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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.
Today you should know that Gov. Fallin has asked the new Department of Corrections director to evaluate a corrections reform law that many believe has not been funded adequately. Rep. Jason Nelson filed legislation that would allow parents who are in crisis to find a foster home for their children without the involvement of the Department of Human Services. Sen. Patrick Anderson, R-Enid, is hosting a hearing to discuss scientific evidence about medical marijuana.
Oklahoma educators are decrying a change that will treat students who enrolled as much as six weeks into the school year as full-year students for accountability purposes. This Land Press contrasted the millions Oklahoma spends on college football programs with the state’s lack of support for helping children learn to read.
Bankruptcy filings continued to decline in northeastern Oklahoma in 2013, reflecting a national trend. Oklahoma issued a record number of handgun permits in 2013. The Number of the Day is how many female students in Oklahoma who took the AP Computer Science exam in 2013. In today’s Policy Note, the New York Times examines how an experiment at providing a universal basic income to Cherokees in North Carolina resulted in a dramatic decrease in substance abuse and mental health problems and an improvement in parenting quality.
In The News
Fallin asks for review of Oklahoma corrections reform law
Gov. Mary Fallin has asked the new Department of Corrections director to evaluate a public safety law that many believe has not been funded adequately, she said Monday. On Friday, the Board of Corrections tapped Robert C. Patton to replace Justin Jones, who resigned last year from an agency that is plagued with crowded prisons, poor staffing and low morale. Patton is coming from the Arizona Department of Corrections, where he was the division director of operations.
Read more from the Tulsa World.
Proposal would take DHS out of foster care in some cases
Legislation unveiled would empower parents who are in crisis to find a home for their children without the involvement of the Department of Human Services, according to the bill’s author. House Bill 2536, by state Rep. Jason Nelson, would create a legal power of attorney for parents to use when placing their children with a host family. The legislation also modifies existing child placing licensure laws to ensure that the laws don’t frustrate or prohibit the work of private groups and host families who are caring for the child of a parent in crisis.
Read more from Public Radio Tulsa.
A medical look at marijuana
Cannabis, marijuana, weed, pot — call it what you may, but the image it brings to mind is people puffing a joint and getting high. Oklahoma legislators will get a different look during a Feb. 12 hearing to discuss scientific evidence about the medical use of cannabis extracts, and listen to families who wish it could be obtained in Oklahoma. Expected to speak at the hearing are Jennifer Walters, president of the Epilepsy Association of Oklahoma; Martin Piel, a Perry resident whose granddaughter, Zoey Johnson, has a catastrophic and rare form of childhood epilepsy called Dravet syndrome; and Derek Mann, a pancreatic cancer survivor who has listened to other cancer patients talk about the benefit they got from using cannabis.
Read more from the Enid News & Eagle.
Oklahoma educators decry change in student categorization
Due to a change in how the state categorizes students, Oklahoma public schoolteachers will now be accountable for the test scores of students who may have missed as much as the first six weeks of school, officials say. In previous years, students who were not enrolled in the first 10 days of school were considered nonfull academic year, or NFAY. This year, students will be considered NFAY if they hadn’t enrolled by Oct. 1, the date the state uses to determine the student count or membership.
Read more from the Tulsa World.
Reading, writing, touchdowns
Two realities collided recently in the national headlines, and it has Oklahoma written all over it. Last week, CNN and ESPN offered continued coverage on the reading specialist and whistleblower at the University of North Carolina claiming 10 percent of UNC football and basketball players read below a third-grade level. Specifically, Mary Willingham has stated her research of 183 UNC athletes between 2004 to 2012 found 60 percent reading at fourth- to eighth-grade levels and roughly 10 percent below third-grade levels. She also said she assisted an athlete who could not read or write.
Read more from This Land Press.
Bankruptcy filings decline in Northeastern Oklahoma
Bankruptcy filings continued to decline in northeastern Oklahoma in 2013, reflecting a national trend. The number of cases in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Tulsa was down for the third consecutive year, according to statistics posted on the court’s website. The total number of new bankruptcy cases filed in the Tulsa-based Northern District of Oklahoma was 3,016, down from 3,417 in 2012, and 3,711 in 2011 after reaching 4,406 in 2010.
Read more from the Tulsa World.
Oklahoma issues record number of handgun permits in 2013
More Oklahomans than ever are exercising their right to legally carry a gun. The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation issued more than 60,000 handgun licenses to Oklahoma residents last year — a 50 percent increase compared to 2012 and more than double the number reported in 2011. Publicity after the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in late 2012 may have contributed to the increase, firearms industry experts say.
Quote of the Day
Now we must develop progress, or rather, a program—and I can’t stay on this long—that will drive the nation to a guaranteed annual income. Now, early in the century this proposal would have been greeted with ridicule and denunciation as destructive of initiative and responsibility. At that time economic status was considered the measure of the individual’s abilities and talents. And in the thinking of that day, the absence of worldly goods indicated a want of industrious habits and moral fiber. We’ve come a long way in our understanding of human motivation and of the blind operation of our economic system. Now we realize that dislocations in the market operation of our economy and the prevalence of discrimination thrust people into idleness and bind them in constant or frequent unemployment against their will. The poor are less often dismissed, I hope, from our conscience today by being branded as inferior and incompetent. We also know that no matter how dynamically the economy develops and expands, it does not eliminate all poverty.
-Martin Luther King, Jr., speaking in 1967 (Source: http://stanford.io/1cQ7zMw)
Number of the Day
30
Number of female students in Oklahoma who took the AP Computer Science exam in 2013, compared to 144 male students.
Source: College Board
See previous Numbers of the Day here.
Policy Note
What happens when the poor receive a stipend?
Growing up poor has long been associated with reduced educational attainment and lower lifetime earnings. Some evidence also suggests a higher risk of depression, substance abuse and other diseases in adulthood. Even for those who manage to overcome humble beginnings, early-life poverty may leave a lasting mark, accelerating aging and increasing the risk of degenerative disease in adulthood. So when, in 1996, the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina’s Great Smoky Mountains opened a casino, Jane Costello, an epidemiologist at Duke University Medical School, saw an opportunity.
Read more from The New York Times.
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