Last Wednesday, Chris Linder was sworn into office as mayor of Pawnee, but he may not be allowed to serve. In 2000, Linder was convicted of a felony in Arizona for his role in a drug deal and gun battle. He served five years in prison and three years of probation.

After completing his sentence two years ago, Linder moved to Pawnee with his wife. He bought a local restaurant, volunteered with the Chamber of Commerce and as a baseball coach, and joined the First Baptist Church. He was elected mayor in April, beating out the incumbent and another former mayor. The felony became public during the campaign, but a plurality of voters believed he was the right person to lead the city anyway.

What they didn’t know was that Oklahoma law prohibits anyone convicted of a felony from holding a public office for 15 years after their sentence is completed. Linder applied for a pardon after learning about the law, but Arizona turned him down. Read the rest of this entry »

In a recent article on state budget negotiations, House Speaker Kris Steele said he and other state leaders are “doing our best to minimize the cuts” to core agencies. He contrasted the treatment of core agencies to the larger cuts that would be made to other areas of government.

This is a red herring. Perhaps education will be cut 5 percent, compared to, say, a 10 percent cut to the Department of Environmental Quality. But those areas identified as core services (education, health and human services, public safety, and transportation) already make up almost 90 percent of state appropriations.

The real issue is not how the vast majority of the budget is treated compared to a few of the smallest state agencies. Speaker Steele and other lawmakers cannot claim in good faith to be protecting core services while ignoring revenue options and voting to make the problem worse. Read the rest of this entry »

From time to time, we use the OK Policy blog to post submissions we receive from Oklahomans who have interesting perspectives on important policy issues for the state. This entry is from Amy Santee, Senior Program Officer with George Kaiser Family Foundation in Tulsa. The opinions stated below are not necessarily the opinions of OK Policy, its staff, or its board. This blog is a venue to help promote the discussion of ideas from various points of view and we invite your comments and contributions. To see our guidelines for blog submissions, click here.

Currently, the State of Oklahoma incarcerates more women per capita than any other state in the nation, a rate of 134 per 100,000, compared to a national average of 69 per 100,000. Tulsa County incarcerates at an even higher rate, 169 women per 100,000.

This practice has a devastating impact on thousands of children around our state.  There are an estimated 4,500 minor children in Oklahoma with their mothers in prison.  These children are at greater risk of school failure, depression, drug and alcohol abuse. Without a successful intervention, they are likely to become the next generation of inmates at the Oklahoma Department of Corrections.  Incarcerating non-violent female offenders does not make economic sense, nor does it protect the public safety.  Is it not better public policy to provide these women with treatment and the tools to become better parents and productive citizens? Read the rest of this entry »