Giving voice to those who don’t have one
ach day, with little fanfare, dozens of developmentally disabled adults arrive by bus or van to their favorite place in the world, the Oklahoma Foundation for the Disabled (OKFD) campus in north-central Oklahoma City.
Founded as a nonprofit organization in 1960, OKFD is the oldest and largest provider in the region of adult day care health services for developmentally disabled adults. It truly is a place where equality, caring and compassion are on full display all the time. Clients range in age from 18 to 76, and have disabilities including autism, blindness, Down syndrome and cerebral palsy. Many are wheelchair-bound, and the vast majority require full-time oversight. While their disabilities may differ greatly, they are all treated as equals in the OKFD family.
For most people, it’s easy to feel compassion for children, homeless persons or even animals. But adults with disabilities are often forgotten. They don’t receive the attention afforded other causes, but that doesn’t stop the staff at OKFD from making sure they have the highest quality of life possible. Clients are encouraged to participate in activities like scouting, singing, exercise and field trips. OKFD focuses on building life skills, socialization, good nutrition, recreation and advancing a health and wellness agenda. For $45 a day ($5.62 per hour), clients receive up to eight hours of hands-on care including meals and transportation to and from their homes.
Without OKFD, clients and their families would lead very different lives. Most clients would be sedentary, lonely and much less healthy. Their families would incur significantly higher costs, both financially and in terms of the additional time spent caring for their loved ones. OKFD not only enriches the lives of its clients, it gives their families much-needed down time, and many of them an opportunity to earn a living wage at a paying job.
This is why the current budget shortfall facing the state is such a significant issue to many Oklahomans. While OKFD has always faced issues like unfunded care hours and shrinking government budgets, the current economy promises new challenges. To counter state cutbacks and continue to function as a vital social services resource, OKFD has aggressively sought charitable funding in the private sector.
Oklahoma has always prided itself on equality, caring and compassion, and doing the hard work to make them a reality. So as our state strives to move forward in difficult economic times, it is important to consider those citizens who cannot speak for themselves. During this National Developmental Disabilities Month, let’s pause to recognize the positive things happening at OKFD and other nonprofits that serve oft-forgotten members of our society. echnology is changing the way we do just about everything. In the search for more energy, oil companies across this country are using the latest and greatest technology to bring more crude to the surface. After years of perfecting horizontal drilling, some of these companies are on the move with a message to everyone in their sights: “Get out of our way!”
On one side of this equation are the pioneers of the Oklahoma oil industry. These companies have been a part of the Oklahoma landscape for decades. Most have a good number of oil wells and most of those wells have been drilled vertically. On the other side is what I would call Big Oil. Many of these companies are well respected, publicly traded and move expeditiously with the latest and greatest of everything. One thing is for certain — Oklahoma needs both of these players to keep our state moving forward as one of this country’s best energy states.
So what’s the problem? After all, both sides agree with the fact that long lateral lines have the potential to create additional revenue. But that seems to be where the agreement stops.
Current rules allow horizontal wells to be drilled 1 mile in all formations, except shale. These big companies want these long laterals to run longer than a mile into all geological formations. The problem is these 1-mile horizontal wells are being drilled in nonshale formations in areas where vertical producing wells already exist. In other words, the horizontal wells are exploiting what has already been found by vertical producers that risked their exploration funds to find these oil and gas reserves. These horizontal drillers are able to drill a well within 600 feet of a vertical well currently producing in the same formations. This can result
Current rules allow horizontal wells to be drilled 1 mile in all formations, except shale. These big companies want these long laterals to run longer than a mile into all geological formations. The problem is these 1-mile horizontal wells are being drilled in nonshale formations in areas where vertical producing wells already exist.
in literally taking reserves that those vertical wells would have otherwise produced.
The key to this process is unique to Oklahoma. It’s called forced pooling. No other state has a mechanism whereby a minority party has the ability to force their way into a drilling and spacing unit where such owners have already established production, pursuant to the laws of the state and the regulations of the Oklahoma Corporation Commission. The result is that these original owners who risked their money to discover oil and gas reserves now must fight desperately to keep what they have already discovered.
Many of our vertical drillers are asking legislators to provide some protection of their long-held reserves. These same owners believe horizontal drilling has been very beneficial for the state and are in favor of those who are discovering “new reserves” in previously untapped reservoirs and areas.
In the end, we must ask ourselves if we’re going to allow big companies to take something that someone else has legally discovered. If that’s the case, then we should no longer call it oil exploration. After all, it can’t be considered exploration if the vertical owner has already found it.