But none of the Legislature’s failures is more frustrating than its refusal to deal with five reasonable, criminal justice reform measures.

The bills were the latest step in the state’s efforts to bend the rising arc of incarceration. Oklahoma locks up a greater portion of its population than any state but one and a greater portion of its women than anyone. If the trend line is not brought to sustainable levels, the state’s incarceration addiction will bankrupt it.

The concept of criminal justice has been tested with the voters, who overwhelmingly approved. State Questions 780 and 781 — which started the process of reconfiguring criminal sentencing and dedicating the savings to programs to deal with underlying drug abuse and mental health problems — passed with margins of 56 percent and 58 percent in November.

With the advice of a blue ribbon task force, the governor’s office put forward an aggressive effort to follow up the two state questions and save the state $2 billion in future costs.

But one man — state Rep. Scott Biggs, R-Chickasha — abetted by Speaker of the House Charles McCall, R-Akota, effectively blocked progress on five resulting bills that were nearing the finish line at the end of the legislative session.

• Senate Bill 649 limits sentencing augmentation on nonviolent convictions because of previous nonviolent convictions;

• Senate Bill 689 gives judges more discretion to divert people from prison to treatment and supervision programs;

• House Bill 221 adjusts penalties for small theft convictions;

• House Bill 2286 establishes specialized supervision for domestic violence and sex offenders and encourages inmates to complete treatment prior to parole;

• Senate Bill 786 distirnguishes car burlaries from home burglaries for sentencing purposes.

Biggs, you might recall, was one of the lawmakers who, earlier in the session, sought to undo the progress of SQ 780 and SQ 781, under the argument that voters were too ignorant to know what they had voted for.

He also was the legislative author of November’s so-called Right to Farm Measure, which voters shot down overwhelmingly.

Biggs might be out of step with the people of Oklahoma, but he apparently has the trust of McCall, who allowed the House Criminal Justice chairman to run out the clock on the reform proposals.

Fallin publicly pleaded with McCall to reassign the bills to a more reasonable chairman’s committee, but when the session ended, nothing had happened. The bills could be be sent to the governor’s desk as soon as the Legislature returns next year, but the state will continue to bleed money into an overpacked, overexpensive prison system in the meantime.

Despite the expressed will of the people, the backing of the governor and piles of evidence to the contrary, one obstinate man was allowed to kill criminal justice reform for the year, meaning the state will continue to waste money on prisoners who could and should be diverted into programs to turn them into taxpayers instead of tax consumers.

We hope the people of Chickasha are happy with the representation they’re getting in the Oklahoma House of Representatives. We aren’t.