hit with budget cuts of 7 percent, news articles and editorials expressed confidence that agencies would be able to absorb these funding reductions without having to implement layoffs or furloughs.

Quickly enough, the picture has begun to darken. Today brings the first reports of agencies considering furloughs, with the Department of Public Safety, which is facing a budget cut of $6.3 million, announcing it is looking at imposing a six day furlough for its staff of 800 state troopers in an effort to save $1.8 million. The Department would also eliminate its annual trooper academy and leave vacancies unfilled.
According to DPS Commissioner Kevin Ward:

“Our concern is with the smaller academy this year not filling all the slots that are going to come open through attrition and no academy next year, we’re kind of getting into a decline in personnel out there,” he said.

“As people quit, like driver’s license examiners, we’re not going to be able to replace them and so some of our areas in which lines are long now, they could get longer.”

Read the rest of this entry »