Quotes of the Day

“It’s just brutal right now trying to get people certified. They may have a degree in underwater basket-weaving, and I’m trying to get them a certificate in elementary education.”

-Newcastle Public Schools Superintendent Tony O’Brien, speaking about how Oklahoma schools are allowing increasing numbers of teachers to instruct outside their areas of expertise due to a lack of applicants for many positions (http://abcn.ws/1EoRxbB) 

“Rather than continuing to wring our hands over the weak statistics for voter engagement, we have decided to do something to make a change and hope that other community members will feel this issue is as important as we do. We hope to empower the community with the knowledge that their vote matters.”

-Mary Jane Lindaman, a facilitator of the Tulsa League of Women Voters Voting Is Power Coalition, which is planning voter registration drives and brainstorming ideas to boost voter turnout (Source).

Attention a teacher devotes to acclimating a new student takes away from instruction time for everyone. In classrooms where the population is in constant flux, this impacts the learning of all students. Yet we expect educators to produce good test results amidst what one master teacher once described to me as ‘a river of children.’

-Tulsa Attorney Mark Barcus, writing the Oklahoma needs better strategies for helping children who frequently switch schools due to unstable families or economic situations (Source).

“I’m scared of (these) budget cuts … that will affect so many people who have moved out of institutions. I’m afraid I’ll have to go back to an institution, and so will my friends. I don’t want to go backwards. I want to go forwards with good staff and agencies in place for support … so I can live on my own as a normal adult.”

Sue Shelton, an Oklahoman with a developmental disability who was among nearly 100 individuals with disabilities, their families and caregivers protesting the state’s plan to cut Medicaid reimbursements for home- and community-based developmental disability and aging services (Source).

“Most of those producers that rely on that aquifer for their livelihood, and have for generations, realize that if they want their future generations to be able to stay there, live and prosper in the panhandle, they’re going to have to manage that resource and take care of it and make sure it’s there for them 50 to 100 years from now,.”

– Oklahoma Water Resources Board Executive Director J.D. Strong, speaking about declining water levels in the state’s aquifers (Source)

“Our governor says she wants to address the issue of uninsured medical care through an ‘Oklahoma Plan.’ We’re waiting. If it is SoonerCare and Insure Oklahoma, it is not working. We continue to have over 500,000 uninsured using our emergency rooms for their primary care, and we continue to refuse $10.5 billion in our tax dollars being returned to our state.”

-Don Millican, Kaiser-Francis Oil Co. chief financial officer and OK Policy board member (Source)

“We already don’t get enough from the government to provide these services, and then we get this rate cut. I think the government is saying ‘We don’t care about the people with disabilities in our state.’ ”

– Mary Ogle, president and CEO of A New Leaf, which provides 24-hour care and vocational services for clients with developmental disabilities. DHS instituted a provider reimbursement cut for those services in order to balance the agency’s budget and cope with reduced funding provided by the Legislature (Source)

“It’s hard for me to see how this would be a sustainable lifestyle. Teachers are miracle workers, they’re willing to sacrifice to make it happen, and we do it each and every day, but, anything less than what we have right now would be great. I mean, it’s amazing how large [the classes] are.”

– Haley Sherrard, an Edmond North High School teacher, speaking to News9 regarding the state’s teaching shortage. Oklahoma’s increasing class sizes and persistently low pay are driving teachers into other states or out of the profession (Source)

“Child support is a legal and moral obligation. If the threat of arrest has been a parent’s main obstacle to meeting that obligation, then Amnesty in August is the perfect opportunity for that parent to re-engage in the support of his or her children.”

-Meg Cannon, spokeswoman for the Child Support Services division of the Oklahoma Department of Human Services, speaking about the agency’s plan to allow parents with past-due child-support payments to work out a payment plan during August without fear of arrest (Source).

“I ask, ‘Do you have a box asking if you are a convicted felon?’ Most nod yes, they probably have that. I say the minute that is checked, you are not going to hire those people. They are getting thrown out.”

-BAMA Companies CEO Paula Marshall, who is pushing Oklahoma businesses to become partners with prison reintegration and diversion programs and hire more Oklahomans with felony convictions (Source: http://bit.ly/1D8p9iM).