Budget woes overshadowed state’s political landscape in 2016
Ted Cruz won Oklahoma’s Republican presidential primary, but Donald Trump was the big political story this year as excitement generated by his visits to State Fair Park and the Cox Convention Center proved a harbinger of the enthusiasm that would sweep him to victory on Election Day.
Trump’s choice of Attorney General Scott Pruitt to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, which Pruitt has sued and sharply criticized, also was big news.
The legislative session was dominated by a $1.3 billion budget hole amid a revenue failure that led to across-the-board cuts, including to agencies providing key public services like common education, public safety and mental health.
Oklahoma leaders were able to withdraw money from the state’s emergency reserve fund to restore some of those cuts, but most agencies continue to have a bigger workload and fewer resources than they have had in years.
Public education has been the squeaky wheel at the Capitol, with teachers and parents making inperson visits to lawmakers to demand teacher raises.
Gov. Mary Fallin had a plan to bring in new, continuing revenue to meet this demand, but her requests for a tobacco tax and a broadened sales tax did not meet with legislative approval. She is expected to renew those requests when the new legislative session begins in February.
She also wanted lawmakers to look at consolidation of administrative functions in certain school districts, but that also went nowhere amid complaints from educators and parents.
Meantime, University of Oklahoma President David Boren hatched his own plan for a teacher pay raise through a state sales tax increase of one penny per dollar. The campaign collected more than enough signatures to qualify the measure for the general election ballot, but it failed at the polls.
Although voters rejected the tax hike, they approved a state question allowing the sale of wine and strong beer in grocery and convenience stores. They rejected a “Right to Farm” measure that sought to provide constitutional protection for the agricultural industry.
Voters supported two ballot measures to reduce the penalty for some nonviolent crimes and to redirect the money to treatment programs aimed at reducing recidivism.
The measures were intended to cut back eventually on the state’s high incarceration rate, which results in overflowing prisons.
Fallin named Joe Allbaugh director of the Corrections Department, and it’s his job to manage those prisons.
He took over an agency with historic budget problems, deteriorating facilities and swirling controversy over its execution system. Problems with some executions prompted a review and nobody has been executed since January 2015.