By:
Steve Lewis
November 21, 2014 // Updated: May 1, 2019
Steve Lewis served as Speaker of the Oklahoma House of Representatives from 1989-1991. He currently practices law in Tulsa and represents clients at the Capitol. You can sign up on his website to receive the Capitol Updates newsletter by email.…
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By:
Gene Perry
November 17, 2014 // Updated: May 2, 2019
About 168,000 children age 5 and younger in Oklahoma live in low-income families (making less than 200 percent of the poverty threshold, or $47,000 for a family of four). Like most families in America, the parents of these young children …
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By:
David Blatt
October 20, 2014 // Updated: May 1, 2019
Despite four years of solid economic growth, Oklahoma’s state budget has never recovered fully from the last recession. While total state appropriations are slightly above pre-downturn levels, the FY 2015 budget is $680 million, or 7.9 percent, below FY 2009…
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By:
David Blatt
October 14, 2014 // Updated: May 2, 2019
After Oklahoma voters decided twenty state questions in 2010 and 2012, including several broad and contentious issues, this November’s ballot may seem anticlimactic. Oklahoma voters will have just three state questions to decide, none of which are especially momentous. Two…
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By:
Gene Perry
October 9, 2014 // Updated: May 2, 2019
Now that same-sex marriage is legal in Oklahoma, there’s one big question on everyone’s mind: how is it going to affect state tax revenue?
Okay, maybe that’s not on everyone’s mind, but researchers at Tulane, Vanderbilt, and Western Kentucky Universities…
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By:
Gene Perry
October 1, 2014 // Updated: January 23, 2023
Almost without fail, any news story related to money for Oklahoma schools will attract commenters bitterly pointing out they thought the lottery was supposed to solve our education funding problems. So why hasn’t the lottery gotten Oklahoma out of the bottom rungs…
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By:
David Blatt
September 8, 2014 // Updated: May 1, 2019
For some 12,000 state employees, the long wait for a pay raise has finally ended. Legislation passed this last session provided selected workers a raise of 6.25 percent or more, effective July 1 (or in the case of state troopers,…
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By:
Guest
September 2, 2014 // Updated: May 1, 2019
Steve Lewis served as Speaker of the House of Representatives from 1989-1991. He currently practices law in Tulsa and represents clients at the Capitol.
A recent article by Journal Record columnist Marie Price reported on a meeting of the Oklahoma…
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By:
Guest
August 14, 2014 // Updated: May 2, 2019
Michael Leachman is the Director of State Fiscal Research with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. This post previously appeared on the Center’s Off the Charts blog.
The meaning of Standard & Poor’s recent downgrade of Kansas’ credit rating,…
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By:
David Blatt
August 13, 2014 // Updated: May 2, 2019
In 2004, Oklahoma voters approved SQ 713, which increased the excise tax on cigarettes and other tobacco products while eliminating the state and local sales tax on these products. The new revenues from the increased taxes were dedicated to a…
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