Sine Die

 

SINE DIE!

by Steve Fair

The 2012 Oklahoma legislative session is over.  By law, the state legislature must adjourn by 5pm on the last Friday in May.  Faced with a potential special session, lawmakers passed a $6.8 billion dollar state budget on Thursday by just one vote in the House.  The budget is $300 million more than the previous year’s budget.  Here are some of the highlights of the 2012 session:

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The Governor signed a bill that will add forty additional Oklahoma State Troopers across the state.  Lawmakers also passed a bill adding a trooper academy.  That is a plus. This is a core service that has been neglected for years.  

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The legislature passed and the Governor signed a bill that allows Oklahoma citizens to openly carry firearms effective November 1st.  The bill permits those who are licensed, or already have been licensed, to carry a firearm under the Oklahoma Self Defense Act to openly carry a weapon or conceal it.  It also allows property owners to openly carry a firearm on their property without a concealed carry permit for the purpose of self defense.  There were also other victories for 2^nd amendment advocates this session.

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The legislature passed a Joint Resolution that will send to a vote of the people a constitutional amendment change which would exempt intangible property from taxation.  Intangible property tax is also known as personal property tax.  Oklahoma is one of only ten states that still tax personal property. 

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Lawmakers also passed a bill that is supposed to save Oklahoma taxpayers about 30 million annually.  The program directs all state agencies and higher education institutions to achieve an energy efficiency and conservation improvement target of at least 20 percent by the year 2020. Improvement is based upon benchmark prior to implementation of program. Upon implementation, all agencies are required to input historical utility cost into approved software on a monthly basis.  In other words, taxpayer owned buildings will have to watch their utility bills just like taxpayers do at their homes and businesses. 

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Legislators passed a bill that will require those applying for welfare benefits to be subject to random drug testing.  They also passed bills that penalized those who get unemployment benefits through fraud. 

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The legislature continued their ten year funding plan to repair and build more roads and bridges after years of neglect. 

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Lawmakers set up a plan to sell excess state government buildings and use the proceeds to fix up the ones that are being used without going into debt.  That makes sense and will long term save taxpayers millions.

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Because the legislature passed HJR #1092, voters in November will get to decide if they want to eliminate the DHS Commission and allow the Governor to oversee the huge state agency.  With all the problems DHS has experienced in the recent past, this seems like a good idea.  The buck has to stop somewhere and having unelected people oversee the agency has certainly not worked well. 

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Some of the disappointments from this year’s session were:

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There will be no elimination or reduction of the state income tax.  After discussion of completely eliminating the state income tax, critics of the plan wanted specific cuts to state agencies to be identified at the same rate the revenue was going down.  When no agreement could be reached on that proposal, the legislature and the Governor attempted to agree on reducing the income tax rate.  Hopefully next session will produce a plan that will reduce the tax burden on Oklahomans and streamline state government at the same time.

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Proposals to eliminate tax credits were not reached.  Both chambers passed bills, but no agreement could be reached on which credits should be eliminated. 

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A proposal to give the State Auditor and Inspector the authority to perform performance audits on state agencies failed to come to a vote in either chamber.  This legislation is necessary and fundamental to Oklahoma’s ‘streamlining government’ initiative.  Until legislators recognize where waste exists, it will be next to impossible to intelligently eliminate it. 

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A bill to raise the age by just three months when a child starts kindergarten failed to get a hearing in either chamber, even though it was overwhelmingly supported by kindergarten teachers across the state. 

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There were other disappointments including no agreement to fund needed repairs to the State Capitol.  Those who have visited the Capitol know the facility needs work, but with a record amount of funds going into the rainy day fund, perhaps funds can be taken from it.

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Thankfully no ‘bond issues’ were passed- either for the Capitol, the Pops museum in Tulsa or the Indian Cultural Center in Oklahoma City.  Lawmakers rightly chose to not borrow money for those projects.

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Oklahoma’s Republican led ‘part time’ legislature deserves a great deal of credit this session for living within their means.  Their fiscal responsible actions send a message that Oklahoma is open for business.