Mayor G.T. Bynum and the City Council revealed a schedule for Vision Tulsa economic-development projects Wednesday with most aimed for funding in the next five years.
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The aggressive front-loading for funding in the 15-year tax, which voters approved in April, is possible through a series of bonds the city plans to issue beginning this spring.
City leaders have been planning the project scheduling around bonds for months, but Wednesday’s announcement was the first time the schedule was made official.
Scheduling projects around bonding and debt — rather than paying for them as the tax revenue comes in — also means projects will be built and benefiting Tulsa residents much sooner than a pay-as-you-go approach.
“Five years from now we will have changed the way that people use the Arkansas River in Tulsa,” Bynum said. “We will have a lake people can use for recreation. … We will be home to an Olympic sport. We will have a museum that is worthy of the greatest collection of Western art anywhere in the world. We will have changed the way that the city works with our schools. … And that’s just four or five things in a long list of literally game-changing projects.”
Bynum said many of the projects, including the Zink Dam and some related infrastructure, will not only be funded within five years but also completed.
In the first five years, 27 economic-development projects are set for $407 million in funding, according to the schedule.
Those projects include the Zink Dam, a Gilcrease Museum expansion, the Cox Business Center and Arena District master plan, Tulsa-area schools’ Safety First project, Tulsa Fairgrounds improvements, airport infrastructure, the Tulsa Zoo and Living Museum and the BMX national headquarters among others.
Several projects are scheduled for staggered funding throughout the life of the tax, including a $10 million project to improve teacher retention and recruitment, $12 million for capital equipment and citywide beautification.
The south Tulsa/Jenks dam and related amenities are scheduled for funding after the first five years. That project had long been planned to come in the latter half of Vision following completion of the Zink Dam.
The south Tulsa/Jenks Dam also awaits a partnership from funding partners, without which the funding will be reassigned.
Tulsa City Councilor Anna America, the council’s chairwoman, credited city staff — especially in the finance and engineering departments — for preparing the schedule, which included months of defining project details.
America said the early-funding approach through bonding avoided anticipated struggles from project sponsors wanting to get their funding as soon as possible in the 15-year tax.
“I think we all expected that we were going to have to sit down and … have to say, ‘Your project isn’t going to get funding until year eight. And your important project isn’t getting funded until year 10 or 12,’” America said. “We just really can’t state enough the amount of time and work that went in especially from the engineering and finance department.”
America said funding up front also avoids increasing construction costs that would be hard to predict a decade from now.
“The value of a dollar today or in two years is a lot more than that dollar will be in 10 or 15 years,” America said. “We are going to be getting these things happening faster. We’re going to generate revenue coming back in and funding other areas of the city.”
Bynum referenced the bonding approach that funded the BOK Center out of Vision 2025, the predecessor to Vision Tulsa.
“The BOK Center when it was constructed was thought to be a fairly expensive project,” Bynum said. “It was bonded up front so that it could be opened earlier than if it would have taken if we had tried to do a pay-as-you-go approach. That facility opened, and in the years since that time you’ve seen over $900 million invested in downtown Tulsa — triggered by the BOK Center.
“We believe there are projects in this program that have equal if not greater opportunity to make an impact on our city.”
