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With the Legislature passing a budget and adjourning for the year last Friday, Oklahoma Watch looked at how the budget cuts might affect key state services. The Oklahoma House and Senate did not receive any cutbacks in the budget that slashes funding by as much as 7.25 percent for 49 other state agencies, and the House even found a way to increase its annual budget base by $1 million. On the OK Policy Blog, Steve Lewis discusses how a lawsuit could upend the process used for the past few years to pass a state budget.
Gov. Fallin called the legislative session a success despite the revenue shortfall. The Oklahoma Department of Human Services is closing a Tulsa emergency shelter for abused and neglected kids, even though the Department is still failing to recruit enough foster homes. The Oklahoman reported that kids at a a state-run emergency shelter in Oklahoma City have been handcuffed and threatened with pepper spray and Tasers by off-duty law enforcement officers. The Muskogee Phoenix reported on how a planned pop culture museum in Tulsa is moving forward now that lawmakers have approved a $25 million bond issue for the project.
The Legislature passed a bill Friday to extend for three academic years a program that allows probationary promotions for third-grade students who read below grade level. A group is considering a legal challenge to a new law that prohibits local municipalities from preventing fracking within city limits. A backlog of Tulsa County inmates continue to wait for competency evaluations as the state’s mental health facility for people charged with crimes has no spare beds.
The Oklahoma Supreme Court dismissed an appeal of a $1 billion divorce judgment by the ex-wife of Continental Resources CEO Harold Hamm. In the face of volumes of contrary evidence, billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens claimed that Oklahoma’s increase in earthquakes isn’t due to the energy industry, just to better monitoring. The drought that has gripped much of Oklahoma before recent rains has caused millions of dollars in damage to the state’s agricultural industry, and researchers say it is a glimpse of the kinds of conditions climate change in bringing to Oklahoma.
Oklahoma City was ranked last in energy efficiency among 51 major U.S. cities, in part due to a lack of building energy code enforcement. Jenks is the fastest-growing city in Oklahoma, according to the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures. The Number of the Day is 9,572 people — the net population growth in Oklahoma City in 2014, an increase of 1.6%. In today’s Policy Note, The Week discusses two areas of America’s criminal justice system that are still tragically underfunded.
In The News
What budget drama’s end means for crucial state services
The 55th session of the Oklahoma Legislature adjourned for the year late Friday afternoon, quietly ending four months’ worth of fighting over money, morals and museums. For most of the session, a shadow hung over everything: a $611 million budget hole. Lawmakers chose to adjourn the session a week early, just days after they wrapped up work on the state’s $7.2 billion budget.
Read more from Oklahoma Watch.
With millions cut elsewhere in proposed Oklahoma budget, money is preserved for lawmakers and their staffs
Negotiators from the Oklahoma House and Senate made sure their organizations did not receive any cutbacks in a proposed 2016 budget that slashes funding by as much as 7.25 percent for 49 other state agencies. The House even found a way to increase its annual budget base by $1 million. The proposed budget calls for a $16.66 million expenditure for the House.
Lawsuit could upend budget process
An interesting sidelight to legislative action is a lawsuit filed this week by Oklahoma City attorney Jerry Fent and others challenging how the legislature the past few years has used a general appropriation bill to pass the state budget. The Fent lawsuit complains that, in moving money around to make ends meet in the same bill, legislators have included in the appropriations measure the transfer of funds from one account to another. He says this violates the limitation that the general appropriation bill “shall embrace nothing but appropriations.”
Read more from the OK Policy Blog.
Gov. Fallin calls Oklahoma legislative session a success, despite big funding shortfall
Despite a revenue shortfall that threatened to derail key state priorities, lawmakers managed to pass legislation in the just-concluded session that will help reduce prison overcrowding and make Oklahoma a healthier place. That was the assessment of Gov. Mary Fallin on Friday as she harkened back to marching orders she gave lawmakers in her state-of-the-state speech four months ago.
DHS short foster homes, despite plans to close shelter
The state is closing the emergency shelter for kids in state custody: the Laura Dester Shelter. Just last week, the director of DHS, Ed Lake, said 63 kids were staying at the shelter. Lake says closing the shelter is not about saving. He said children do better when they’re in more permanent homes, like foster homes. However, child advocates say there could be a big problem with that. A report obtained by the 2 Works for You Investigators shows DHS is failing to reach its own foster home benchmarks.
Abused, neglected children handcuffed at state-run shelter in Oklahoma City shelter
Abused and neglected children being cared for at a state-run emergency shelter in Oklahoma City have been handcuffed and threatened with pepper spray and stun weapons, The Oklahoman has learned. The Oklahoma Department of Human Services has replaced the two off-duty law enforcement officers responsible for the conduct, admitting the armed officers went too far.
Pop culture museum closer to reality
The 100,000 or so artifacts earmarked for the would-be Oklahoma Museum of Popular Culture have for several years been neatly tucked away in numerous boxes at the state’s history center in Oklahoma City. While historians pined for the day when they’d be able to show off all the films, recordings, art and other memorabilia, critics assailed the proposal as a vanity project that would never get off the ground. Now, the OKPOP museum in Tulsa has a heartbeat.
Read more from the Muskogee Phoenix.
Oklahoma Legislature passes bill extending probationary promotions for third-graders with reading difficulties
The Oklahoma Legislature passed a bill Friday to extend for three academic years a program that allows probationary promotions for third-grade students who read below grade level. Senate Bill 630 now goes to the governor. The bill would require public school students in kindergarten, first, second and third grades to take reading screening tests at both the beginning and end of each school year.
Opponents consider legal challenge to bill prohibiting local fracking regulations
The Oklahoma legislature’s passage of SB 809, a bill prohibiting cities and municipalities from regulating oil and gas wells and drilling in city limits could face a legal challenge, according to a spokeswoman with the group called Stop Fracking Payne County. It’s what Angela Spotts tells OK Energy Today in an interview after the legislature sent the bill to the Governor on Thursday.
Read more from OK Energy Today.
The majority of Oklahomans with mental illness who are in jail would be better served outside criminal justice system, state leader says
A backlog of Tulsa County inmates continue to wait for competency evaluations as law enforcement and mental health leaders discuss the best course of action to take, Oklahoma’s mental health commissioner said Friday. Commissioner Terri White, who leads the state Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services, said at the agency’s board meeting that she and Tulsa County officials are discussing how to best serve inmates in the jail who suffer from mental illnesses and substance abuse.
Billionaire oilman Harold Hamm can continue divorce appeal as Oklahoma Supreme Court rules against ex-wife
The Oklahoma Supreme Court dismissed an appeal Tuesday of a $1 billion divorce judgment by the ex-wife of Continental Resources Inc. founder and CEO Harold Hamm. The court, in a 7-2 decision, said Hamm can continue his appeal of the judgment but said Sue Ann Arnall gave up her right to appeal after depositing a $974.8 million check from Hamm in January.
T. Boone Pickens denies earthquake links to energy industry
In the face of volumes of contrary evidence, billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens said Friday that Oklahoma’s increase in earthquakes isn’t due to the energy industry, just to better monitoring. “Wastewater wells and fracking have nothing to do with — they’re not even earthquakes,” he told KFOR news anchor Kevin Ogle, who interviewed the oilman from Holdenville before a crowd of 300 guests at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in Oklahoma City.
Scientists work to help Oklahoma’s wheat industry adapt to climate change
In the four years since it began, the drought that has gripped much of Oklahoma has caused millions of dollars in damage to the state’s agricultural industry. The upside, if there is one, is that it’s also given state wheat researchers a glimpse of the kinds of conditions climate change could bring to Oklahoma. Researchers are working to develop strains of wheat that would be better able to cope with conditions that scientists predict the state could see by mid-century.
OKC ranks last among big cities for energy efficiency
Building codes and energy conservation go hand in hand, said John Semtner, director of engineering services at ADG Inc. If building energy codes aren’t enforced, however, energy efficiency can be tough to achieve. Lack of building energy code enforcement is one reason why Oklahoma City was ranked last in energy efficiency among 51 major U.S. cities, said T.O. Bowman, interim sustainability director for the city. Oklahoma City was the only Sooner State municipality listed in the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy ranking released Wednesday.
Read more from the Journal Record.
Jenks is fastest growing city in Oklahoma
Jenks is the fastest-growing city in Oklahoma, according to the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures. The Jenks population grew by 6.8 percent during the one-year period ending July 1, 2014, according to the Census Bureau’s annual city population estimates report. The city, located on the west bank of the Arkansas River in southwest Tulsa County, grew by 1,264 people to 19,951 residents during the one-year period.
Read more from the Tulsa World.
Quote of the Day
“That would be extremely disappointing to a lot of people, if we’re going to spend that money on private prison beds. (Employee) morale is in a bad place. I don’t know how it could possibly get worse.”
-Sean Wallace, executive director of Oklahoma Corrections Professionals, on news that the Oklahoma Department of Corrections has decided to spend its $14 million budget increase on sending more inmates to private prisons instead of providing the employee raises proposed in the agency’s budget request (Source)
Number of the Day
9,572 people
Net population growth in Oklahoma City in 2014, an increase of 1.6%.
Source: U.S. Census via The Washington Post
See previous Numbers of the Day here.
Policy Note
Yes, the justice system is bloated. But these 2 areas are still tragically underfunded.
At long last, almost everyone seems to agree that the criminal justice system needs to be cut. With spending over $260 billion — 3.5 times higher than the 1980 total for corrections, and 4.5 times higher for police — the system just seems like a big bloated mess. With their first glance at the system, politicians of all stripes have highlighted and underlined the same item on their agendas: Cut criminal justice spending. That’s important, but it doesn’t reckon fully with reality: Some of the gravest problems facing the justice system are areas of neglect and underfunding, not overspending.
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