Amid weeks of confusion surrounding whether State Superintendent Ryan Walters had applied for crucial federal grants, lawmakers are looking to put some guardrails on which grants Walters can refuse to apply for. A measure that passed the state’s House Friday that would do just that.
Senate Bill 36X would force the Superintendent to get permission from the Speaker of the House and Senate Pro Tem if the office wants to not apply for grants it’s received in the past.
With key funding issues on the line, like free and reduced lunches and Title I grants for economically disadvantaged kids, some lawmakers felt the need to step in. Tulsa Representative and former teacher, John Waldron, dared Republicans to vote against it and deal with the political fallout.
"I will tell you, as a Democrat, that by all means, vote against this limits bill, give him unfettered access, and we will tie vulnerable members of your caucus to his extremism and we will win at the ballot box," said Waldron. "Sure, he may have won in a statewide election, but he was the second lowest of statewide vote recipients after the governor. He’s vulnerable in districts we seek to target. So, Mr. Speaker, I leave it to you, make the political calculus."
The bill passed in the ongoing special session. It now heads to the governor’s desk, though it’s unclear whether he’ll sign it.
As the 2023 regular Legislative session was coming to an end on Friday, Gov. Kevin Stitt said he might call for another special session.
Even though there’s already an ongoing special session, Governor Stitt said he’s considering calling for another to address income and grocery tax cuts that did not get passed.
"If we have $6 billion in savings and we have $1 billion too in excess revenue above expenses, you shouldn’t just spend all that money. You should give some of that back to the taxpayer. And so, the fact that we weren’t able to get that done to me is just unbelievable," Stitt said.
At the beginning of this session, Stitt called for corporate and personal income tax cuts as well as eliminating the sales tax on groceries.
After 26 years, the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife recently announced it’s pausing its Selman Bat Watch program this summer.
Each summer, visitors could watch hundreds of thousands of Mexican free-tailed bats pour from the Selman Bat Cave to feast on insects near Woodward.
But that Oklahoma bucket list item is now on hold.
Micah Holmes is a spokesperson for the state department of wildlife.
He says wildlife officials put a pause on the outreach program due to staffing shortages and wants to review how to better serve visitors.
"I want to emphasize that the bat population is very healthy. There's nothing going on with the bats in particular. So we'll continue to do some basic habitat management on that area," said Holmes.
The bats travel as much as 1,400 miles to Oklahoma each spring to give birth to their pups in the Selman Bat Cave.
Unregistered visitors aren’t allowed on the site to prevent the habitat from being disturbed by people.
Oklahoma City continues to be one of the fastest growing cities in the country.
Census data estimates released earlier this month show nearly 695,000 people call Oklahoma City home.
That makes OKC the 20th largest city in the country after adding more than 10,000 people since the official census in 2020.
The city had the sixth-highest percentage growth of any city in the country, beating out two metros south of the Red River in Austin and Houston.
Mayor David Holt touted the new numbers on social media, pointing out that Oklahoma City’s population ranking keeps climbing. Just five years ago, it was at No. 27.
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