Quotes of the Day

“If we only have to close those five we would consider that lucky.”

-Ken Jones, director of Aging Services for the Association of South Central Oklahoma Governments (ASCOG), who said state budget cuts are expected to force the closure of senior nutrition sites in Cache, Lawton, Geronimo, Wayne and Walters (Source).

“We do know that some school districts are going to have a very difficult time remaining open.”

– State Superintendent of Schools Joy Hofmeister, announcing $47 million in midyear cuts to Oklahoma school districts as a result of the state’s revenue failure (Source)

“We don’t write a lot of those tickets anyway because we know they can’t pay it. We want them to get off the median so that they’re not out there causing accidents and becoming parts of accidents.”

– Maj. Dexter Nelson of the Oklahoma City Police Department, on the city’s anti-panhandling ordinance. Nelson says that police are distributing informational sheets on the ordinance in lieu of writing tickets for the first 30 days the law is in effect (Source).

“There are already harsh penalties for those who don’t meet the work requirements. You’re risking taking a family that’s already facing real hardship and making it even harder for them to dig out.”

-OK Policy Executive Director David Blatt, speaking about a proposed bill by state Sen. Roger Thompson that would revoke Temporary Assistance for Needy Families benefits if recipients quit their jobs (Source).

“I believe that according to statutes we have an obligation to audit them. Because he got his feelings hurt over a comment in a newspaper article does not provide an excuse over him being audited.”

-State Auditor Gary Jones, speaking about Attorney General Scott Pruitt’s attempt to contract with a private auditor rather than being audited by the state. Jones had previously questioned the attorney general’s office for adding dozens of employees and moving into higher-priced office space in a time of state cutbacks (Source).

“We are very concerned we don’t have seismologists we can consult.”

-Oklahoma Corporation Commission spokesman Matt Skinner, expressing concerns about Oklahoma’s lack of a replacement for former state seismologist Austin Holland as the state prepares a case against Sandridge Energy, which has refused to shut down six wells linked to earthquakes (Source).

“It becomes really tough now because we’ve already made all of the cuts we thought were out there, the ones that were clear to us and we do not feel comfortable enlarging our class sizes any more than we already got them.”

– Muskogee Public Schools Superintendent Mike Garde on the budget cuts school officials have been warned they will have to make due to the revenue shortfall (Source)

“The only responsible path forward is to put new recurring revenue on the table and to reassess tax cuts and tax breaks that are becoming more unaffordable every day.”

– David Blatt, Executive Director of Oklahoma Policy Institute, on the state’s $900.8 million budget hole going into FY2017 (Source)

“The most frightening element of the education statistics is that the period since 2008 included a national recession and an Oklahoma boom, driven by record high petroleum prices. Rather than turning that gusher to education or saving it for the future, the Legislature cut taxes, ensuring fewer resources for critical state services, especially public schools. With Tuesday’s announcement that crashing oil prices have brought a state budget faillure, there’s no reason for optimism that the state’s education funding failure will soon improve.”

-Tulsa World Editorial Board, discussing why Oklahoma leads the nation for cuts to education funding (Source)

“We have, I believe, a moral obligation to make sure we do what we can to spend our money wisely from a government standpoint, and so when we’re doing all this retraction of dollars, it does make it difficult because you don’t want to lose sight of the person at the end of the number. There is an individual there who is desperately needing help … and we want to help them.”

-Oklahoma Health Care Authority CEO Nico Gomez, who said his agency has had to make cuts that could put health care providers out of business and threaten access for Soonercare patients just to stay at a flat budget request for next year (Source)