This afternoon at 3:00 marked the first meeting of Governor Henry’s coordinating council to oversee the use of the federal stimulus money available to Oklahoma through ARRA. All of the members of the council were in attendance for this inaugural meeting. Susan Savage will serve as the lead contact for the council. Scott Meachem will work on all aspects of the stimulus package as they relate to the state budget and will work on a daily basis to coordinate with the legislature. Steve Burrage will be the “monitoring guru”.

Governor Henry stated that the goal of the council is to make sure Oklahoma doesn’t fall into any traps and that we get the full benefit of the stimulus funds. He stressed that, although openness and accountability is a key goal of this process, it goes beyond that. The other stated goal is to identify all opportunities where Oklahoma can benefit from the stimulus package.
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We are very pleased to learn that Governor Henry has announced the creation of a coordinating council to help oversee use of federal stimulus funds. OK Policy was out front in calling for such an entity to allow for input and transparency in the distribution of funds from the massive American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The Governor previously designated the State Auditor to lead the effort to ensure oversight of stimulus funds and launched a state website at http://www.ok.gov/recovery/ to provide publicly-accessible information on the various funding streams contained in the stimulus package. Given the unprecedented magnitude and critical importance of the stimulus bill, the coordinating council is another important component of the effort to develop public confidence that funds are being spent efficiently and honestly.

The coordinating council is set to hold its first meeting on Friday, March 13th at 3:00 p.m. in the Governor’s large conference room at the Capitol.

UPDATE: Here’s the Governor’s Executive Order creating the Coordinating Council