OKPOP, levees among Tulsa earmarks from 2024 legislative session

Levees, pop culture, health care, judges and the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System are among items earmarked for Tulsa in legislation approved during the legislative session that concluded Thursday.

Much of the related legislation is still subject to Gov. Kevin Stitt’s approval, but the governor did sign off Friday on $50 million for the Tulsa area’s levee system.

Other items of local interest include authorization to spend a previously appropriated $18 million for the long-delayed Oklahoma Museum of Popular Culture — provided another $18 million is raised in the next 18 months. Another measure infuses $30 million into a planned expansion and renovation of downtown’s Oklahoma State University Medical Center, estimated to cost $170 million.

Senate Bill 1429 reorganizes the state’s involvement in MKARNS capital improvements, and SB 1173 authorizes two new special judge positions for Tulsa County District Court.

More broadly, the success or failure of the session largely depends on perspective.

Senate President Pro Tem Greg Treat, R-Oklahoma City, deemed it a rousing success. House Speaker Charles McCall, widely seen as a possible 2026 gubernatorial candidate, deemed it less so because the Senate refused to consider an income tax cut on top of a $418 million sales tax reduction.

Private schools and their patrons, law officers, chicken farmers, and construction contractors of all types probably are on the plus side.

Public school employees, students and parents, LGBTQ individuals and supporters, American Indians, immigrants, marginal voters, northeastern Oklahomans concerned about water quality and people trying to get state questions on the ballot might feel otherwise.

Here’s a brief look at some of the issues touched on during the session.

Public safety: Law enforcement may not have gotten everything it wanted, but it got quite a bit.

Law officers talked lawmakers into overriding Stitt’s veto of a measure raising their state pension benefits, saying that would improve recruitment and retention.

In addition, the Legislature committed $18 million to subsidize county sheriff offices in the form of grants. The grants cannot be used for salaries, but proponents said that is likely to be one result as operating funds are freed up.

The same bill also raises sheriffs’ minimum salary from $19,000 to $44,000.

In practice, the lowest-paid county sheriffs are paid around $30,000 a year, lawmakers said. That low ceiling makes finding people willing to take the job difficult, and hiring deputies and other department employees even harder.

The Legislature also authorized allocations from the Legacy Capital Fund of $74 million for a new Department of Public Safety training facility and $27.5 million for a new Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation headquarters.

Allocations from the LCF are essentially no-interest intragovernmental loans the agencies are expected to repay.

Public education: For the most part, common education is in for more administrative work and not much additional money for the state system’s 700,000 students.

The $3.86 billion appropriation fiscal year 2025 is $108 million less than for FY ‘24, which ends on June 30, but that figure is somewhat misleading because the FY ‘24 total included $160 million in one-time expenditures. So there is a small increase for regular operations — but it is expected to be largely absorbed by higher costs, soaring property insurance among them.

Common education revenue is also affected by local property and motor vehicle taxes, and by direct apportionments to the so-called 1017 fund from income, sales, and oil and gas taxes.

Administrators and teachers have new marching orders for reading instruction and will be incorporating new graduation requirements. Missing class time will be easier for students because of several new laws, including one that allows them to miss up to three classes a week for off-campus religious and moral instruction.

Public school advocates, though, may be most upset by what didn’t happen: meaningful restraints on state Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters and the state board of education.

After much fuming and fussing, legislative leadership shut down attempts from both Democrats and Republicans to rein in Walters, the board, and their controversial policies.

Private education: Lawmakers smoothed the process for utilizing the state tuition assistance program as payments to private schools are expected to rise $50 million as the result of legislation passed in 2023.

Eligibility for the Lindsay Nicole Henry scholarship program was also expanded.

Taxes: Treat and the Senate tout the 4.5% state grocery sales tax’s elimination as the largest tax cut in state history — an estimated $418 million in its first full year.

The cut becomes effective 90 days after Thursday’s final adjournment, which would be Aug. 28.

McCall and Stitt, who along with some influential pressure groups want to eliminate the state income tax altogether, pushed for an immediate rate reduction and a long-term glide path to zero.

The Senate, citing revenue projections and not-so-distant history, refused to budge.

Transportation: Besides its usual appropriations and direct apportionments, the Legislature authorized a $500 million bond issue for the Oklahoma Department of Transportation.

The money is expected to be used primarily for widening Interstate 35 in southern Oklahoma and to replace the 80-year-old Roosevelt Bridge spanning the Washita River arm of Lake Texhoma between Kingston and Durant.

LGBTQ: After banning trans women from participating in women’s sports last year, the Legislature passed and Stitt signed the Women’s Bill of Rights, which basically says trans women don’t exist as far as the state of Oklahoma is concerned.

Immigration: Undocumented residents can be fined, jailed and ordered out of the state under legislation passed this year after Texas pass a similar but more draconian law.

Local law enforcement is not crazy about the law because they fear it will actually make policing more difficult, but Attorney General Gentner Drummond endorsed it as a weapon against low-level foreign drug operatives.

Chicken waste: Lawmakers passed and sent to Stitt on the final day of the session legislation insulating confined chicken-growing operations from most lawsuits related to water pollution from waste.

The measure is of particular interest to northeast Oklahoma, including Tulsa, because of dependence on surface water.

Tribal tags: Among the things the Legislature didn’t do was pass another extension of the Cherokee vehicle registration compact.

The compact is due to expire at the end of this year unless an agreement with Stitt is reached. Without a compact, the Cherokees can still sell its citizens car tags, but only to those living within the reservation boundaries and the state getting a cut.

Stitt has been trying to cajole tribes into signing tag compacts with the state but doesn’t have much leverage under current federal law and legal precedent.

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