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In The Know is a daily synopsis of Oklahoma policy-related news and blogs. Inclusion of a story does not necessarily mean endorsement by the Oklahoma Policy Institute. You can sign up here to receive In The Know by e-mail.
State Treasurer Ken Miller said a bill being pushed by insurance companies in the Oklahoma Legislature is so bad for consumers that he would sue the state if it were ever passed. On the OK Policy Blog, a guest post from Treasurer Miller’s Oklahoma Economic Report warns against Oklahoma’s passage of repeated tax cuts without saying how they will be paid for. Appropriations and budget subcommittees in the House and Senate are meeting with agency leaders this week to find out how they would handle budget cuts ranging as high as 10 percent. Oklahoma Arts Council Director Amber Sharples said they would have to cut community arts programs in rural Oklahoma.
Fallin’s finance secretary, Preston Doerflinger, said he may have found a source of savings in agency travel costs, memberships to other organizations, and promotional and events expenses, or what his office calls “swag,” but Oklahoma Watch reported that there may not be much savings to be found from cutting those expenses. Longtime Tulsa oil leaders discussed how the oil price collapse of 2015 compares to the oil bust of 1985. Former U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn came to the state Capitol to urge lawmakers to pass a bill calling for a Constitutional Convention to change the U.S. Constitution. On the OK Policy Blog, we explained why a constitutional convention would put everything at risk with a process that cannot be controlled.
The House approved a bill allowing Oklahoma district attorneys to collect DNA samples for the state’s offender database from defendants who aren’t sentenced to prison. On the OK Policy Blog, we previously explained how indiscriminate DNA testing could lead to false convictions of innocent Oklahomans. A bill establishing a six-month mandatory minimum sentence for eluding police has been pulled back for revision after pushback against mandatory minimums. The OK Policy Blog previously examined how excessive mandatory minimums have contributed to the state’s incarceration crisis. An Oklahoma Watch investigation showed how ex-offenders face a steep price to reinstate their driver’s license, which creates a major barrier to getting a job and reintegrating with society. A professional bull riding circuit has expressed interest in bringing back Oklahoma’s prison rodeo, which has been cancelled due to budget cuts. Tulsa County and the city of Tulsa are inching closer to a deal on a new jail agreement.
The House Common Education Committee approved a bill to make permanent the changes made to the state’s third-grade reading sufficiency requirements last year. A bill in the state Senate could set up a water fight between eastern Oklahoma and the drought-stricken west. The Tulsa World spoke with teachers about how black history is being taught in Oklahoma schools today. Oklahoma Muslims and their interfaith supporters will visit the state Capitol Friday, despite a threatened protest by an anti-Muslim group.
The Number of the Day is the percentage of Tulsa County residents who claimed the Earned Income Tax Credit in 2012. In today’s Policy Note, the Washington Post examines the underrated economic benefit of parents who work less.
In The News
Oklahoma treasurer says he will sue state to protect unclaimed property beneficiaries if Legislature passes bill
Last legislative session, lawmakers withdrew a bill that could have prevented thousands of Oklahomans like Sherry Sanders from receiving millions of dollars in unclaimed life insurance benefits. State Treasurer Ken Miller said the bill was so bad for consumers that he would sue the state if it were ever passed. On Thursday, a similar piece of legislation, Senate Bill 298, authored by Sen. Marty Quinn, was approved in committee and sent to the full Senate. Miller said the bill is backed by out-of-state insurance companies who are seeking to prevail over Oklahoma citizens.
Avoid ‘naked tax cuts with none of the pay fors’
At the dawn of a new legislative session, current government expenses once again exceed expected revenues and agencies are lining up with $2 billion in additional requests. Policymakers and the public are questioning whether Oklahoma taxes too little or too much, if the state has the right mix of taxes, and what the state should or should not be incentivizing through tax policy. For years, the discussion about Oklahoma’s tax structure has focused on eliminating the income tax. Mostly ignored is how to replace the more than one-third of state revenue it generates.
Read more from the OK Policy Blog.
Oklahoma agencies return to Capitol for budget briefing
Officials from state agencies across Oklahoma are returning to the Capitol for more budget briefings after the Legislature learned the $611 million shortfall it’s dealing with is twice as large as initially projected. Appropriations and budget subcommittees in the House and Senate are meeting with agency leaders this week to find out how they would handle budget cuts ranging as high as 10 percent.
State Arts, Libraries Agencies Prepare for Further Cuts
A state House budget subcommittee asked cultural agencies Monday how they’re preparing for another year of cuts. Oklahoma Arts Council Director Amber Sharples said their first cuts would be to community arts programs. “These go very heavily to our rural communities — the festivals that take place everywhere from Claremore, Idabel, across the state,” Sharples said. “So, obviously, that would have ramifications.”
What the State Spends on Travel, Memberships and ‘Swag’
Facing a budget hole of more than $611 million, state lawmakers said they’re looking everywhere for revenue to fill that hole. On Friday, Fallin’s finance secretary, Preston Doerflinger, said he may have found a source of savings: agency travel costs, agencies’ memberships to other organizations and agency promotional and events expenses, or what his office calls “swag.”
Read more from Oklahoma Watch.
Longtime Tulsa oil leaders compare swoon of 2015 with bust of 1985
Sometimes an oil bust is like alphabet soup. Close to 30 years ago, Tulsa oilman Bob Sullivan was trying to make sense of the mid-1980s collapse with his father, Sullivan & Co. founder Robert “Spike” Sullivan. Was that downturn a “V,” with a sharp drop and equally fast rally, or a “U,” with a fall, a steady bottom and then a return? Or something else alphabetically? Spike Sullivan posed a troubling question to his son. “What if it’s an L?”
Read more from the Tulsa World.
Former Sen. Tom Coburn urges Oklahoma lawmakers to call for convention to alter U.S. Constitution
Former U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn came to the state Capitol on a mission Monday. Coburn, who left the Senate two years early and is fighting prostate cancer, wants legislators to approve a resolution to have Oklahoma participate with other states in a convention to amend the U.S. Constitution. An overly powerful federal government must be reined in, he said. Coburn, R-Muskogee, has been a foremost proponent of amending the Constitution in this way.
See also: The con-con con from the OK Policy Blog
House Approves Bill to Expand DNA Collection
The Oklahoma House has approved a bill allowing Oklahoma district attorneys to collect DNA samples for the state’s offender database from defendants who aren’t sentenced to prison. The House voted 93-3 for the measure Monday and sent it to the Senate for consideration. Defendants convicted of certain crimes are required to provide samples to the state DNA database. Most samples are taken by prison officials, leaving those convicted but sentenced to probation often omitted.
Read more from Public Radio Tulsa.
See also: Indiscriminate DNA testing could put innocent Oklahomans in prison from the OK Policy Blog.
Lawmaker makes wise decision to pull back on mandatory eluding police effort
A bill establishing a six-month mandatory minimum sentence for eluding police is back where it belongs — on the drawing board for revision, by agreement from its author, Rep. Lisa Billy, R-Lindsay.
Oklahoma already has a felony law for the same serious offense that was signed by former Gov. Frank Keating, a former prosecutor, 15 years ago. That law, setting a maximum two-year penalty and $5,000 fine, differs from Billy’s measure in one important respect: It leaves sentencing where it belongs, at the judge’s discretion.
Read more from the Tulsa World.
See also: Oklahoma’s mandatory minimum punishments too often don’t fit the crime from the OK Policy Blog
Ex-Offenders Face Steep Price to Reinstate Driver’s License
When offenders leave prison to re-enter society, one of the steepest barriers they face is finding a job. Then they encounter a second barrier: paying hundreds or thousands of dollars in fees to reinstate a driver’s license so they can look for and keep a job. State Sen. Josh Brecheen, R-Coalgate, was one of the authors of a 2013 law aimed at lowering costs to reinstate driver’s licenses. Brecheen said reinstatement costs are so high they create a barrier to an inmate reintegrating into society.
Read more from Oklahoma Watch.
Could Oklahoma’s prison rodeo return soon?
Red, white and blue paint on the back side of the state penitentiary’s walls still welcomes passers by to “the only behind the walls rodeo.” However, these days the only people who see the chain-link gate to the rodeo grounds situated between two brick guard towers are prison staff and the occasional visitors to death row immediately next door. After nearly 70 years in existence, the nation’s last remaining prison rodeo, which allowed inmates the opportunity to compete in a variety of events, closed for good in 2010. Now a professional bull riding circuit has taken interest in bringing the tradition back.
City of Tulsa, Tulsa County closer to a jail deal, officials say
Tulsa County and the city of Tulsa are inching closer to a deal on a new jail agreement, officials said Monday. “I would say we are much, much closer,” County Commissioner Ron Peters said. Peters met privately with City Manager Jim Twombly on Monday morning to try to resolve the differences that have left the parties without a jail agreement since June 30. The city and county have skirmished for decades over how much the city should be charged to hold its municipal inmates in the county jail and the definition of what constitutes a municipal inmate.
Read more from the Tulsa World.
Bill to make third-grade reading changes permanent advances in Oklahoma House
Changes made to the state’s third-grade reading sufficiency requirements last year would become permanent under a bill adopted Monday by the Oklahoma House of Representatives’ Common Education Committee. House Bill 1523, by Reps. Katie Henke, R-Tulsa, and James Leewright, R-Bristow, would eliminate the sunset date from the legislation passed in 2014 over Gov. Mary Fallin’s veto. That legislation delayed a requirement that most third-graders pass a year-end reading test to advance to fourth grade. Instead, such decisions were left to parents, teachers and administrators in consultation with each other. Without HB 1523, or something like it, the reprieve from the test-only provision expires at the end of this school year.
Read more from the Tulsa World.
Water transfer bill worries southeast Oklahoma residents
A bill in the state Senate could set up a water fight between eastern Oklahoma and the drought-stricken west. The bill would set up a task force to study the possibility of transferring surface water from parts of the state where it’s abundant to areas where it’s a scarce resource. But residents in southeast Oklahoma worry about the impact it could have on the area’s water supply and local economies.
Teachers talk about how black history is being taught in Oklahoma schools today
In Anthony Marshall’s first-hour class on Monday, students were doing research about Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois. “With whom do you agree?” the assignment on the classroom white board reads. “Who had the best plan for equality?” Marshall teaches Advanced Placement U.S. history, and he also teaches a course focused on African-American studies. He refers to it as “U.S. history from an African-American perspective.”
Read more from the Tulsa World.
Muslim group moves ahead with state Capitol event despite threatened protest
Oklahoma Muslims and their interfaith supporters will converge Friday on the state Capitol for panel discussions and sessions aimed at promoting civic engagement within the Islamic community. Anti-Muslim protesters might be in attendance as well. Adam Soltani, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations-Oklahoma Chapter, said the CAIR-OK-sponsored “Muslim Day at the Capitol” will take place despite the prospect of protesters.
Quote of the Day
“The greatest threat to public education in our state today isn’t poverty. And it’s most certainly not the federal government. The greatest threat to Oklahoma public education is the people elected to represent Oklahomans and Oklahoma’s children. They have opted for feel-good rhetoric over hard work. They’ve opted to pick winners and losers among our children instead of providing hope and support for all. They’ve taken the path of least political resistance instead of charging headstrong toward the right and noble goal of great schools for every child. Oklahomans should not stand for it.”
– Oklahoma City Public Schools Superintendent Rob Neu, urging legislators to better prioritize state support for public education (Source)
Number of the Day
19.70%
Percentage of Tulsa County residents who claimed the Earned Income Tax Credit in 2012. The average amount was $2,307
Source: Brookings.
See previous Numbers of the Day here.
Policy Note
The underrated economic benefit of parents who work less
The term “family-friendly” in American culture stirs images of Old Navy sales, theme park Groupons and child-protected basement screenings of “The Lego Movie.” The White House is striving to change that soft connotation, connecting family-friendly workplace policies to a stronger labor force and economy. It comes just in time for election rhetoric: as the Upshot’s Nate Cohn points out, “the parent agenda” appears to an emerging focus for the Democratic party.
Read more from the Washington Post.
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